Jim Hightower's Lowdown

In this year’s Beijing Olympics, the top team performance has been Corporate America’s breathtaking “Double-twist Ethical Backflip.” This group of corporate giants loudly tout their code of ethics, pledging to stand against repressive regimes that abuse human rights. But here came the Olympics, posing a direct test… and they flopped! Human rights advocates worldwide had asked that corporations withhold their sponsorship of the propagandistic use of the Olympics by China’s brutally oppressive rulers. CEOs were simply asked not to endorse a Chinese dictatorship that is routinely committing acts of genocide and political suppression against Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hong Kong citizens, and others under their rule. Corporate leaders would not even have to speak out or publicly stand up to the oppressors – just don’t show up, don’t pay millions of their shareholders’ dollars to link arms and reputations with rank repression. Well, if you’ve watched any of the Olympic broadcasts, you’ve seen which side corporate America chose – they’ve done a collective backflip from the high ethical bar of human rights into the pits of crass, unprincipled commercialism. A who’s who of America’s corporate all-stars are flying their flags in Beijing, having paid more than a billion dollars to strut their stuff as sponsors of the regime’s Olympic show. It looks bad, though, to admit that they value humanity less than money, so sponsors are piously proclaiming that sports should not be politicized. As one put it, offending China’s autocrats “would not advance the cause of sport in which our commitment lies.” Really, how sporting is genocide? Another barked that “nobody, nobody cares what happens to Uyghurs, OK?” No, it’s not OK, and also not true. And yet another clueless corporate boss cavalierly dismissed ethics by declaring, “Ski and sport have no business in politics… It’s common sense.” No, it’s cowardice, stupidity, and clearly un-Olympian.

Suddenly, "social distancing" is our new national etiquette, abruptly supplanting handshakes, hugs, gatherings, and other forms of ingrained communal behavior by us humans. Awkward. Disconcerting. Isolating. Yet, as we frantically scramble to deter the health and economic ravages of Covid-19, we might benefit by pondering a self-inflicted cause of the contagion's disastrous spread: Social distancing! For some 40 years, American corporations and governments have imposed economic, political, and social policies to "distance" the financial fortunes of the wealthy few from the well-being of the workaday majority. Consider the interrelationship of multimillionaires with the unseen kitchen staff of restaurants where they dine. To further enrich themselves, such multimillionaires have forced low-wage policies on food preparers, denied health coverage for them, and lobbied to kill proposals to provide paid sick leave. So, a kitchen worker coughs because he or she is infected with coronavirus, but doesn't know it, since the worker has no healthcare coverage for testing. Even though running a fever, the staffer must come to work or lose the job. A few days later, a multimillionaire coughs, because... well, Covid-19 doesn't distinguish between rich and poor. The very proposals that plutocrats have been blocking for years (Living Wages, Medicare for All, Paid Sick Leave, Family Medical Leave, Free College and Trade School Tuition, Home Healthcare, and others) are exactly what a sane government would adopt to avoid the consequences of inequality that now confronts every American. The actual disease that's forcing social distancing on our country is not a pathogen, but the widening separation of rich elites from the rest of us – and the cure is a national push for renewed social cohesiveness. As commentator Glenn Smith recently puts it: "[COVID19] puts into focus a biological, psychological, economic, and socio-political fact that we too often deny: We are a species of completely interdependent beings."

