جيسون
ميلر



ترجمة
: قسم الترجمة في مركز الشرق
العربي



بالتجول
عبر أي مدينة أو قرية مأهولة
نسبياً في أمريكا، يواجه المرء
مشهداً سوريالياً اجتاحته
معابد تفجيعية الأشكال لإلهي
أمريكا التوأم واللذان هما
الرأسمالية والاستهلاكية.
وبينما تدفع أعداد متزايدة من
الملاك الأفراد إلى الانقراض،
تتابع شركات عملاقة (حوتية) مثل (وول
مارت)، و(مكدونالد)، ومئات
الشركات الأخرى إنشاءها السريع
للمزيد من المعابد لخدمة جماعات
المصلين المتحمسين لها. وما أن
يصبحوا في الداخل، يضحي العديد
من الأمريكيين وبسرور بالوفير
من أموالهم عند مذابح يؤمها
أتباع الاستهلاكية الغافلين. من
أجل فوائد وأجور ضئيلة بشكل
مروع، يجمع أمناء الصندوق،
الذين يرعون كنائس (الاستهلاكية
والرأسمالية) المقدسة، العطايا
التي تمكن أتباعهم المخلصين من
جني ثمار ممارسة ولائهم.



بإمكان
المستهلكين الجيدين الصغار
تلقي خيرات حقيقية من (البركات)
والتي تتضمن العمل في وظائف هي
بمثابة الإلتزام بعقد عبودية،
وسمن مفرط، ودين مستعص،
والانعزال عن باقي العالم،
والدعم دونما قصد لنظام قوة
عسكرية عديم الرحمة آخذ في
التطور إلى فاشية، وعبادة وثنية
للمشاهير والمال، وتسهيل
للتركيز الفاحش للثروة في أيدي
قلة، والمشاركة في انتهاك بالغ
لبيئتنا.



قد
يكونون متواجدين في أرض يباب
روحي، ولكن على الأقل فإن هؤلاء
الأمريكيين الذين لديهم ما يكفي
من الحظ لإيجاد أنفسهم في
الطبقة الوسطى الآخذة بالتقلص
يستطيعون الحصول على الضروريات
البشرية، وبعض الرفاهية الحسية
والأمن والاستقرار النسبيين (على
الأقل في المدى القصير). على
الرغم من ذلك، فإن عدداً
متزايداً من الأمريكيين يجدون
أنفسهم وهم يتجولون في صحراء
قاحلة مفتقرين إلى كلٍ من دعم
الروح ودعم (البركات) المادية
التي يتم إغداقها على محصلي
الأجور في الطبقة الوسطى من قبل
كهنة الرأسمالية والاستهلاكية.



ـ كيف نشأ هذا
الكابوس؟



في
الوقت الذي ظهرت فيه (الماجنا
كارتا*)
وتطورت، وتمت قولبة دستور
الولايات المتحدة ووضع في حيز
التنفيذ، بدأت الإقطاعية
والملكية في لفظ أنفاسها.
والمزعوم أن حكم القانون كان قد
حل محل حكم الإنسان لنشر قدر
سليم من العدالة والمساواة.



في
الحقيقة، فإن البشرية ببساطة
كانت قد استبدلت مجموعة من
الطغاة بأخرى. وحتى هذا اليوم،
مايزال الكثيرون يتملقون
بأسطورة كون الولايات المتحدة
هي صلة الوصل للحرية والمساواة
وحقوق الإنسان. ومع ذلك، فإن
الجمهورية الدستورية للولايات
المتحدة كانت قد تمت صياغتها
بشكل رئيسي على يد رجال بيض،
والذين كان العديد منهم أثرياء
وملاكي أراضي يتطلعون إلى تحرير
أنفسهم من طغيان الملك جورج في
نفس الوقت الذي يحتفظون فيه
بمصالحهم الضيقة. إن حقيقة أنه
كانت هناك مقاومة حقيقية لإدخال
(بيان حقوق الإنسان) في الدستور
لهي دلالة وافية على أولويات
العديد من آبائنا المؤسسين.



