Dear Santa

Dear Santa,
It is that time of the year again, and I know that your inbox is overflowing with mail and requests for presents from people all over the world. It seems that people are capable of asking, but not of giving these days. What happened to the idea of collective responsibility? Many Christmas stories, poems and plays discuss the origin of you and the idea of gift giving, but I think that your costume gives a clue to the real reason. Your suit of "red" clothing represents radical change and revolution against the power paradigm, not a revolution of violence, but one predicated on Love of our fellow human being. This is the basis of collective responsibility and sharing amongst humanity.


This has a direct connection to many life philosophies around the world including Christianity, where the idea of charity towards others is not an option but a duty. Somehow this idea has been corrupted and commodified by crony capitalism, where greed and self interest are the only responsibilities espoused. Our world is clearly on the edge of the abyss and it is alarming that those who should be concerned act as if there is nothing wrong and we will continue on without any consequences.




War has become the first resort in the 21st century and not the last, with children being the victims most affected by it, as they are the ones who are killed by bombs dropped and missiles fired by our forces in this endless war of empire. We have created many euphemisms for it, "collateral damage," is the one most used to give cover to this practice. This has a tragic touch of irony as children are the people automatically associated with you and Christmas. So we have young Americans, who not too many years ago, were making up lists to send to you, and are now active participants in a war that causes the deaths of other children. This war that has no end, is described as "fighting for our freedoms, bringing liberty and democracy and protecting the US." But how can the death of children anywhere be an act of fighting for our freedoms here at home, bringing liberty or even protecting the US? With each child's death, a little of our freedom dies; with each child's death, the idea of liberty dies a little; and with each child's death, we become less and less secure at home.


So Santa my gift list is short, with only one thing listed on it, that is please stop the war and the killing of children, everywhere and of every color, nationality and creed. Because if this killing is stopped, we will have peace in our time, and have time to reflect on where we are at, what has to be done to save our world and to make it a better place.


Sincerely yours,

Pat Saunders

Why the Obama Tax Deal Confirms the Republican Worldview

Robert Reich

Fmr. Secretary of Labor; Professor at Berkeley; Author, Aftershock: 'The Next Economy and America's

Apart from its extraordinary cost and regressive tilt, the tax deal negotiated between the president and the Republicans has another fatal flaw.

It confirms the Republican worldview.

Americans want to know what happened to the economy and how to fix it. At least Republicans have a story -- the same one they've been flogging for thirty years. The bad economy is big government's fault and the solution is to shrink government.

Here's the real story. For three decades, an increasing share of the benefits of economic growth have gone to the top 1 percent. Thirty years ago, the top got 9 percent of total income. Now they take in almost a quarter. Meanwhile, the earnings of the typical worker have barely budged.

The vast middle class no longer has the purchasing power to keep the economy going. (The rich spend a much lower portion of their incomes.) The crisis was averted before now only because middle-class families found ways to keep spending more than they took in -- by women going into paid work, by working longer hours, and finally by using their homes as collateral to borrow. But when the housing bubble burst, the game was up.

The solution is to reorganize the economy so the benefits of growth are more widely shared. Exempt the first $20,000 of income from payroll taxes, and apply payroll taxes to incomes over $250,000. Extend Medicare to all. Extend the Earned Income Tax Credit all the way up through families earning $50,000. Make higher education free to families that now can't afford it. Rehire teachers. Repair and rebuild our infrastructure. Create a new WPA to put the unemployed back to work.

Pay for this by raising marginal income taxes on millionaires (under Eisenhower, the highest marginal rate was 91 percent, and the economy flourished). A millionaire marginal tax of 70 percent would eliminate the nation's future budget deficit. In addition, impose a small tax on all financial transactions (even a tiny one -- one half of one percent -- would bring in $200 billion a year, enough to rehire every teacher who's been laid off as well as provide universal preschool for all toddlers). Promote unions for low-wage workers.
But here's the obstacle. As income and wealth have risen to the top, so has political power. Money is being used to bribe politicians and fill the airwaves with misleading ads that block all of this.

The midterm elections offered dramatic evidence. NBC news reported shortly after Election Day, for example, that Crossroads GPS, one of the biggest Republican secret-money organizations, got "a substantial portion" of its loot from a group of extremely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund and private equity managers. Why would they sink so much money into the midterms? Because they've been so strongly opposed to a proposal by congressional Democrats to treat the earnings of hedge fund and private equity managers as ordinary income rather than capital gains (subject to only a 15 percent rate).