In this horrible time of economic collapse, it is truly touching to see so many corporate chieftains reaching out in solidarity with the hard-hit working class. We know they're doing this because they keep telling us they are – practically every brand – name giant has been spending millions of dollars on PR campaigns in recent weeks asserting that they're standing with us, declaring over and over: "We're all in this together." Except, of course, they're really not standing anywhere near us. While we're waiting in endless lines at food banks and unemployment offices, the elites are still getting fat paychecks and platinum-level health care. The severity and gross disparity of our country's present economic collapse is not simply caused by a sudden viral outbreak, but by a decades-long plutocratic policy of intentionally maximizing profits for the rich and minimizing everyone else's wellbeing. As the eminent economist Joseph Stiglitz rightly put it, "We built an economy with no shock absorbers." Jobs, once the measure of a family's economic security, have steadily been shriveled to low-wage unreliable work, untethered to a fair share (or any share) of the new wealth that workers create. In a relentless push for exorbitant, short-term profits, today's executives have abandoned any pretense that a corporation is a community of interdependent interests striving to advance the common good. Instead, while the honchos are richly covered, they're washing their hands of any responsibility for the health, retirement, and other essential needs of their workforce. "Rely on food stamps, Obamacare, and other publicly-funded programs," they say, even as their lobbyists and for-sale lawmakers slash the public safety nets so rich shareholders and speculators can take evermore profit. These forces of American greed have shoved millions of working families to the economic precipice – and all it takes is a virus to push them over.

We might expect that corporate billionaires and Koch-funded Republican right-wingers would be howl-at-the-moon opponents of a wealth tax, Medicare-for-All, and other big, progressive ideas to help improve the circumstances of America's workaday majority. But... Democrats? Unfortunately, yes. Not grassroots Dems, but a gaggle of don't-rock-the-corporate-boat, Fraidy-cat Democrats. These naysayers are the Party's old-line pols, lobbyists, and other insider elites who're now screeching that Democratic candidates must back off those big proposals. Why? Because, they squawk, being so bold, so progressive, so – well, so Democratic – will scare voters. As one meekly put it: "When you say Medicare for All, it's a risk. It makes people afraid." Excuse me, but in my speeches and writings I say "Medicare for All" a lot - and far from cowering, people stand up and cheer! In fact, the New York Times has just reported that 81 percent of Democrats (and two-thirds of independents) support Medicare for All. Even apple pie doesn't score that high! It's simply a lie that the people are "afraid" of the idea of everyone getting public-financed health care. So who really fears it? Three special-interest groups: Insurance company profiteers, Big Pharma price gougers – and the political insiders who're hooked on funding from those corporations. Not only is it a pusillanimous fabrication to claim that the people oppose any changes stronger than corporate minimalism, it's also political folly. If the Democratic Party won't stand up for the transformative structural changes that America's middle and low-income majority clearly wants and needs, why would those people stand up for Democrats? As the 2016 presidential election taught us so painfully, a whole lot of the working class Democrats the Party counts on... won't. "'It's a Risk': Democratic Leaders Warn That 'Medicare for All' May Backfire," The New York Times, November 27, 2019. "The Heart of the Matter in the Democratic Debate," Medium.com, November 18, 2019. "Biden overstates 'Medicare for All' opposition," Austin American Statesman, December 2, 2019. "Voters Back Warren Plan To Tax Rich, Poll Shows," The New York Times, December 2, 2019.

For $3.5 Trillion a year, shouldn't we Americans have a world-class healthcare system? Yet, while we spend the most of any advanced nation in the world to get care (more than $10,000 a year per person), we get the worst results. No surprise then, that the "Medicare-for-All" idea is now backed by 85 percent of Democrats, 66 percent of Independents, and (get this) 52 percent of Republicans! So... why isn't Congress responding to this overwhelming public demand for universal coverage? I suspect that one big reason for Washington's big yawn over the people's plea for sweeping reform is that our lawmakers do not personally feel the financial pain and emotional distress that are inflicted on millions of regular Americans by a system built on private greed. After all, their health needs are met by a double-dose of the socialistic care that they so furiously deny to our families. First, they are given big taxpayer-subsidies to cover the cost of their insurance with you and me paying about 72 percent of the price. But, second, there's a secretive medical center located right in the US Capitol building that provides a full-blown system of – shhhhh – healthcare socialism to our governing elites. Called the OAP (Office of the Attending Physician), it provides a complete range of free medical service for lawmakers. No appointment needed and no waiting – they walk in and doctors, nurses, technicians, pharmacists, and other professionals tend to them right away. No need to show an insurance card, and they never get a bill, but they do get what a former OAP staffer calls "The best healthcare on the planet." Thus, members feel no urgency to restructure a system that's working beautifully – for them. So, to get good care for all of us, we might start by taking away the pampered care that lawmakers have quietly awarded to themselves. "Special Health Care for Congress: Lawmakers' Health Care Perks," ABC News, September 30, 2009.