بإنشائهم
لحكومة فيدرالية قوية،
وتقليلهم من قدرة الفقراء
والطبقة العاملة على صنع القرار
إلى الحد الأدنى وذلك في
الانتخابات التي يتم إجراؤها في
المناسبات للنواب والذين يحد من
تأثير أصواتهم عن طريق تشكيل
" الهيئة الناخبة"
وبحرمانهم النساء من المشاركة
السياسية، وتجاهلهم للسكان
الأمريكيين الأصليين،
واحتفاظهم بشرعية العبودية،
بفعلهم هذا، أنشا مؤسسونا أمة منحت
الحرية والمساواة بشكل يكاد
يكون حصرياً للذكور البيض الذي
يمتلكون قدراً من الثروة.



سرعان
ما تعلمت الطبقة الملاكة
الحاكمة في أمريكا التلاعب
بقوانينهم لاستغلال سائر الشعب
بطرق مختلفة عن طرق أسلافهم
الذين حكموا من فوق العروش. وفي
الوقت الذي عاشوا كلوردات،
وملوك، فإن النخبة في الولايات
المتحدة كانوا يتشمسون في بريق
احترام (قيمهم المتنورة). وعبر
السنوات فإنهم قد أظهروا
ألوانهم الحقيقة للعالم
بانخراطهم في العديد من المساعي
الإمبريالية، واستئصالهم
تقريباً للسكان الأمريكيين
الأصليين، ومحاربتهم الفعلية
للحركات التقدمية كحركة (أبولشن)
و(معاناة النساء) بكل جزء من
كيانهم التجمعي.



(الرأسمالية:
الحكم الاقتصادي للأغنياء بيد
الأغنياء، للأغنياء)



كونها
قد أسست على مبادئ الحرية
الفردية وحرية اختيار المصير (للذكور
البيض ملاكي العقارات)، فقد
وفرت الولايات المتحدة في أول
نشأتها أرضية خصبة لبذور
الرأسمالية. إن أموراً مثل
العبودية والتزايد المتفجر في
أعداد البنوك، وتوجه أمريكا
القوي لتوسعة أرضها، والتجارة
المحايدة خلال الحرب بين
بريطانيا العظمى وفرنسا،
وأخيراً الثورة الصناعية قد
مكنت الرأسمالية الأمريكية
لتنمو إلى غابة مزدهرة.



بحلول
نهاية القرن التاسع عشر، ازدهرت
شركات الإئتمان والاحتكار. لقد
منعت سياسة (الاستبهال
الاقتصادي*)
الحكومة (المكونة من الشعب) من
التدخل في الاستغلال الذي
تمارسه النخبة فاحشة الثراء
للإنسان وللبيئة. لقد كانت طبقة
الأغنياء في أمريكا تعيش بسعة
في حين كافح بقية السكان وعانوا.



لسنوات،
لقنتنا مدارس أمريكا وإعلامها
فكرة أن الرأسمالية هي النظام
الاجتماعي الاقتصادي الأعلى في
تاريخ البشرية. بالرغم من دعاية
(الشعور الجيد) التي يقصد بها
إبقاءنا طيعين، عاملين،
ومستهلكين، فإن هناك جانباً
حالك الظلمة للطريقة الأمريكية
التي يتم التبجح بها بشدة.



(لم
تنشأ وفرة أمريكا من قبل تضحيات
العامة للصالح العام، بل من قبل
عباقرة منتجين من الرجال
الأحرار والذين كافحوا من أجل
مصالحهم الشخصية ومن أجل تكوين
ثرواتهم الخاصة).



شكراً،
آيان راند، لتأكيد وحشية نظام
أمريكا الاقتصادي والاجتماعي
وجشعه البالغ، نظام تمكين قلة
ذات امتياز خاص من الذين يتقنون
(لعب اللعبة) من متابعة مصالحهم
الشخصية دونما رحمة، وتجميع
ثروات شخصية، واحتكار حصة الأسد
من (الوفرة الأمريكية).



إن
اقتصاد الولايات المتحدة،
والذي يمتلك العديد من العناصر
ذات التعريف المقبول عموماً
للرأسمالية، ملطف بدرجة معينة
بناء على عناصر ليكون من الأنسب
أن يتم عزوها إلى الاشتراكية،
أو (نظرية الانتفاع التقدمية)،
والأنظمة الاجتماعية
والاقتصادية المكرسة في قسم
كبير منها لضمان رفاه المجتمع
ككل والتي تقدر البشر ككائنات
ذات أحاسيس أكثر من كونهم سلعاً.



