A day that lives in infamy

[Ian Livingston]

Yes, by the time Reagan took office in 1980, the number of independent news
agencies was a fraction of what it had been during the 60s. It was,
however, an organic process endemic to capitalism: greater volumes of
ownership provide greater profits to the owner(s) and investors.
Independent news agencies got swallowed up in the same way neighborhood
grocery stores did, and banks, pharmacies, bowling alleys, etc and so on.
The pathology is in the influence great wealth peddles in government. As
the great corporations gained control of greater shares of the markets,
they gained access to the senators and representatives necessary to approve
the legislation their lawyers wrote. That process certainly predates
Nixon--even Roosevelt, and I mean Teddy--it is one of the foundational
elements of American capitalism and governance. But, for a moment, for 30
days, anyhow, it seemed like system might have faltered, and the nation
might develop some characteristics of leadership from the bottom up. It was
illusion, of course, and the corporates used the opportunity to swallow up
the presses and offer them as outlets for the pols. Was the pardon good for
the country? That depends on who's buttering your bread. It was good for
Wall Street.


On Fri, Aug 9, 2013 at 2:26 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:

> We will always have Nixon to kick around, that slimy turd.
> *NY Review of Books @nybooks *11m<http://us-mg4.mail.yahoo.com/nybooks/status/365943765304750080>
> On the anniversary of Nixon’s resignation, readings by Gore Vidal, Norman
> Mailer, Garry Wills, and Mary McCarthy http://j.mp/11Sioge <http://t.co/3C99AHdSku>
>
>   *From:* "kelber at mindspring.com" <kelber at mindspring.com>
> *To:* pynchon-l at waste.org
> *Sent:* Friday, August 9, 2013 2:28 PM
>
> *Subject:* Re: A day that lives in infamy
>
>  But one thing we still had back then was a relatively independent press,
> with genuine investigative journalists who helped expose the Watergate
> affair. Ford's pardon was a disgrace, of course, but I'm not convinced that
> it was the first step in the road to the current level of NSA surveillance
> and the trampling of the civil rights of voters, poor people and
> whistleblowers. The consolidation of the major news outlets and the
> systematic buying out of government (not just US) by corporate interests,
> via lobbying and manipulations of existing laws, had already begun. It
> wasn't caused by Ford's pardon, or by Nixon's famous megalomania. If Nixon
> had served time, along with various of his minions, would we be living in a
> flourishing democracy now? Even if Nixon had been a passionate democrat and
> pacifist, the powers-that-be would have replaced him, inevitably, with a
> Reagan. The really overt, opening battle cry, the real day of infamy, that
> got us where we are today, was Reagan's 1981 declaration of war against the
> PATCO workers, which opened up the floodgates of union busting. It was a
> corporate test case on what the American people would swallow. And boy did
> they swallow!
>
> Laura
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ian Livingston
> Sent: Aug 9, 2013 12:31 PM
> To: alice wellintown
> Cc: pynchon -l
> Subject: Re: A day that lives in infamy
>
> I was quite young at the time, it was just prior to my 18th birthday, and
> I recall the glee and relief around Minneapolis, where I was living at the
> time. People among my group of counter-culture drop-out types were mighty
> happy, we began to dream that the politicians had been served notice, that
> they would now recognize that they were the servants of the people. Nobody
> really knew what it was all about, only that "we" had taken down the
> President of the United States. While it's true that had it not been for
> the popular groundswell the investigation might have turned out quite
> differently, the delusion remained until September 8, 1974, which I count
> as the day the government officially announced its status as an agency
> independent of the will of the people, and the beginning of all that
> happened after. But for this one month we had our little dream, the people
> had the power, as Patti Smith later said, to redeem the work of fools.
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 9, 2013 at 6:27 AM, alice wellintown <
> alicewellintown at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> You can't be serious. Nixon obstructed justice after the Burglary. The
> burglary was a far more serious crime than anything Obama has been accused
> of, and the cover up, which some place higher than the burglary, though
> doing so  is questionable, caused the president to resign because he, as
> president, tried to subvert the constitution, to undermine the essence of
> our democratic system. He did not only engage in crimes of political
> espionage, spy on the competition, he engaged in crimes of sabotage.
> Remember too, that many o the people, groups of people he, through abuse of
> power, damaged, were "competition" only in his paranoid mind. Nixon's
> competition, those who suffered from his crimes, include, anyone who
> opposed his filthy wars, the free press, our system of election, our system
> of justice. Not to mention our History. Your quip here seems to side with
> Nixon on the last of these.
>
> The paranoid man in the theatre / theater can't here the rocket. What?
> It's important to keep things in perspective: Obama is not the new Nixon.
> The world is changed, for he better, despite the sufferings from h excesses
> of global capital. We ain't livin in no Nixon Land no mo.
>
>
> On Friday, August 9, 2013, wrote:
>
> In light of the present-day levels of surveillance, his actions seem
> almost lovably benign and even comical. Ooh, he spied on the competition -
> horrors!
>
> Laura
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ian Livingston **
> Sent: Aug 8, 2013 11:31 PM
> To: pynchon -l **
> Subject: A day that lives in infamy
>
>
> http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/picture/2013/aug/08/photography-president-nixon
> ****
>
>
>
>
>
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