Our society has coined expressions like "philanthropist" to encourage and hail people's charitable spirit. Look on the flip side of that shiny coin of generosity, however, and you'll find that its base substance is societal selfishness. After all, the need for charity only exists because we're tolerating intentional injustices and widespread inequality created by power elites. A society as supremely wealthy as ours ought not be relegating needy families and essential components of the common good to the whims of a few rich philanthropists. Yes, corporate and individual donations can help at the margins, but they don't fix anything. Thus, food banks, health clinics, etc. must constantly scrounge for more charity, while big donors have their "charitable spirit" subsidized with tax breaks that siphon money from our public treasury. Especially offensive to me is the common grandiose assertion by fat cat donors that charity is their way of "giving back" to society. Hello – if they can give so much it's probably because they've been taking too much! As business columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin points out, "All too often, charitable gifts are used... to make up for the failure of companies to pay people a living wage and treat their workers with dignity." It's not just the unemployed who rely on food banks, but janitors, nannies, Uber drivers, checkout clerks, and others who work full time, but are so poorly paid they can't make ends meet. That's not a sad charity case, but a matter of criminal exploitation by wealthy elites – and the charitable thing to do is to outlaw it and require a living wage for all. As Sorkin puts it, "The aim should be to create a society where we don't need places like food banks... We should be trying to put the food banks out of business." "Real Charity: Pay Workers Living Wage," The New York Times, December 24, 2019.

As Lyndon Johnson used to say about special interests trying to get his support to pass some blatantly self-serving legislation: "They can't make chicken salad out of chicken sh*t." Yet, chicken sh*t is all that the corporate health complex has to work with as it frantically tries to defend its current system of mass malpractice, known as corporate health care. After all, as most Americans have learned the hard way, the corporatized care of profiteering insurance giants, Big Pharma, and hospital chains grossly overcharge us while constantly trying to shortchange or outright deny care to millions of our families. So, unable to win public support on their own merit, the corporatists and their hired political hacks are going all out to continue their gouging and keep control of America's dysfunctional system. They're now running a multimillion-dollar PR and lobbying campaign of lies to trash and kill all reforms that would deliver quality, comprehensive care to everyone, at far less cost than they can deliver. Masquerading as a Partnership for America's Health Care Future, the profiteers warn ominously that such reforms as "Medicare for All" or a "public option" for health insurance would take away people's "choice" and our "control" over health care. Hello... we presently have no choice or control. Our "care" is managed by a handful of insurance, drug and hospital monopolists whose primary objective is not improving our health, but feathering their own cushy nests. And the undeniable, ugly truth is that they can only continue ripping us off by killing real reform That's one reason the American Medical Association and others are dropping out of the Partnership's political front. Honest health care practitioners no longer believe it's in their best interest - or the public's - to be part of its chicken sh*t PR campaign. "Your Insurance Is Getting Disrupted –With or Without Medicare for All," New York Magazine, April 8, 2019. "Lobbies' Greatest Ally in the Effort to Sabotage Health Care Reform," Truth Dig, January 28, 2020. "The Army Built to Fight "Medicare for All'," Politico, November 25, 2019. "Fever Pitch Surge in Opposition Lobbying and Advocacy Validates the Credibility of the Medicare for All Movement," Citizen, June 28, 2019. "Lobbies' Greatest Ally in the Effort to Sabotage Health Care Reform," Truth Dig, January 28, 2020.