لسوء
الحظ، فإن الرأسمالية على
العموم، هي السائدة في النظام
الاجتماعي الاقتصادي الأمريكي
وهي تشكل قسماً كبيراً من
شخصيتنا الوطنية (أو نقصاً فيها
تابعاً لذلك). تجسد أمريكا
الاستغلال عديم الرحمة للبشرية
وللأرض. ففي النموذج الرأسمالي،
فإن الكائنات البشرية والكوكب
هي ببساطة عناصر مادية وجدت
لتلبية رغبات السادة
البرجوازيين.



وتمضي
الامبريالية الليبرالية
الجديدة على وئام مع الرأسمالية.
إن الطمع الذي لا يشبعه شيء وحصر
الاهتمام بالحسيات لا تحترم
تخوماً ولا حدوداً.



وعلى
ماهي عليه الولايات المتحدة من
القسوة والوحشية، فبإمكاننا أن
نتخيل كمن كانت لتكون عديمة
الرحمة فيما لو أرخي العنان
للدارونيين الاجتماعيين من
الطبقة الأرضية العليا من
مجتمعنا لتطبيق رؤيتهم
الهوبيزية.




Wednesday,
May 31, 2006



by:
Jason Miller



citizen
journalist



Rolling
through virtually any reasonably populous city or town
in
America
, one encounters a surreal landscape blighted by
grotesque temples to

America

's twin gods of Capitalism and Consumerism. As an
increasing number of individual proprietors are driven
to extinction, Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and hundreds more
leviathan corporations continue their rapid construction
of more houses of worship to serve their zealous
congregation. Once inside, many Americans gleefully
sacrifice an abundance of their greenbacks at altars
attended by Consumerism's unwitting acolytes.



For
appallingly meager wages and benefits, the cashiers
tending the sacred Churches of Capitalism and
Consumerism gather the offerings which enable their
fellow faithful to reap the fruits of practicing their
devotion.



Good
little Consumers can receive a veritable cornucopia of
"blessings" which include working in jobs
amounting to indentured servitude, obesity,
insurmountable debt, insularity from the rest of the
world, unwitting support of a merciless militaristic
regime which is evolving into fascism, idolatrous
worship of celebrities and money, facilitation of
obscene concentration of wealth into the hands of a few,
and participation in the severe desecration of our
environment.



They
may exist in a spiritual wasteland, but at least those
Americans who are fortunate enough to find themselves in
the shrinking middle class have access to basic human
necessities, some creature comforts, and relative
stability and safety (at least for the short term).
However, a growing number of Americans find themselves
wandering in a barren desert, lacking both sustenance
for the soul and the corporeal "blessings"
bestowed upon the middle class wage earners by the high
priests of Capitalism and Consumerism.







How
did this nightmare evolve?



As
the Magna Charta emerged and evolved, and the United
States Constitution was conceived and implemented,
"feudalism" and monarchy began to gasp their
dying breaths. Ostensibly, the rule of law was
superseding the rule of men to deliver a sound measure
of justice and equality.



In
truth, humanity simply traded one set of tyrants for
another. To this day many still cling to the myth that
the

United States

is the nexus of freedom, equality and human rights. Yet
the constitutional republic of the

United States

was forged primarily by White men, many of whom were
wealthy land-owners looking to free themselves from the
tyranny of King George while preserving their narrow
interests. The fact that there was significant
resistance to the inclusion of the Bill of Rights in the
Constitution speaks volumes of the priorities of many of
our Founding Fathers.



In
creating a powerful federal government, minimizing the
decision-making power of the poor and working class to
occasional elections of representatives (while limiting
the impact of their votes by forming the Electoral
College), barring women from political participation,
ignoring the Native American population, and maintaining
the legality of slavery, our founders created a nation
which afforded freedom and equality almost exclusively
to White males who possessed a measure of wealth.





America

's
propertied ruling class quickly learned to manipulate
their laws to exploit the rest of the population in ways
not unlike their predecessors who reigned from thrones.
As they lived like lords and kings, the elites of the

United States

basked in the glow of admiration of their
"enlightened values". Over the years they
showed their true colors to the world by engaging in
numerous imperialistic endeavors, nearly wiping out the
Native American population, and fighting progressive
movements like Abolition and Women's Suffrage with
virtually every fiber of their collective being.







