Wayne Besen

June 8, 2014 • Opinion • 6912

To Hell With the Airlines — They Are to Blame for Spike in Air Rage

I don’t know about you, but I am so sick of the airlines. They keep getting worse and worse.

First, they came for your free snacks. Remember those? Complimentary peanuts and cookies. Gone.

Now, when you sit on the runway forever and you get hungry, you have to buy snacks. That’s more money out of your pocket.

Next, they started charging for every bag, so you have to under pack or get slammed with exorbitant charges. This might boost airline profits, but it is terrible for the economy. Tourists used bring empty suitcases to fill with souvenirs – now they don’t, which harms retail outlets.

Have you looked at airline prices lately? They are through the roof and unaffordable to normal, working people. What the airlines have done is merge, which killed competition, cut down the number of flights and raised the prices. So now they have fewer planes, but the ones they do have are packed with people who can afford the spike in prices. The rest of America is shut out from what used to be a relatively inexpensive way to travel.

If that’s not enough, the airlines have gotten brazen in their abuse of passengers. They shrunk the size of second-class seats at a time when America’s butts are the biggest they have been in our nation’s history. So, aside from your own uncomfortable seat, you have love handles spilling over into your seat from the chunky person sitting next to you.

They shrunk the seats in second class, to add more in first class. And these first class seats keep getting larger and more luxurious – because thanks to huge tax cuts, the wealthiest Americans have more disposable income. They sure as hell aren’t going to ride in steerage with the rest of us, so they upgrade – because they can.

Now, many of the seats don’t even recline, which means riding is downright uncomfortable. I would argue, it can cause back pain and harm customers. The way it’s going, we are soon going to fly subway-style, where we stand up and grab onto a handgrip. Really, isn’t that the direction we are going in?

If you are going to pack working people like sardines into a levitating tin can, after you’ve already placed them in long lines, and made them strip half naked to make sure they aren’t terrorists — tempers are going to flare.

The airlines reported more than 8,200 incidents of air rage worldwide last year — that’s up from more than 5,200 in 2012.

You know what really pisses me off? Instead of taking responsibility for upsetting fliers, the airlines are blaming the customers. The airlines recently met in Doha, Qatar to figure out ways to spank the misbehaving fliers. They offered intense training for flight attendants and encouraged airlines to go after problem passengers for the cost of these disruptions — as much as $200,000 each instance for diverted flights, covering passengers who miss connections, extra fuel and ground crew costs.

If a person flying is an idiot, they deserve to pay consequences. But, the sharp rise in incidents either means we – the public – are a 63 percent crazier than we were in 2012, or the airlines are doing something to drive us insane. I think it’s the latter.

The nightmare of flying today is a mirror of our society and reflects a Koch Brothers world in the modern gilded age. You are either well-to-do or “screw you.” There is not much in between.

If we had a real Congress that actually worked for the American people, they would step in and create competition. This would bring down prices, and the airlines would begin competing again for the business of ALL Americans, not just the upscale market. Suddenly, we’d have our cookies back and have leg room.

Wouldn’t that be nice?

What we don’t want is to live in an airline-style world where a few lucky ones have all the amenities, and the rest are crammed into a floating metal tube – and then the kings and queens in front of the plane wonder why the rabble seems disturbed. (I also feel bad for the flight attendants. They had nothing to do with the changes impacting consumers, but they get the brunt of the blame, because they are the ones who fliers interact with)

Now, I don’t have a problem with having a First Class section. But, the gap between flying first class and economy class shouldn’t be widening — like our incomes. To treat customers like caged animals is wrong, and shows that these airlines have no class.
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June 7, 2014 • Weekly Column • 6546

The GOP’s Most Unpatriotic Attack On a Soldier

(Weekly Column)

We begin with the topic of the week, the rescue of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.

President Barack Obama was correct to rescue Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. This isn’t about whether he deserted his post, but whether America will desert service members in their darkest hour of need. Of course, we all prefer unambiguous, heroic endings, such as when former NFL football player turned Army soldier, Pat Tillman, was killed by foreign enemies in Afghanistan. Oh, wait, that was a tale from the Bush PR machine hiding the fact that Tillman had been killed by friendly fire.

Once again, Republicans are turning what should be a unifying moment into a divisive political issue. The visceral hatred for our black president runs so deep that many GOP lawmakers are reflexively petty and partisan. Last week, the Republicans were mindlessly attacking Michele Obama’s effort to have school cafeterias serve healthy lunches to students. This week, they have degraded this nation by suggesting we should leave an American soldier in the hands of the Taliban.

Former U.N. Ambassador under George W. Bush, John Bolton, bitterly companied that what Obama did was “negotiate with terrorists…for the exchange of hostages.” Florida Sen. Marco Rubio whined that the deal “could encourage future terrorist kidnappings of Americans.”