Right before our eyes, an invaluable American species is fast disappearing from view. Kar-toon-us A-mer-i-kan-as. These are the newspaper cartoonists who’ve long delighted readers and infuriated power elites. And there’s nothing natural about their sudden decline – its not the result of a declining talent pool, and certainly not due to a lack of political targets. Rather, what’s happening is that their media habitat is being intentionally destroyed. Around the start of the 20th century, some 2,000 newspapers featured their own, full-time cartoonists, but in just the last decade, those healthy media environments have shriveled. So now, only a couple dozen newspapers have these vibrant artistic journalists on staff. One major reason is that most US papers have been gobbled up by profiteering hedge funds that have merged, purged, and plundered these essential local sources of news and democratic discourse. The overriding interest of these Wall Street owners is to cash out a paper’s financial assets and haul off the booty to boost their personal wealth – journalism and democracy be damned. Thus, they view cartoonists as a paycheck that can be easily diverted into their corporate pockets, dismissing the fact that enjoying good local cartoonists ranks as one of top reasons people give for buying the paper. Note that this mass extermination is not old-school media censorship, but slight-of-hand money censorship by the new monopolistic order of newspapering. Political cartoonists are still free to express any opinion they want – but the Wall Street system locks them out of their primary marketplace. Censorship is ugly, but eliminating paychecks… well, that’s just business. The good news is that these freewheeling artistic spirits of the cartooning craft are inventing new ways to connect with America’s strong consumer demand for their fun and important work. To get connected and get active with them, go to EditorialCartoonists.com.

I never dreamed of growing up to be a political activist/ commentator, but here I am, and it’s worked out pretty well for me. I’ve been lucky enough to have a voice in public matters and eke out a modest living running my mouth as an independent populist agitator. Still, I have to confess to the sin of Job Envy. Not in the sense of being resentful, but regretful about my own inability to lift the trade of journalistic commentary to the heights attained by a small, feisty collection of unique public opinionators: Political cartoonists. In framing issues and rallying people to think and act, these journalists have an unfair advantage over us mere word crafters. They can literally draw a picture to make their point! They reach masses viscerally as well as cerebrally. And visceral usually outpunches cerebral. Editorial cartooning is a profession made up largely of progressive mavericks who enter the social-political-cultural fray with an abundance of anti-establishment audacity, an eye for irony, a fondness for the underdog, an ability to laugh at absurdity…plus artistic talent. Because cartooning is an expression of the human spirit that has been irrepressible since cave drawings, generation after generation of pen-and-ink champions of democracy blossomed. The general public’s appreciation and demand for the cartoonist’s unblinking honesty and satire have never flagged, even increasing whenever the artists come under public assault by autocrats, plutocrats, screwballs, and assorted other censors. Beyond popularity, though, these graphic editorial artists matter. Again and again, the pointed ink pens of generations of political cartoonists have roused the public to rise up and put down corporate and political scoundrels, incrementally advancing our nation’s democratic possibilities. As in the natural world though, even the most beneficial creatures can be driven to extinction. Check your own local newspaper – are your favorite cartoonists still there?

The morning after December’s horrific nighttime tornado smashed a huge Amazon warehouse in Illinois, killing six workers, corporate CEO Jeff Bezos issued a personal video message. Was he distressed and sorrowful? No, Boss Bezos was perversely giddy. That’s because the narcissistic gabillionaire had not made the video to mourn the deaths, but instead had chosen this hour of tragedy to gloat to the world that his private space tourism business had just rocketed a small group of extremely rich thrill seekers on a 10-minute joy ride. The “Popular Information” newsletter reports that Bezos, dressed in a pretend astronaut costume, exclaimed that everyone involved was really “happy.” Back on Planet Earth, though, the families and co-workers of the employees crushed when Amazon’s cheaply-built structure collapsed on them were not happy with him. It took Bezos some 12 hours after his self-congratulatory media event before he finally issued a perfunctory tweet professing to be “heartbroken over the loss of our teammates.” But they weren’t “lost” – they were killed by a deliberate corporate culture that routinely cuts corners on worker safety to put more profit in corporate pockets. First, the building itself was thrown up quickly with cheap preassembled, 40-foot-high concrete walls that collapse inward in a tornado; second, Amazon’s employees were expected to stay on the job that night even though there was a high risk of tornados; third, nearly all of the workers were classified as “contractors,” letting Amazon dodge liability for on-the-job harm. This is Jim Hightower saying… Oh, and Jeff might also want to reconsider one more bit of corporate arrogance he revealed in this ugly incident: Those dead workers were not his “teammates,” as he so cynically called them – even a high-flying captain doesn’t treat teammates as throwaway units, carelessly sacrificing their lives for a few more dollars in corporate profit.