Capitalism:
Economic Rule of the Rich, by the Rich, for the Rich



Founded
on the principles of individual liberty and
self-determination (for White male property owners), the
nascent

United States

provided fertile ground for the seeds of Capitalism.
Conditions such as slavery, explosive growth in the
number of banks,
America
's powerful drive to expand its territory, neutral trade
during the war between
Great Britain
and

France

, and ultimately, the Industrial Revolution enabled
American Capitalism to grow into a thriving jungle.



By
the late Nineteenth Century, trusts and monopolies
flourished. Laissez faire economic policy prevented the
government "of the people" from meddling in
the wealthy elite's obscene human and environmental
exploitation.

America

's plutocracy was living large while the rest of the
population struggled and suffered.







For
years,

America

's schools and media have inculcated us with the notion
that Capitalism is the superlative socioeconomic system
in the history of humankind. In spite of the "feel
good" propaganda intended to keep us pacified,
working, and consuming, there is a very dark side to the
much vaunted

American Way

.



"

America

's abundance was created not by public sacrifices to the
common good, but by the productive genius of free men
who pursued their own personal interests and the making
of their own private fortunes."



Thank
you, Ayn Rand, for affirming the naked brutality and
avarice of
America
's socioeconomic system, a system which enables a
privileged few who "play the game" well to
mercilessly pursue their personal interests, amass
private fortunes, and hoard the lion's share of "

America

's abundance".



The
economy of the United States, which possesses many
elements of commonly accepted definitions of Capitalism,
is tempered to some degree by components which would
more appropriately be attributed to Socialism or
Progressive Utilization Theory (PROUT), socioeconomic
systems devoted in large part to ensuring the welfare of
society as a whole and which value humans as sentient
beings rather than commodities.



Unfortunately,
by and large, Capitalism predominates in the American
socioeconomic system and represents a substantial
portion of our national character (or lack thereof).

America

embodies ruthless exploitation of humanity and the
Earth. In the capitalist paradigm, human beings and the
planet are simply material objects which exist to
fulfill the desires of the bourgeoisie masters.
Imperialism and Neoliberalism go hand in glove with
Capitalism. Insatiable greed and objectification do not
respect borders or boundaries.



Cruel
and brutal as the United States is, imagine how ruthless
it would be were the Social Darwinists of the upper
stratum of our society given free rein to implement
their Hobbesian vision.







Relentless
Momentum



After
years of gains for the poor, women, minorities, and
labor throughout the Twentieth Century, a champion arose
for

America

's White Capitalist Patriarchy in 1980. When Ronald
Reagan took the driver's seat, he wasn't content to
simply return justice and compassion to the back seat.
He threw them in the trunk and left them there to rot.







Reagan's
successors, Republican and Democrat alike, have worked
feverishly to refortify the Capitalist bulwarks of
privatization, property laws, deregulation, cuts in
social spending, and free trade agreements.







American
Capitalism is a pyramid scheme shaped and forged over
time to ensure that a small minority of principally
White males garner a majority of the wealth. A few token
minorities are allowed to "join the club"
while some women enter the upper stratosphere (usually
by virtue of their birthright and inheritance), but by
and large, the White Patriarchy maintains its
strangle-hold on choice properties like Boardwalk and

Park Place

. A majority of Americans wind up holding
Mediterranean
and Baltic.







You
Might as Well Stand Around Waiting to be Struck by
Lightening



Horatio
Alger wrote over 130 very popular fiction novels in the
Nineteenth Century. Unfortunately, his ideal notions of
attaining "rags to riches" success through
hard work and determination in the Capitalist system
were principally fiction too. Calling him a useful idiot
would be unfair because his heart was in the right
place, but his works did provide very useful propaganda
for the wealthy ruling class who wanted their modern day
serfs to believe they had a realistic chance of rising
to the top of the economic or political food chain.
Undeniably there are those who started with virtually
nothing and accrued vast fortunes or became powerful
people, but for each one who did, millions failed. And
the same is true today.







He
Who Has the Gold Makes the Rules



Consider
that over half of our presidents came from families
ranking amongst the wealthiest 3% of Americans while at
least a dozen sprang from the loins of elitists in the
top 1%.







In
2005, 143 of 435

US

Representatives and one in three Senators were
millionaires.



Statistics
from 2002 indicate that eight of the fifteen wealthiest
individuals in

America

had acquired their fortunes through inheritance. Five of
these eight were Waltons. The other three were progeny
of the founder of the Mars Candy empire. Three of the
top fifteen derived their fortunes from the same
company, Microsoft. No concentration of wealth in the
hands of a few there, is there?







