I first recall the name Shinseki when, during the failed presidential bid of U.S. Senator John Kerry, he invoked his name as a virtual talisman – General Shinseki, General Shinseki. This was the 2004 elections when the name could not shield Kerry, a Vietnam vet, from the odious attacks of a team of Swift Boaters who called into question his own military service. When President Barack Obama ran for the office, he too, invoked Shinseki’s name repeatedly to give heft to his critiques of the military debacles unfolding in Iraq and Afghanistan. Shinseki, like the ill fated moor Othello, has done the state some service and was rewarded with the honor of being named Secretary of Veterans Affairs in 2009 by the president. Eric K Shinseki, who has spent decades in the military at various ranks, ending at General, began as head of the VA with a 2010 budget of $108.3 billion dollars. In 2011 it ballooned to $141.1 billion. A year later, it shrank to $124.3 billion dollars. Is there any wonder that the agency is in disarray?
Nonetheless, no leader of an agency controls funding. Congress does, and this congress has been driven by the desire to cut budgets, the better to free moneys to grant to the rich in lower taxes. They demanded the head of Eric Shinseki, and Obama gave it to them. A sacrifice to savages who were drunk on the blood of political virgins. When I was a boy, I visited the Philadelphia Zoo where I marveled at the sight of lions, tigers, gorillas and zebras. Above all, the cages and enclosure signs were prominent. They said, “Please don’t feed the animals.” Perhaps a similar sign should be posted at the front door of Congress. “Don’t feed these animals, it only encourages them.” From in prison nation, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
These commentaries are recorded by Noel Hanrahan of Prison Radio.
