What would Thomas Jefferson say to those who evoke
his words to install fascism in America today?
“Why can't you see?
We just want to be free
To have our homes and families
And live our lives as we please.”
Dana Rohrabacher
West Coast Libertarian Troubadour (1973)
(From David Friedman's, The Machinery of Freedom)
April 16, 2007 was the 264th Anniversary of the
birth of Thomas Jefferson. A lot has happened in America in those
years but most importantly a lot is still happening that Americans
fail to understand. We need to connect ALL the dots.
In California a Federal Maritime Officer, Lt. Eric
Shine, is fighting charges he is depressed; although they have
argued he is employed within the proceedings they refuse to pay
him or give him his benefits; that means he receives none of his
due medical benefits or legal aid. Catch-22. Very useful to those
suing him, which includes the US Government, Homeland Security,
and the US Coast Guard. The powers that be pretty much ignored
Shine and the charges he had leveled of toxic waste dumping, graft,
and corruption, until he began to write letters to Congress. They
then slammed him with continuous litigation and decided he was
depressed. If he wasn't he should be.
Who 'they' is goes to the Dot question. If the
US Government, Homeland Security, and the Coast Guard weren't
enough Shine has gotten the attention of others who are perhaps
even scarier. One of these is The Carlyle Group and their friends
and associates. This included George W. Bush for a while; the
senior Bush is still believed to be associated.
The Carlyle Group, a corporation that handles investments
for the well connected, including alumni of the Reagan, Bush Administrations
and Saudi Princes, acquired General Dynamics, for which Eric Shine's
father worked as Vice President of Engineering in 1992. Seeing
what was happening to America 's military through the acquisition
of General Dynamics in that year gave Eric the insight he needed
to understand what was happening to the Merchant Marine. At the
time, Eric had no idea how "Six Degrees of Separation"
the world really is.
The Carlyle Group acquired General Dynamics, which
produced electronics for the military, in 1992. They purchased
the electronics division, located in San Diego, according to William
E. Conway Jr., a Carlyle managing director, in an, “all-cash
deal was for less than $100 million.” Carlyle Group, named
for the hotel where the founders met, was founded in 1987.
Moving from investment in restaurants, Carlyle
Group began assembling a portfolio with a very different focus,
at the beginning of the HW Bush Administration. General Dynamics
was expected to make $300 million when it was acquired, according
to Conway . According to a specialist in the market consulted
for this article that price was, “a steal.” We will
follow those dots in a later article.
According to the Wikipedia, “Carlyle deals
in the following industries: Aerospace & Defense, Automotive,
Consumer & Retail, Energy & Power, Healthcare, Real Estate,
Technology & Business Services, Telecommunications & Media,
and Transportation. The Carlyle Group's investments are focused
on East Asia, Europe and North America, with most investment money
coming from the United States (65%), Europe (25%), Asia (6%),
Latin America, and the Middle East . Defense investments represent
about 1% of the group's current portfolio — though this
translates, for example, into a 33.8% ownership of QinetiQ, the
UK 's recently privatized defence (sic) company.”
A shiny new Ensign in 1991, Eric Shine began what
he assumed would be a career carrying out the duties of an officer
in the Merchant Marine and Naval Officer. As part of his training
he had become familiar with the statutes and regulations that
had governed the existence of the Merchant Marine since 1791.
Shine had not yet heard the term 'privatization,' it would soon
become frighteningly familiar to him.
The term, 'privatization,' as it is used by those
in power today bears as much resemblance to the original as Anna
Nicole Smith does to Mother Theresa.
The term, 'privatization,' was first used by Dr.
Robert Poole, founder of Reason Foundation in his book, “Cutting
Back City Hall,” in the mid 70s. The idea of converting
services provided by government into services provided through
private, for profit business, became a byword for efficiency over
the next three decades. But efficiency had not been the point.
The issue was giving people back control of their own lives.
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
The idealism of the 70s was harvested for the benefit of the greedy.