Reports
from 2002 also indicate that Bill Gates had acquired as
much wealth as the bottom 40% of US households. And the
Walton clan possessed 771,287 times the wealth of the
average US household. Here is to the land of equal
opportunity!







In
2004, the

United States

had 374 billionaires and 7.5 millionaires (about 2% of
the population). The wealthiest Americans possessed $11
trillion in assets. Meanwhile 13% of Americans lived
below poverty level. What was that Horatio Alger myth
again?



Yes,
the bourgeoisie is thriving and dominating in the

United States

. We are indeed experiencing the dawn of the Second
Gilded Age.



According
to Friedrich Engels, the bourgeoisie are:



"...the
class of modern capitalists, owners of the means of
social production and employers of wage labour."







Whose
function is:



"...the
appropriation and therefore control of the labour of
others and... the selling of the products of this
labour."



And
who are differentiated from the small proprietors (which
their massive corporate entities often crush) by:



"capitalist
production requires an individual capital big enough to
employ a fairly large number of workers at a time; only
when he himself is wholly released from labour does the
employer of labour become a full-blooded
capitalist."



More
staggering statistics demonstrate who reaps the bounty
in a Capitalist system (even one constrained by elements
of more just and humane economic systems):



More
than 99% of American businesses have fewer than 500
employees and account for less than 37% of all business
sales.



Elite
corporations (those employing more than 5,000 people)
comprise a fraction of the remaining 1% of American
businesses, yet ring up over 40% of sales.







Within
specific business sectors, corporate monopolists shine
brightly. The fifty largest banks control over 35% of
bank assets in the

United States

.







The
largest 100 corporations alone account for over 46% of
corporate net income after taxes.



1%
of Americans own more stock than the 90% of us who dwell
at the bottom of Bush's "ownership society".



While
a tiny segment of the

US

population becomes increasingly powerful both
economically and politically, working class families
continue to rely on two incomes to make ends meet while
13% of the population lives below the poverty level.



As
the semblance of a meritocracy in

America

succumbs to the forces of plutocratic ambition and greed
under the Bush Regime, American economic system's
"noble and fair" reputation is dutifully
maintained by genuflecting mainstream media pundits. Yet
there is one particularly shameful stain which not even
master propagandists can mask.







Material
Prosperity.Spiritual Bankruptcy



In
a self-proclaimed Christian nation awash in a sea of
money, guided by allegedly noble principles, and
purported to have a Manifest Destiny to convert the
world to the American Way, a significant number of
discarded, hopelessly poor human beings are living proof
of the cruel hypocrisy of the ruling elite of the United
States.

America

's homeless are living testaments to the gross
injustices of Capitalism, even in an economy tempered
with elements of government-funded social programs and
regulations on businesses.







"Let
all bear in mind that a society is judged not so much by
the standards attained by its more affluent and
privileged members as by the quality of life which it is
able to assure for its weakest members."



--Javier
Perez de Cuellar (former PM of

Peru

and Secretary General to the UN)



Each
year 3.5 million Americans experience homelessness. Of
these unfortunates, 750,000 are chronically homeless.
49% are Black while only 35% are White (which represents
an obviously gross disproportion when compared to the
racial make-up of the general population). A startling
40% of the homeless include families.







Who
are these Nameless, Forgotten, "Disposable"
Human Beings?



Homelessness
is not limited to the conventional notion of people
sleeping in a cardboard box or on a park bench.

America

's homeless people include those who live in their cars,
abandoned buildings, cheap motels called flop-houses,
and train or bus stations.



Many
homeless maintain jobs making sub-standard wages. Other
ways the homeless obtain their meager incomes is through
begging, street performance, selling street magazines
(written and distributed by the homeless), and selling
their blood plasma. In their desperation, some feign
illness to gain admission to hospitals while others
commit crimes so they can get "three hots and a
cot".







Those
with untreated mental illness are amongst the most
vulnerable of our society. Tragically, the mentally
afflicted comprise 25% of the homeless population. In
the 1960's, the

United States

government de-institutionalized many suffering with
chronic mental illness. Our ruling elites at multiple
levels of government failed (and continue to fail) to
establish and fund adequate community service programs
necessary for these people to achieve stability in their
lives. Without adequate support systems in their
communities, many mentally ill individuals wind up
living on the street.