In other words, the problem isn't big government. It's power and privilege at the top.

So another part of the solution is to limit the impact of big money on politics. This requires, for example, publicly-financed campaigns, disclosure of all sources of political spending, and resurrection of the fairness doctrine for broadcasters.

It's the same power and privilege that got the Bush tax cuts in the first place, and claimed the lion's share of its benefits. The same power and privilege that got the estate tax phased out.

Get it? By agreeing to another round of massive tax cuts for the wealthy, the president confirms the Republican story. Cutting taxes on the rich while freezing discretionary spending (which he's also agreed to do) affirms that the underlying problem is big government, and the solution is to shrink government and expect the extra wealth at the top to trickle down to everyone else.

Obama's new tax compromise is not only bad economics; it's also disastrous from the standpoint of educating the public about what has happened and what needs to happen in the future. It reinforces the Republican story and makes mincemeat out of the truthful one Democrats should be telling.

Robert Reich is the author of Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future, now in bookstores. This post originally appeared at RobertReich.org.

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Disposability

The politics of “disposability” are in vogue in 2010. What is “disposability?” It is the idea that large segments of our population are in fact, disposable. These segments are the poor, the unemployed and those who have been marginalized for reasons of not conforming to the mainstream idea of acceptability; white, affluent and Christian-right wing. The top .05% has poured millions and millions of dollars into the electoral process in 2010, thanks to the Supreme Court who equated money with political speech earlier this year. This has funded the “citizen movements” like the Tea Party and other groups who from their platform want to turn back the clock in the US to the late 19^th century before Teddy Roosevelt busted up the trusts or the monopolies that controlled the US, lock, stock and barrel.

The new Trusts of the 21^st century are the Koch Brothers, Richard Scaife, Rupert Murdoch and others who want to undo what is left of the framework of a society that cares about all of its citizens, not just those at the top of the pile. Their tool to perform this task is the Republican Party, which is heavily ladened with irony as it was the same party under the leadership of Teddy Roosevelt who broke up the trusts of the 19^th century. What we are looking at is the destruction of civilization as we know it, local schools will be stripped of all revenue from the state and federal government, and programs will be funded by people at the local level; highway construction programs will be curtailed to basic maintenance; the cost of higher education will skyrocket driving a bachelors degree to the range of $100,000 for students and parents; and the idea of our children living better than the preceding generation will be gone forever. Those who hunger for the good old days of 19^th century America, and the spirit of entrepreneurship of that era, forget that for most of the folks in that time, times were very, very bad.

While there was economic expansion going on by the captains of industry, at the same time there was widespread exploitation of men, women and children workers by these same captains of industry. Industry was not regulated at all; as a result it was a dangerous place for those worked there for little or nothing. While they talk about the millions of jobs that will result from turning back the clock to those dark times, will there in fact be any jobs created by these policies? Those who control 70% of the wealth, the top 5% will have little incentive to invest their riches when there are no taxes at home for them to offset. Besides, the super profits from outsourcing our jobs to poor countries will continue to outweigh any tax cuts or even the elimination of taxes at home.

The paradox presented by this election, is that millions of folks who will be desperately impacted by these changes will be voting for the candidates of the super rich in the ill conceived perception that they are working for them. This is a pattern that has been repeated many times in the last 40 years, and the difference now is that we as a nation are on the last step of the plan to reverse the direction of our nation back to the future, the 19^th century future. So all of those elderly citizens who are dependent on keystones of a benevolent society, i.e., Medicare, Social Security; will wake up to find that they and these programs are now “disposable.”  The 50% of school age children who depend on subsidized school lunch programs will also find that these programs are “disposable.” The millions who are dependent on some kind of assistance will find that these programs are “disposable.”  

How do you tell who is disposable in the new economy and who is not? It is not hard, if you are not employed, too old, too young, not able to buy your own healthcare (after healthcare reform is repealed), attend college on your own-no subsidized loans or financial aid and do not look like the founders of this country-white; you are disposable. Although, the elites will always need the poor to fight their wars, so the military will always be needed to fight for the “freedom” of mega corporations to exploit and steal resources of poorer nations. “Disposability,” the ultimate elevation of the commodification of a society who worships money and the things it can buy.

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Inducing Panic

Inducing Panic

How do you induce panic?

Can you do it with words?

Can you do it with acts?

The spoken word can panic

It can be taken out of context

It can be taken literally

An act can panic

It can mean one thing

But taken another

What else can induce panic?

A society that pushes fear

Is it guilty of inducing panic?