The issue of privatizing began with trash collection,
proposed by Bob Poole and then Social Security, was first posed
for a position paper written for the campaign of Ed Clark, Libertarian
presidential candidate, in 1979. The 'white paper' later appeared
in much the same form under the sponsorship of Cato Institute,
founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane, III, Charles Koch, and Murray
Rothbard. During this time things changed. Ideas are useful tools
for achieving your goals; this idea proved to be fertile ground.
In 1981 Rothbard, a stalwart Austrian School Economist,
was ousted from the Cato Board. In his newsletter, Libertarian
Review, Rothbard said Cato, "revealed its true nature and
its cloven hoof. Crane, aided and abetted by Koch, ordered me
to leave Cato's regular quarterly board meeting, even though I
am a shareholder and a founding board member of the Cato Institute."
Austrian economists do not approve of Congress fiddling with the
economy.
Cato began providing regular briefings for Congress
on how to minimize their costs and optimize their profits in the
90s when the Contract on America swept into office.
Privatization and outsourcing had found applications
that lead to consequences none of the Libertarians who had originally
supported the ideas expected.
Lt. Eric Shine had seen continuous and troubling
violations of the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, through the first
six years of his career. Shine had witnessed blatant dumping of
toxic waste, violation of safety regulations, and other wrong
doing. Because he was doing his due diligence, ironically Shine
gained a reputation as a trouble maker. He persisted in reporting
these through avenues that had been truncated, leaving active
Federal Maritime Officers with no recourse. It was as if the rules
he had learned had been canceled.
Congress had mandated that at majority of American
shipping must sail under America's flag. They had done this to
ensure that ships would be available in time of conflict and peace
so that standards for safety and the well-being of the seas and
our nation would be maintained. These ships, Congress said, would
be manned by Officers of the US Merchant Marine. When Lt. Shine
began his career, the 10,000 ships under the US flag at the close
of WWII had shrunk to less than 200, reducing the protections
to America intended by Congress, and the jobs available to Federal
Maritime Officers.
In 1998, Shine began work in Hawaii for the Navy.
What Shine saw at Pearl Harbor was the application of American
ingenuity to the dissolution of the Navy Installation that had
been a hub of strength for decades. Under the mandate of privatization,
services were being transferred to private companies. Graft, corruption,
and thievery were systemic. Serving as a project engineer Shine
could find no one who would listen to his objections. There was
too much money to be made by remaining silent. Privatization and
cost reduction were the rhetorical devices that filled the air.
What Shine was witnessing was the birth of the
Corporation as its own nation in its nascent form. Having extended
corporate leverage through the use of government to wage war,
to realize profits through war and through income streams flowing
into their pockets from Americans, Corporations were now looking
at how to further their portfolios by clamping Americans into
place forever. The means were the various Grids that had become
the core of their holdings; Aerospace & Defense, Automotive,
Consumer & Retail, Energy & Power, Healthcare, Real Estate,
Technology & Business Services, Telecommunications & Media,
and Transportation.
The next step was to bolt in place those missing
links to nationhood. Corporations, including those owned by Carlyle,
have now begun to assert extraterritoriality, ignoring laws through
manipulation, payoffs, and restructuring. American maritime law
says that foreign ships cannot engage in commerce between two
American ports; the corporations are now chipping away at this
limitation. The rules exist only for others and where they augment
profits. Sea Launch, a ship that puts satellites into space, harbors
at Long Beach and has extraterritorial status. Corporations have
become nations, with all the power and money and none of the accountability.
Anyone who get in their way will be toasted.
In 2001, Lt. Shine filed a grievance in the hopes
someone would finally listen. Again he was ignored. Then, he began
writing letters to Congress and the reaction was swift. Shine
was astonished to find himself detained, charged with being 'depressed.'
He had not been aware that even if he was depressed this could
be deemed a cause for denying him medical benefits. For the CorporaState,
the rules are made anew every day, as needed.
Why would Eric Shine persist? He could have gotten
on the Corporate dole, accepted the lavish stipends offered from
his probably intentional placement with the military industrial
complex. That goes to who he is. The answers are in his origins.