Corporate America has proudly elevated good moral values to a special place. That place is the trash can. Indeed, free market gurus assert that the only ethical obligation a corporation has to society is to deliver as much profit as possible to its big investors – everybody else be damned. And they excuse any awfulness they cause by claiming that they “broke no laws.” But – hello – they write the laws, so corporate immorality is always technically legal. America experienced this corporate dodge just before Christmas, when a line of super-cell tornados ripped through the Midwest states, demolishing buildings and whole towns, killing more than 90 people. It was called “a tragedy” – but those deaths were not destiny. While a twisting 190-mph vortex can be cataclysmic, we’re not helpless in the face of its fury, for an effective, cheap defense is readily available: Safe rooms. Built inside homes, schools, factories, shopping centers, and elsewhere, people can shelter safely in these simple concrete rooms during big blows, surviving even if the building around them is shredded. They’ve been proven to provide “near absolute protection” from tornados, and safety officials, insurers, consumer advocates, and others have long proposed amending our building codes to require them in new commercial and public buildings. Such a provision would’ve saved many workers who were crushed inside an Amazon warehouse, a candle-making factory, and other buildings destroyed by December’s storms. But they died, because in 2012, members of a little-known industry-controlled group, the International Code Council, quietly vetoed the proposal, calling it “overly restrictive,” even declaring it “way too soon to do a knee jerk reaction” to tornado deaths. All those buildings smashed by December’s tornados were corporate death sites because their shoddy construction “broke no laws.” Let’s ask Corporate America if it’s still too soon for Congress to mandate tornado-safe rooms.

Can antibiotic medicines, long hailed as miracle drugs, be too much of a good thing? Yes. Two factors are at work here. First, bacteria (one of the earliest forms of life on Earth) are miracles in their own right, with a stunning ability to outsmart the antibiotic drugs through rapid evolution. Second is the rather dull inclination of us supposedly-superior humans to overuse and misuse antibiotic medicines. Every time we take an antibiotic to kill some bad bacteria that is infecting our bodies, a few of the infectious germs are naturally resistant to the drug, so they survive, multiply, and become a colony of Superbugs that antibiotics can't touch. Multiply this colony by the jillions of doses prescribed for everything from deadly staph infections to the common cold, and we get the "antibiotic paradox:" The more we use them, the less effective they become, for they're creating a spreading epidemic of immune Superbugs. A big cause of this is the push by drug companies to get patients and doctors to reach for antibiotics as a cure all. For example, millions of doses a year are prescribed for children and adults who have common colds, flu, sore throats, etc. Nearly all these infections are caused by viruses – which cannot (repeat: CANNOT) be cured with antibiotics. Taking an antibiotic for a cold is as useless as taking a heart drug for heartburn. The antibiotics will do nothing for your cold, but it will help establish drug-resistant Superbugs in your body. That's not a smart trade off. In fact, it's incomprehensibly stupid. Antibiotics are invaluable medicines we need for serious, life-threatening illnesses, but squandering them on sore throats has already brought us to the brink of Superbugs that are resistant to everything. That's the nightmare of all nightmares.   "The Rising Threat Of Antibiotic Resistance In The United States," www.alternet.org, December 20, 2013.