Incorrigible

Disclosure:
These poems are based on observations by the poet. 
The subject of this poem was being sent to the Ohio Department of Corrections.

Incorrigible
He told them to take their rules and shove them..

For it was too late to start obeying them now

He was past the point of no return

He was heading south, to criminal grad school

A three year assistantship on the state

To get that PhD in Criminal Justice from the inside

He acted out, yelled, cussed and ridiculed the power

Any chance he got, yelling and talking all night long

Lecturing to his audience in the pod from behind his cell door

While screaming at the Turn Keys, he was at home

With his homeboys, the other felons

Playing cards during his one hour out and the other 23 in

He was home and happy with the other prisoners

Was he incorrigible, or at home?

At 39, he had spend more than half behind bars

An Incorrigible criminal….an institutionalized human being?

A man of the system, at home inside

And out of the norm outside, incorrigible

By

Patrick R. Saunders, 10.12.2010

Lock Down

Disclosure: These poems are based on observations by the poet. 

Lock Down

Pod Shake Down, searching for contraband

What contraband, a pillow

A pillow to lay your head on at night

The crime, making a pillow, sounds bizarre

The punishment, 5 days lock down in your cell

Locked in the cage for 23 hours a day

Five days for a pillow

Which all of us take for granted

But inside, nothing is taken for granted…

By

Patrick R. Saunders, 12.10.2010



2nd Amendment

2^nd Amendment

What did the founders mean?

When they created the 2^nd Amendment

Was it because of the time or the fear?

The founders wrote that we have the right

to bear arms, but where?

In a militia, to protect our homes?

Is the act of having arms, a crime?

Is the act of wanting to be armed, a crime?

What did the founders mean?

What would the founders say?

About today, they lived in a dangerous world

Do we?

What would the founders say,

who we have to fear, today

Ourselves or our protectors?

By

Patrick R. Saunders, 14.10.2010

The House of Should Haves'

The House of Should Haves’

It is the house of should haves’

If I would have only done that’s’

A house of regret after the fact

It is the house of should haves’

It is the house of time relived

It is the house of time frozen

It is the house of should haves’

The home of the innocent man

Incarcerated and locked out of sight

It is the house of should haves’

Where people have nothing but time

Time to remember, time to consider the should haves’

By

Patrick R. Saunders, 14.10.2010

Disclosure:
These poems are based on observations by the poet. 

War on Crime??

Laws that used to be to protect and serve are now used and changed to control and terrorize.

Emails from Vietnam, July 2002

Notice
The information contained in this e-mail is the intellectual property of Patrick R. Saunders, P.O. Box 13, Norwalk, OH, 44857, tel   419-668-0335; cell 419-6810290; e-mail: Patrick.R.Saunders@gmail.com None of the information contained in this document can be used without the express permission of Mr. Saunders, and if it is used, attribution or credit must be given to him.

The following is a collection of e-mails recording my thoughts, observations and reportage sent back to my wife and friends while I was traveling in Vietnam from July 5th, 2002 to July 18th, 2002 with the South East Asia Field Study class from Firelands College, BGSU, Huron, OH.

Pat Saunders
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Date Mon, 8 Jul 2002 182744 -0400

Subject “The Question Should Be?"

Hanoi, VN: Before embarking on this trip, I had many thoughts of what I would be doing once I arrived "in country." But sitting in the lobby of the hotel in Hanoi where I am staying and showing a local Vietnamese youth (born in 1975, the end of the war) how to register and participate on E-bay, was not one of
them.

"Enterprise" is the word to describe what is happening in South East Asia. And it is defined both by approach and by scale, from the massive economic infrastructure developments that we saw in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, i.e., the "Airport City" project to the thriving small business atmosphere here in Vietnam. The type and level of enterprise is also equally varied, from the totally "Western Mall" atmosphere of the 89 story "Petronis Towers" complex (remember the Sean Connery movie?) in Kuala Lumpur to the bazaar-like atmosphere of the thousands and thousands of small shops here in Hanoi; which are organized by street, by products and by services that are offered.

The atmosphere and attitude is one of that anything is possible, sounds down-right "American," doesn't it. So the question that was asked by the reporter of us before we departed for South East Asia, who won the war? Should have been, what opportunities were lost and at what price? Because here in the heart and
soul of Ho Chi Minh, "capitalism" with a little "c" and a human face, holds sway and Americans are welcome.
on further reflection and another question comes the heels of the terrible events of September 11th and the questions of why do they hate us (the Arabs), after we have done so much for them? After a twenty year war and three to five million casualties on the Vietnamese side and 360,000 casualties on ours, why do they (the Vietnamese) like us? That is a question that I will be trying to find an answer to, in the days
ahead.