At
least 38% of the homeless are reported to self-medicate
with drugs and alcohol to escape the misery of their
situation, thus greatly diminishing the likelihood they
can reclaim stable lives.



About
5% of the homeless are runaway teens. It is a travesty
that due to a dearth of government social safety nets,
many of these children fall prey to drugs, street gangs,
prostitution, or the pornography industry.



Representing
a particularly searing indictment of
America
's Capitalist constitutional republic are the 500,000

US

military veterans who experience homelessness each year.
Conscripted or manipulated by propaganda to fight in
wars of imperial aggression (like

Vietnam

), homeless veterans were used by the elites and cast
aside like yesterday's garbage. The Veterans
Administration only provides housing for veterans who
are chronically ill, has severely neglected the needs of
those with mental illness, and cut most Vietnam War
Veterans adrift with no job training. Risk your life to
expand the American Empire and you get to spend the rest
of your days eating out of trash dumpsters.



Many
choose homelessness, at least temporarily, because they
are unable to make a living wage in

America

's "booming" economy or find themselves
completely unemployed. Offshoring of American jobs,
stagnant wages, the soaring cost of housing, and the
agonizing loss of industrial sector jobs with healthy
wages are leaving many Americans vulnerable to financial
disaster. Overwhelmed by bills and crippled by
insufficient income, some Americans are forced to choose
amongst basic necessities. Naturally housing goes before
food and clothing, leaving people living on the street,
or if they are lucky, in their cars.



Natural
disasters like Hurricane Katrina can add dramatically to
the number of homeless. At least 50,000 Katrina victims
remain homeless.

New Orleans

is a particularly instructive case because it clearly
demonstrates the Capitalist elites' obsession with
property rights and their callous disregard for
humanity. Our Constitution charges the federal
government with promoting the general welfare. Yet the
Bush Regime had cut funding for the levees despite
warnings of the impending disaster dating back to 2001,
provided a slow and anemic relief effort by utilizing a
FEMA entity which they had gutted, and patrolled the
streets with heavily armed Blackwater contractors to
secure property and assets.



Principally
because of its draconian crack-down on non-violent
drug-users, particularly in the Black community, the
United States has the world's largest prison population
(5% of the world's population and 25% of the prison
population: more evidence that preservation of the
propertied class and their holdings must come before all
other considerations in a nation dominated by Capitalist
elites).



Since
the American justice system emphasizes punitive measures
over rehabilitation, many of the two million
incarcerated face bleak possibilities once they have
completed their sentences. Lacking job training and
adequate social coping skills while bearing the stigma
of a felony conviction, former convicts find it
extremely difficult to reassimilate into society. Many
wind up homeless, living with the friends with whom they
got into trouble in the first place, in homeless
shelters, in flop-houses, or under bridges.







Their
Milk of Human Kindness Soured Long Ago



As
the moneyed class strengthens its dominance over our
society, the plight of the homeless is worsening. The US
Conference of Mayors (representing 270 cities) reported
that the demand for homeless shelter space increased by
13% in 2001 and by 25% in 2005. 22% of those seeking
shelter in 2005 were refused.



Demonstrating
the depths of their compassion, our
"benevolent" leaders have begun to criminalize
homelessness. Of the 224 American cities that
participated in a recent National Coalition for the
Homeless survey, approximately 30% are taking measures
targeting the homeless, including banning pan-handling
and "camping", initiating frequent police
sweeps of public areas to arrest or "evict"
homeless persons, and selectively enforcing loitering
laws.



While
our heavily entrenched corporate elites and affluent
decision-makers cut their own taxes, reduce spending on
social programs, and lavish insane amounts of the
working poor's and middle class's tax money on a
military which exists to protect and expand their
pecuniary interests, they offer the weakest members of
our society, our homeless people, a quality of life that
would repulse a sewer rat.



Thanks
to the pathological greed unleashed and rewarded by
Capitalism,

America

has forged a Faustian Pact. It is inevitable that
Mephistopheles will come to collect his due. Or perhaps
he already has.







Jason
Miller is a 39 year old sociopolitical essayist with a
degree in liberal arts and an extensive self-education
(derived from an insatiable appetite for reading). He is
a member of Amnesty International and an avid supporter
of Oxfam International and Human Rights Watch. He
welcomes responses at willpowerful@hotmail.com or
comments on his blog, Thomas