In 1972, I was part of a nationwide campaign that came close to getting the US Senate to reject Earl Butz, Richard Nixon’s choice for secretary of agriculture. A coalition of grassroots farmers, consumers, and public interest organizations teamed up with progressive senators to undertake the almost impossible challenge of defeating the cabinet nominee. The 51 to 44 Senate vote was so close, because we were able to expose Butz as… well, as butt-ugly. We brought the abusive power of corporate agribusiness into the public consciousness for the first time. We had won a moral victory, but it turned out to be a curse and a blessing. First, the curse. Butz had risen to prominence in the world of agriculture by devoting himself to the corporate takeover of the global food economy. He openly promoted the preeminence of middleman food manufacturers over family farmers. “Agriculture is no longer a way of life,” he barked, “it’s a business.” He instructed farmers to “Get big or get out” – and proceeded to shove tens of thousands of them out by promoting an export-based, corporate-run food economy. “Adapt,” he warned, “or die.” The ruination of farms and rural communities, Butz added, “releases people to do something useful in our society.” The curse of Butz, however, spun off a blessing. Small farmers and food artisans practically threw up at the resulting Twinkieization of America’s food. They were sickened that nature’s own contribution to human culture was being turned into another plasticized product of corporate profiteers. They threw themselves into creating and sustaining a viable alternative. Linking locally with consumers, environmentalists, community activists, marketers, and others, the Good Food rebellion has since sprouted, spread, and blossomed from coast to coast. To find farmers markets and other expressions of this movement right where you live, go to www.LocalHarvest.org.

This holiday season got me to thinking about America's spirit of giving, and I don't mean this overdone business of Christmas, Hanukkah and other holiday gifts. I mean our true spirit of giving – giving of ourselves. Yes, we are a country of rugged individualists, yet there's also a deep, community-minded streak in each of us. We're a people who believe in the notion that we're all in this together, that we can make our individual lives better by contributing to the common good. The establishment media pay little attention to grassroots generosity, focusing instead on the occasional showy donation by what it calls "philanthropists" -- big tycoons who give a little piece of their billions to some university or museum in exchange for getting a building named after them. But in my mind, the real philanthropists are the millions of you ordinary folks who have precious little money to give, but consistently give of themselves, and do it without demanding that their name be engraved on a granite wall. My own Daddy, rest his soul, was a fine example of this. With half a dozen other guys in Denison, Texas, he started the Little League baseball program volunteering to build the park, sponsor and coach the teams, run the squawking P.A. system, etc. etc. Even after I graduated from Little League, Daddy stayed working at it, because his involvement was not merely for his kids . . . but for all. He felt the same way about being taxed to build a public library in town. I don't recall him ever going in that building, much less checking-out a book, but he wanted it to be there for the community and he was happy to pay his part. Not that he was a do-good liberal, for God's sake -- indeed, he called himself a conservative. My Daddy didn't even know he had a political philosophy, but he did, and it's the best I've ever heard. He would often say to me, "Everybody does better when everybody does better." If only our leaders in Washington and on Wall Street would begin practicing this true American Philosophy.

Here's a twist on Christmas that would make Jesus weep. First, a right-wing faction in the US has been wringing its hands over a hokey cultural "crisis" cooked up by the faction itself, namely that liberals, atheists, humanists, and – God Forbid – Marxists are waging a "War on Christmas." The infidels are not accused of lobbing bombs in this war, but Words of Mass Destruction. Specifically, the right-wing purists wail that unholy lefties are perverting the season by saying "Happy Holidays," instead of "Merry Christmas." Second, some ultra conservative members of this same faction have launched their own war – against Jesus! How twisted is this? They say no one should mess with the word "Christmas," yet they're messing with the guy Christmas is supposed to be about. Okay, technically they’re not going directly at Jesus, but at a key part of his message – and in particular, at a key messenger of Christianity: Pope Francis! They've decided that the Pope is a "Marxist," pointing out that Francis speaks often about "the structural causes of poverty," the "idolatry of money," and the "new tyranny" of unfettered capitalism. Obviously, say the Pontiff's pious critics, that's commie talk. The clincher for them was when Francis wrote an official Papal document in which he asked in outrage: "How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?" See, cried the carpers, that's proof that Francis is the Red Pope! But wait – that was a very good question he asked, one ripe with the moral wrath that Jesus himself frequently showed toward the callous rich and their "love of money." Indeed, the Pope's words ring with the deep ethics you find in Jesus' sermon on the Mount. Was he a commie, too? Could it be that the carpers are the ones lacking in real Christmas spirit?