Pat Saunders
"The Hotel Ho Guom"
76 Rue Hang Troung
Hanoi, Vietnam
Tel84.4-8252225
9 July, 2002


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Date Tue, 9 Jul 2002 183354 -0400
Subject “Learning Starts at Three"

Hanoi: Another hot day, the morning air hit you like falling face first into a boiling vat. The summer is in full swing and yet the rains have not arrived, for when they come, they will not go away until the Fall comes. Life is a learning experience, and most people recognize that it starts at birth. In this country, they are making an investment in their children based on the thought that the earlier the process starts, the better.

As a group we visited an Early Childhood Teachers College in Hanoi, it is one of two in the country. The purpose of this facility is obvious, to train teachers to successfully start the child on the learning path. The facility, while not like the nicely appointed colleges we have in our country, (no A/C, etc.), is equipped to give develop those skills critical to the process. At the college, they have an onsite kindergarten, where children and the student teachers are both exposed to the methods being developed at this school. Children are admitted at age three and then go through a phased program much like we have in the States.

Children at three and four are mainly allowed to play and interact, with some learning exercises incorporated into the "play." We saw yesterday, three year olds, who have learned how to use the "Windows" system on computers to perform functions and to access and to utilize programs designed for children. At five years, the children are started on the path to being bilingual, in that they begin to learn to speak, read and write English as well as Vietnamese. The children also start to develop math skills and at the time they enter the regular school setting at age seven, they are proficient in basic reading, writing and math skills.

The students at this teachers college, receive their education without cost to them. Vietnam has like our country has realized that an investment in education is an investment in their future. The only difference, is that they make that investment on the frontend, not the backend like us. There are not any students graduating with $40,000 in debt at this facility, as there are in schools across our country today. The main difference in approach, is that these students are those who are academically up to the challenge of college and in our country, we still feel and believe that all people should have the chance to try and fail in college.

On another note, we had some free time in the afternoon and went shopping. Haggling is the national pastime and no offense is taken or no quarter given in the contest between shopkeeper and shopper. There are some really beautiful things here and they can be purchased at a very reasonable price, if you stick to your guns, so to speak. There are many westerners in this country, many are from Europe, it seems that this country has been discovered as a not only exotic but very reasonable vacation destination.

Pat Saunders
c/o
The Ho Goum Hotel
76 Hang Trong Street
Hanoi, VN

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Date Tue, 16 Jul 2002 235840 -0700 (PDT)

The trip has been something out of a dream. On last Wednesday, the 10th, we visited Hanoi University of Education and met with the Vice Rector, the Director of International Affairs. They are Dr. Thanh's superiors and are not appointed by a board of trustees, but elected by their peers (their fellow teachers). They have about 1,700 students on the campus at Hanoi, but nationwide have about 15,000.

Their setup is like California's and they have campuses in all of the other cities in Vietnam. HUE, is a "liberal arts" school and is regarded as the top school in the country. As I said in a earlier e-mail, for education majors, tuition and books are free. For all other colleges, the tuition is rather nominal, like maybe $7.00 @ year and books are just as cheap. In order to attend, students are required to take a competitive exam, that is the difference.

On Thursday, the 11th, we went to Ha Long Bay, which is North East of Hanoi and next to Haiphong Harbor. This is a beautiful place and there are islands composed of limestone all over a vast bay area. We went out on the bay and went to a island for swimming. The commercialization of this area is something else and the Vietnamese are fast taking pages out of our playbook in regards to promoting natural wonders.

The next day we departed for the south, we spent the night, Friday, the 12th at Cua Lo, a village on the south china sea coast about 2/3's of the way to Hue City. There was a beach there and 10,000 vacationing Vietnamese.

The next day we pulled out and headed for the DMZ and south. We stopped at a the Director for International Studies, Mr. Cho, mother's home. It is right on highway one and just north of the DMZ. They were very nice people, poor people, but very proud of Mr. Cho. I guess it would be the same thing if a poor family in Eastern Kentucky had a son who rose up to be a big shot at Harvard or something, same thing.