Sally Shine, now 80, remembers her son, Eric, “as
a good boy,” who, “made her proud.” “Eric,”
she said, “was president of his graduating class in High
School.” Eric Shine was poised to live a life of accomplishment
when he graduated from King's Point, the Academy for the USS Merchant
Marine, in 1991. Life is full of surprises.
One of five children from a close-knit and loving
Catholic family, he had attended St. Columbia School in San Diego,
moving on to what is now Cathedral Catholic High School, while
participating in the local scouting program with Troop 272. Shine
was the first member of his troop in a long time, according to
his mother, to achieve the rank of Eagle Scout. His Court of Honor
was held February 15, 1977. During the Court of Honor the Scout
receiving his Eagle Badge renews the oath taken when he became
a scout; that oath includes the promise of, “Living honorably
reflects credit on his home, his church, his troop, and his community.”
In the experience of those who know him best, Eric
Shine takes life seriously. He did so when he chose as his Eagle
Scout Project to organize donations of food and clothing for a
poor village in Mexico and he did the same when, as newsletter
editor at King's Point, he insisted on publishing an article that
uncompromisingly told the truth, despite pressure to do otherwise.
Those were the values he had learned and then lived.
Those values stayed with him when he went on to a career in the
Merchant Marine. Career was another thing the Shine family took
seriously.
Eric's father attended West Point, as did many
other family members, going on to a career with General Dynamics
for 30 years. He retired as Vice President of Engineering and
Director of Ethics. Hard work and doing the right thing were values
strongly inculcated in the Shine home. Eric was sure that this
whole thing could be cleared up, if he just persisted.
Each of us sees the world through our own place
in that world, and Eric Shine began his career in the Merchant
Marine, hearing from his father about General Dynamics, where
the elder Shine had spent most of his life, and about doing the
right thing. Unfortunately, that does not square with the birth
of the CorporaStates.
The stark images of returning veterans at Walter
Reed Hospital and elsewhere are still alive in the minds of Americans,
demonstrating what privatization and 'cost reduction' really mean.
Those and other techniques for lowering costs have been used since
the Vietnam War with deadly results. Veterans needing treatment
and benefits were, and are, forced to wait while their symptoms
are dismissed as 'emotional problems.' Those in need are simply
waited to death. Dealing with Shine was just a matter of using
the same methods that worked to lower other costs.
According to Philip Meskin, founder of the Veteran's
Party, the treatment meted out to Shine exactly parallels the
treatment of Veterans after all American wars since Vietnam.
“Same old business as usual,” he said.
Meskin, added that, “300,000 veterans died after the Vietnam
War of Agent Orange and other diseases related to cancer, cell
degenerative conditions, and other undefined causes.” “They
were depressed, too,” he said wryly. Social workers are
notorious for rendering opinions that deny benefits to veterans
based on such causes as 'depression.' “There are no limits
to what they will do to cut costs. They let people die every day,”
said Meskin.
So the same technique that eliminates costs in
caring for veterans can, in the case of Shine, make it impossible
for him as a whistle blower to find help.
So many are involved. So many, like Dana Rohrabacher,
who were once singing the praises of freedom, have found cozy
lives elsewhere. Following the money, connecting the dots, always
brings us the answers, however unpalatable those may be.
Next week Lt. Shine will face yet another round
of court dates, again without counsel. Detained without pay, he
is now without any resources – but he continues to speak
out. Eagle Scouts don't give up and Shine is no quitter. One man
left standing against the CorporaState, unless others help. David
and Goliath was nothing to this.
Happy Birthday, Thomas Jefferson!
(To contact Lt. Eric Shine go to his website.
He will be grateful to hear from you.)
Melinda Pillsbury-Foster is the author of GREED:
The NeoConning of America. She hosts a talk show on BBSRadio.com,
writes for the Iconoclast, and is presently working on building
an effective coalition for change. Her blog is How
the NeoCons Stole Freedom. |