Published on Monday, November 14, 2005 by the Los
Angeles Times
This Isn't The Real America
by Jimmy Carter

In recent years, I have become increasingly concerned
by a host of radical government policies that now
threaten many basic principles espoused by all
previous administrations, Democratic and Republican.

These include the rudimentary American commitment to
peace, economic and social justice, civil liberties,
our environment and human rights.

Also endangered are our historic commitments to
providing citizens with truthful information, treating
dissenting voices and beliefs with respect, state and
local autonomy and fiscal responsibility.

At the same time, our political leaders have declared
independence from the restraints of international
organizations and have disavowed long-standing global
agreements — including agreements on nuclear arms,
control of biological weapons and the international
system of justice.

Instead of our tradition of espousing peace as a
national priority unless our security is directly
threatened, we have proclaimed a policy of "preemptive
war," an unabridged right to attack other nations
unilaterally to change an unsavory regime or for other
purposes. When there are serious differences with
other nations, we brand them as international pariahs
and refuse to permit direct discussions to resolve
disputes.

Regardless of the costs, there are determined efforts
by top U.S. leaders to exert American imperial
dominance throughout the world.

These revolutionary policies have been orchestrated by
those who believe that our nation's tremendous power
and influence should not be internationally
constrained. Even with our troops involved in combat
and America facing the threat of additional terrorist
attacks, our declaration of "You are either with us or
against us!" has replaced the forming of alliances
based on a clear comprehension of mutual interests,
including the threat of terrorism.

Another disturbing realization is that, unlike during
other times of national crisis, the burden of conflict
is now concentrated exclusively on the few heroic men
and women sent back repeatedly to fight in the
quagmire of Iraq. The rest of our nation has not been
asked to make any sacrifice, and every effort has been
made to conceal or minimize public awareness of
casualties.

Instead of cherishing our role as the great champion
of human rights, we now find civil liberties and
personal privacy grossly violated under some extreme
provisions of the Patriot Act.

Of even greater concern is that the U.S. has
repudiated the Geneva accords and espoused the use of
torture in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, and
secretly through proxy regimes elsewhere with the
so-called extraordinary rendition program. It is
embarrassing to see the president and vice president
insisting that the CIA should be free to perpetrate
"cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment"
on people in U.S. custody.

Instead of reducing America's reliance on nuclear
weapons and their further proliferation, we have
insisted on our right (and that of others) to retain
our arsenals, expand them, and therefore abrogate or
derogate almost all nuclear arms control agreements
negotiated during the last 50 years. We have now
become a prime culprit in global nuclear
proliferation. America also has abandoned the
prohibition of "first use" of nuclear weapons against
nonnuclear nations, and is contemplating the
previously condemned deployment of weapons in space.

Protection of the environment has fallen by the
wayside because of government subservience to
political pressure from the oil industry and other
powerful lobbying groups. The last five years have
brought continued lowering of pollution standards at
home and almost universal condemnation of our nation's
global environmental policies.

Our government has abandoned fiscal responsibility by
unprecedented favors to the rich, while neglecting
America's working families. Members of Congress have
increased their own pay by $30,000 per year since
freezing the minimum wage at $5.15 per hour (the
lowest among industrialized nations).

I am extremely concerned by a fundamentalist shift in
many houses of worship and in government, as church
and state have become increasingly intertwined in ways
previously thought unimaginable.

As the world's only superpower, America should be seen
as the unswerving champion of peace, freedom and human
rights. Our country should be the focal point around
which other nations can gather to combat threats to
international security and to enhance the quality of
our common environment. We should be in the forefront
of providing human assistance to people in need. It is
time for the deep and disturbing political divisions
within our country to be substantially healed, with
Americans united in a common commitment to revive and
nourish the historic political and moral values that
we have espoused during the last 230 years.

Jimmy Carter was the 39th president of the United
States. His newest book is "Our Endangered Values:
America's Moral Crisis," published this month by Simon
& Schuster.
What a guy!!!!!!!!!!!!

© 2005 Los Angeles Times

although i have love for the the 5 boroughs, i'm from the "fresh coast" (aka the west coast, some say the best coast... :P) "here's a little story that must be told..." about where i live:

EL PUEBLO DE NUESTRA SENORA LA REINA DE LOS ANGELES DE PORCIUNCULA. The name Los Angeles is Spanish for The Angels. There is much more to this name, however. On Wednesday, August 2, 1769, Father Juan Crespi, a Franciscan priest accompanying the first European land expedition through California, led by Captain Fernando Rivera Y Moncado, described in his journal a "beautiful river from the northwest" located at "34 degrees 10 minutes." They named the river Nuestra Señora de los Angeles de la Porciúncula. In the Franciscan calendar, August 2 was the day of the celebration of the feast of the Perdono at the tiny Assisi chapel of St. Francis of Assisi. Early in St. Francis' life, the Benedictines had given him this tiny chapel for his use near Assisi. The chapel, ruined and in need of repair, was located on what the Italians called a porziuncola or "very small parcel of land." Painted on the wall behind the altar was a fresco of the Virgin Mary surrounded by angels. Now contained within a Basilica, the chapel was named Saint Mary of the Angels at the Little Portion. The newly discovered "beautiful river" was named in honor of this celebration and this chapel. In 1781, a new settlement was established along that river. The settlement came to be known as El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula or The Town of Our Lady the Queen of Angels of the Little Portion although its official name was simply El Pueblo de la Reina de Los Angeles [from www.losangelesalmanac.com/topic...a.htm] The full name of Los Angeles, El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula, can be abbreviated to 3.63% of its size: L.A. [Stuart Kidd].