We then went to the DMZ or what used to be the DMZ. I walked across the Ben Hai Bridge, from the North to the South, something that none of my friends did so many years ago. We stopped at Dong Ha, that was a site of a big Seabee Base during the War, they were trying to build a fence (it was called McNamara's wall, because he thought a fence would help end the war) to separate the North from the South and got the hell beat out of them in attempting it. We drove through Quang Tri, where my best friend, Ron, was KIA in July of '67.

We arrived in Hue City that evening. The next day, we visited the tombs of Vietnamese Emperors. Minh Mang and Tu Doc, who were largely puppets of the French in the 19th century. The tombs are beautiful and show the Chinese Dynastic influence on Vietnamese architecture. 

In the afternoon, we went to the old imperial city, the Citadel. While I was there, I ran into a group of American 'Nam Vets, who were part of a group called “Veterans with a Mission.” They were at the citadel as tourists. But they had just opened their 23rd Medical Clinic in Viet Nam in Da Nang. The citadel was interesting for me, because of the major battle that was fought there in Tet of '68. They are
restoring it, but there is major battle damage still evident. The controversy over the Citadel was the fact that we bombed and shelled it to dislodge the NVA and VC soldiers who had taken control of it at the beginning of the offensive. The Vietnamese fought to the end and few were taken captive after the bombing and artillery attacks. We spent two nights and three days at Hue in all, leaving it for our next stop HoiAn, south of Da Nang.

I am sending this e-mail to you from an open internet cafe in Hoi An , an ancient trading port on the Yellow Sea, about 20 klicks from DaNang, it is hotter than heck and sweat is pouring down my back. I will continue this later.

Pat

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Date Wed, 17 Jul 2002 101021 -0400

Ho Chi Minh City, VN
Subject: Vietnam Journal, filling in the gaps to 12 July, 2002.

July 11th, we visited the Mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh. This is similar to viewing the body of Lenin in Moscow, in that the his body is perfectly preserved in a climate controlled massive building. It is said that before Ho Chi Minh died in 1969, that he told those close to him that he wanted a simple funeral like any other Vietnamese. Now Vietnamese and people from all over the world come to pay their respects to him. On the day we visited the tomb, there was a group of about 50 veterans (Vietnamese) who were paying homage to their fallen leader, just ahead us. It was interesting to watch their reactions as we walked past the body. After leaving the mausoleum, we went to the Museum dedicated to the fallen leader. It documented the struggle for independence from the first French invasion in 1858 to the fall of Saigon in 1975. While the struggle against the French was represented in display after display, the “American War,’ was only a small part of the museum. After leaving the museum, we visited the home of Ho Chi Minh. In 1954, when the French pulled out of Viet Nam, the government of Ho Chi Minh inherited the former Governor’s Palace in Hanoi. Ho refused to live in it, saying that he would live as the rest of the Vietnamese lived and had a small four room house built on the grounds and the Palace today is used only to host visiting foreign dignitaries. In the afternoon, we visited the Hanoi University of Education and met with the Vice Rector and the Director
for International Relations.

On our way out of Hanoi, we stopped at the “Hanoi Hilton,” the prison that was used to house the American POW’s. One thing that I learned there, that long before John McCain spent time there, thousands of Vietnamese had been imprisoned there, tortured and executed by the French Colonialists by guilotine or firing squad. In fact, the very torture techniques used by the Vietnamese on our POW”s were developed by the French and used on the Vietnamese during the long “French war” for independence. (1930-41/1946-1954).

Ha Long Bay: This picturesque area is located some 60 klicks north east of Hanoi. We left Hanoi on the morning of the 11th for Ha Long Bay. Ha Long Bay is a beautiful place, a huge bay with limestone islands scattered all over (it was in the film, "Indochine," the slave market). To the east of it, is Haiphong Harbor, one of the major shipping ports of Vietnam, and a heavily bombed area during the war. It was hard to imagine that this beautiful area was the scene of some of the most fierce combat during the war, with Haiphong being a target of our Navy and Air Force planes. As we cruised slowly (about 2 mph), across the bay, I tried to picture planes streaking across and the responding anti aircraft fire, I could not do it.

The next day we departed down highway One for the south, our first stop was at Cua Lo, this was about 300 klicks from Hanoi. We spent the night there and continue on our trip the next morning. The coast of Vietnam is one beautiful stretch from the North to the South. We stopped at the home of the mother of Mr. Tho, who is the Director of International Relations for HUE. They live very simply (poor) and are in the area of the 17th parallel, the former DMZ. She is about 80 years and consequently saw the whole war, French and American. They were very gracious and showed us around their small home and garden.

I am now in Saigon or Ho Chi Minh City, will send More.............

Pat
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Date Thu, 18 Jul 2002 003147 -0400

On Highway One, Vietnam

“Enterprise”

As we drove through the length of the country, one thing that is for certain, the Vietnamese understand “enterprise.” Every home it seems has some thing for sale, from refreshments at an ad hoc “café,” to merchandise. This was evident in every village, town and city. While Hue City, we visited some imperial tombs. At each site there was a flurry of vendors selling post cards and other items that tourists buy. The vendors were kids and women. At Minh Mang, we had to cross the Perfume River in Sampans to get to the site of the tomb. There were large numbers of vendors on both sides of the river, but once we entered the tomb site they were gone. It seems that the vendors are not allowed near the sites and cannot use what could be described as forcible tactics in their sales approach. As we crossed back over the river, I watched as workers constructed a large bridge across the river towards the tomb site, I wondered what impact that bridge would have on the local’s rice bowl, since it would put the sampans out of business and take tourists away from the small village from where they were based at. Something would be worked out, because every one works in Viet Nam.

“Infrastructure”

Construction is not a word here, it is the only word. There are no orange barrels, just miles and miles of road, bridge, water and sewer projects. There is literally thousands and thousands of homes being built up and down the length of Highway One and all over Viet Nam. In the central region of the country, they had some devastating floods from tropical storms and Typhoons. Now the Vietnamese are in the process of rebuilding the roads, raising the level of the roadway, enlarging the other infrastructure components, culverts and drainage ditches. There are bottlenecks, but at 37 mph (70 kph) the national speed limit, traffic just moves on and they accommodate each other.

“Remnants of War”

Driving through the country, we saw few signs of the “American War.” Maybe a former Army 6x6, now hauling stone, dirt or rice, but that was it. The huge American complex at Chu Lai is mostly non-existent, with the buildings being disassembled and the materials put to other uses. The concrete forts and gun emplacements of the “French War” are still scattered through the countryside, mostly at bridges, railroad points and mountain passes. At Da Nang, I saw something left over from the “American War, the remains of some concrete airplane revetments, and the main gate of the Marine base, all slowly deteriorating in the heat. At Nha Trang, I saw numerous revetments and airplane hangars, still being used by military, but the planes ere covered up and not on “stand by.”

The most telling remnant of the “American War,” was the memorial at Song My, the village also known as My Lai. This is a reminder of man’s inhumanity to man and that violence only begets violence. The original village site is preserved and the foundations of the homes still there. There is a simple plague at each, that tells who lived there, who died, and their ages. The ages ranged from senior citizens of 68 to babies of one year old. Five hundred and seven people were killed at this village, mostly women and children. Ironically, the last remaining survivor, a young woman, who was three years old at the time and who used to give talks about the massacre to visitors at the memorial. Died of cancer several years ago, I wondered if her death by cancer was attributable to the defoliates that we used in this area during the war.

Beaches”

The one thing that this country has in abundance is beaches. There is hundreds of miles of pristine beach and wonderful surf. There also are thousands of people at the beach in the larger towns. But out in the country along Highway One, there are beaches without a soul that make Club Med look sick.




“Housing”

In this country, if you want to build a house, you must get a permit from the state, since all land belongs to the state. But after getting that permit, you can build any house you want. Most homes range from 4 to 6 rooms and are multi-storied in the city and more spread out in the country. Each year the homeowner pays a fee to the state for the land that his home is on. Dr. Thanh, our guide and host said that he pays about 100,000 Vietnamese Dong annually, or about Eight Dollars to the state.

“Food Production”

Outside of commerce and construction, the other main interest is production of food. Food for human consumption, not for animal consumption as in our country. All along Highway One, are rice paddies, as we drove the length of Vietnam, we watch the harvesting, preparing , planting and harvesting of rice. With Vietnam's climate they get an average of two to three crops a year and in the delta, three to four crops

a year. That is why Vietnam is now a major rice exporting country in Asia now.

They also raise sweet corn, melons, and other vegetables for consumption. All along the central region, are hydroponic ponds where they have a thriving aqua-culture  industry. They have salt water ponds where they raise shrimp and crabs; and freshwater ponds where they raise a variety of fresh water fish. They also raise large numbers of livestock from ducks and pigs to cattle. Also still evident is the “Water Buffalo”, the tractor of the Asian farmer. There are still vast numbers of these animals being used in agriculture right along side tractors and trucks.

“Traffic”

The word is intense to describe the traffic, huge trucks by the hundreds roar by. There are many cars and SUV’s on the road; but the most numerous are the motorbikes and motorcycles in the millions it seems. They are like swarms of bees at times, buzzing enmasse from one point to the next. One of the group commented on the lack of white lines and lane dividers on the road. When drivers use the whole road, who needs lines?

“The land of the cold towel”

Finally a note on how the public is treated in this country. Whether you are Vietnamese or foreigner, people go out of their way to be cordial and friendly. At restaurants, large or small, the comfort of the customer is number one. One of the first things you are offered is a cold towel to wash off the dust of the road and to refresh yourself. When the temperature is hovering near a hundred degrees. That really hits the spot and makes you feel like a Million dong.

------------------------------------------------

“Answering the Question”

Ho Chi Minh City, (Saigon) Vietnam

In the beginning of this trip, I posed the Question, why do they like us; especially in light of 9-11 and its aftermath? The answer that I have been able to find is that they look at history with a long view. They still talk about the many wars that they had with the Chinese over a thousand years ago and have not forgotten the brutal French Colonial period. But seem to consider the “American War” as a post script and that it is time to move on to the future.

So as I board the plane today and embark on the trip home to my country, that is what I will be returning too, the future and not the past.

Pat Saunders

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DateThu, 18 Jul 2002 223558 -0400

Vietnam Journal, 19 July, 2002

“On the Flight back to the World”

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
On the road again, this time bound for home and family. While waiting here in KL to catch the next connection to home, I’m looking at the past ten days and the trip down Highway One in Vietnam. There are a couple of things that I left out in the earlier journal entries.

“The Cities”
The cities in Vietnam are growing by leaps and bounds, new construction and new businesses are going up every where there is room. We saw evidence that industry was moving outside the cities to find room to build. Unfortunately, the land that they are building on is being reclaimed from the rice fields, by filling the paddies that line the highway. Hanoi, the capital city has a population of 3 million people and is growing. Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) has the largest population of all at 5 million and by the incorporation of Cholon
and HCMC in the late 90’s it is also one of the largest cities in Asia now.

"Population”
The population of Vietnam is over 81 million and growing rapidly. The “carrying capacity” of the country is around 95 million and at the present rate of growth will reach that in the near future. If the land along Highway One is representative of the rest of the country, population density will be a critical problem for
the Vietnamese Government in the new Millennium. There was evidence of a state program encouraging small families, there were billboards all through the cities and along the roads, espousing the benefits of smaller families. In the cities, the average family is about 4, but out in the countryside, there are still large
families. Of course, the issue in the country is that the work of the farmer is still labor intensive, with many hands needed to prepare, plant and harvest the crops; with the work being the hardest kind of stoop labor. The introduction of machinery into the agriculture production was in evidence. There was also the use of more “people operated” machines, like pedal driven threshers that separated the rice head from the stalk and pedal driven pumps to move water from one rice paddy to another.

The average life expectancy in Vietnam is 68 years old and with smoking a national past-time in this country, it probably will not increase in the future. The government is waging a very visible war on HIV and Aids in Vietnam. The billboards addressing these health issues are quite common throughout the cities and countryside. They also have billboards stressing vaccinations and highlighting undesirable behavior, such as using drugs and promiscuity.

“Communication and Information”

While we are still having problems in Huron County utilizing cell phone technology. In Vietnam, the “mobil” phone is wide spread across the country and a common sight in the city and in the country. The Vietnamese have leapfrogged from the shoulders of the more developed countries in adopting the wireless technology
wholeheartedly. Vina-Conex, the state communications company has erected up and down the length of Vietnam, a series of huge towers and the accompanying smaller towers for transmission of wireless communication. You can be anywhere and be reached by “mobil” calls or make a “mobil” from anywhere. Reception is clear and no fuzzy or background noise in the call. They also have text messaging available throughout the country. Our driver received many text messages from his wife during the trip on his “mobil” phone, so I don’t know if that is good or not!

The internet is widespread and there are internet cafes’ in all of the larger towns and cities. In most of these “cafes”, you can use their computers and connect on to the internet for a very low cost. In Saigon, I used a computer and accessed the internet for time period of over two hours, the cost was 9,000 dong or about fifty cents US. The Vietnamese use the internet to communicate amongst themselves in “chat rooms”, they love this past-time and to send messages to family members who are overseas either working or living.

“The Vietnamese Expats and Workers”

There are many Vietnamese who have left the country to work in other countries. They are an important source of “hard” currency for the Vietnamese Government. These workers send their money (mostly in US Dollars) home to their families and it is exchanged for Vietnamese Dong at the local banks and the foreign currency goes to the government’s foreign cash reserves. There also those Vietnamese who left the country at the end of the war in 1975, afterward and now are returning home to see their families and the country that they left. They are referred to as the Viet Khieu They also send to their families large amounts of money, which are then exchanged and end up in the country’s cash reserves. Our driver, Hai, spent two years driving oil trucks in the Kuwaiti Oil fields as one of these expatriate workers.

“Back to the World”

I leave KL today, the afternoon of the 19th, when it is still the morning of the 18th , back in the “World.” I arrive in LAX on the evening of the 19th and in Detroit at 530 a.m. of the 20th. Just in time for Pat’s wedding at 4 that afternoon.

See you when I get home,

Pat

Denial is the Enemy of Civilization and Humanity

Truthout

"We live in interesting times," a phrase used many, many times to give a sense of significant changes happening in the world. I imagine that it was used when Alexander spread the reach of the Greek Culture across Southwest and South Asia before his 30th birthday. Again, when the Romans spread the combined Greco Roman culture across Asia, Africa, Europa and the British Isles, it was interesting times. In the Seventh century, A.D., the Islamic faith and culture spread across Asia, Africa and middle Europe culminating in the 12th century's Golden Age of Islam. The treasures of western civilization, the ancient Greek and Roman writings that are the foundation of western culture, were not protected in this time of darkness in the west, but by those who are seen as the enemy of the west, the Islamic Renaissance Scholars who recognized that the writings, teachings and other components of Greek and Roman culture had to be preserved for those in the future.

What if it would havee been the other way? Would have the West preserved Islamic culture because it was important and should be kept for those in the future? To get your answer, you need only to look at the misplaced umbrage and furor over the Islamic Center proposed in Manhattan, three blocks from Ground Zero. The European Renaisance, the age of Enlightenment, the Age of Exploration and discovery and the Industrial Revolution were all interesting times as they moved our civilization forward.

Now, again we live in extremely interesting times, for it seems like the noble experiment of a concerned humanity is coming apart at the seams in this beginning of the new Millenium. Anywhere you look the evidence is there, for anyone to see. This summer, the evidence that we have some issues concerning climate change has manifested itself as record temperatures for heat are set everyday. In Eurasia, the Russian countryside is in flames, as the normal temperate summer temperatures have gave way to record 100+ degrees killing hundreds in Moscow each day. The wild fires have another downside, for the areas that are in flames are those were the weapons of mass destruction were made and are the most contaminated on the face of the earth. The Russian fires are releasing these dormant radioactive poisons to the winds and the four horsemen of Apocalapyse to spread the death from above across the globe. In the press of the west or more to the point, the US, there is not a word of this potential global calamity

We have just passed two anniversaries of interesting times in our history, the Katrina Disaster in the New Orleans region and the 1963 March on Washington demanding human and civil rights for Black Americans. The anniversary of Katrina, shows that tens of thousands of families who were the victims of that storm and flood surge, are still out of the loop as far as getting some help to rebuild their lives and their neighborhoods. This is the result of a deliberate effort to exile those who are poor and disenfranchised in that region and the fruit of it will be with us for decades. Because it created a new approach to disaster relief, "do nothing." We have become a country that does not deal well with humanitarian needs inside our own country because it takes away those monies needed to conduct war without end outside our country to futher the interests of the American  Empire.

The 47th anniversary of the March on Washington and Martin King's speech that has achieved iconic status in the history of our nation and the world, this year was observed by the white majority on the Mall, moderated by that wellspring of love and humanity, Glenn Beck. Beck who framed the event as the taking back of the civil rights struggle by the White majority. My question is, How can you take back something that was not yours in the first place? This struggle came from the inequities of a society ran and controlled by Whites for the benefits of Whites. Some of us (white folks) complain, saying it was not us or the folks in the present who did that terrible stuff. What they are missing is the fact, how do you rectify 250 years of slavery and another 110 years of prejudice, discrimination and hate used to control millions of folks in their daily lives? You cannot bury it in a hole in the ground and act like it never happened. It did happen and it is still happening today. It has to become a part of the national discussion in this country. Because now it has evolved to targeting those who are Muslim and Latino.

On the surface, Dr. Martin King being imitated by the likes of Glenn Beck is almost laughable, if it was not a part of the agenda of the right to rewrite history and to glorify those past horrific injustices as a beautiful moment in America. Yes, we live in interesting times..............