Are Bolton and Rubio really suggesting that last week the Taliban was allowing American tourists to happily stroll in the bazaar’s of Kandahar – yet thanks to Obama’s POW trade, they are now out to get us? This line of so-called reasoning is ludicrous beyond comprehension.

If the policy of America is to abandon those who damage this country – then I guess we should leave Bolton and Rubio behind if they are ever kidnapped. After all, they continue to grievously harm this country with their wacky ideas and pathological obstruction of our president.

Even more pathetic is Sen. John McCain, who four months ago said:

“Obviously, I’d have to know the details but I would support ways of bringing him home and if exchange was one of them I think that would be something we should seriously consider.”

Now that Obama did exactly what he suggested, McCain has predictably changed his tune.

“I would not have made this deal,” McCain said this week, calling the exchange “troubling” and a “great threat.”

No, a great threat is choosing Sarah Palin to be Vice President, putting her one heartbeat away from controlling our nuclear arsenal. John McCain has become such a dishonorable hypocrite, that it’s difficult to remember that there was a time when he was regarded by some as a straight shooter who served the best interests of his country.

Not to be outdone, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, the reigning dean of the Fred Thompson School of presidential primary busts, said that freeing Bergdahl was an effort to distract public attention from the Veteran’s Administration scandal.

“Here’s the bigger concern for me, and I really would like for somebody to take a look at this and answer it — was this done to take the VA off the front page of the newspapers?” Perry said during an appearance on Fox News’ “Hannity.”

Unfortunately, Perry is delusional enough to think he has a shot at the White House in 2016. He spoke at the Texas GOP convention this week, making it clear that he was considering a run. According to the Dallas Morning News, Perry gave “a rabble-rousing speech about the future of American leadership, laying the groundwork for a potential second presidential run after leaving the Texas stage.”

I guess forgetting the name of entire federal departments to shut down, peddling in conspiracy theories, and suggesting we allow a POW to die in the hands of the Taliban is what Perry considers the leadership of tomorrow. Apparently, the governor’s memory hasn’t improved, or would have recalled how he humiliated himself during his 2012 flame out. I suppose he can soon join the other scarecrows in Iowa in wishing that he “only had a brain.”

Back to the Bergdahl smear campaign – South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham’s hyperbole sunk to new depths by claiming that Obama’s release of five prisoners from Guantanamo might be considered an impeachable offense.

These half-witted hypocrites act as if such a prisoner exchange is unprecedented. David Brooks, a conservative columnist with the New York Times, pointed out that Israel once traded 1,027 Palestinian prisoners to get back a single Israeli soldier. On another occasion, Israel swapped 1,150 prisoners for three of their soldiers. And, as we know, the threat of terrorism in Israel is substantially higher than it is in the United States.

No one wants to free these dangerous Taliban slugs. However, if we desire continued protection from such monsters, our service members need to know we have their backs and we will do everything in our power to ensure they return home safely.
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June 2, 2014 • Weekly Column • 5173

Is Abortion Still Legal?

(Weekly Column)

At what point do we stop pretending that Roe v. Wade is still the law of the land?

In 1992’s Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Supreme Court fumbled when it asserted that abortion regulations could not put an “undue burden” on women. This vague language opened the door for legislators to cleverly manipulate the law and then portray their attack on freedom as a mild inconvenience. Since this time, the anti-abortion industry, with the assent of right wing activist judges, have gutted the right to choose.

Those who want to dictate women’s reproductive choices keep relentlessly stretching the meaning of “undo burden” beyond reason. First, they used harassment outside of abortion clinics to limit the number of providers. Next, these groups strategically employed inflammatory language to incite violence against the few remaining doctors who were brave enough to endure the taunts and terrorism.

The “burden” keeps growing, making it more difficult for women to exercise their constitutional right to end a pregnancy. This week, Louisiana’s theocratic legislature, the same one that recently attempted to declare the Bible its State Book, passed a bill that might shutter three out of the state’s five abortion facilities.

In the Deep South, the barriers to having a safe abortion are becoming unreasonable. The new Louisiana law is similar to recent ones passed in Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas – making it nearly impossible to cross state lines to terminate unwanted pregnancies.

Lawmakers in Louisiana feigned that women were in grave danger and then passed their extreme law vowing to protect women from abortion providers who don’t have admitting privileges to local hospitals. When he signed the restrictive measure, Louisiana’s Republican governor and presidential wannabe, Bobby Jindal, called it “a common-sense bill that gives women health and safety protections they deserve.”

Could he be any more disingenuous? Complications that lead to hospitalization occur infrequently. In the rare cases when a trip to the hospital is necessary, emergency rooms take all patients – so admitting privileges are irrelevant to the health of these women. Jindal’s contrived words will never mask the fact that abortion clinics are significantly safer than the coat hangers he presumably prefers.

It is particularly cynical for these extremists to demand admitting privileges, considering that abortion providers don’t have the credentials because they are from out of town. And, the reason they are from different geographical areas is because it is often too dangerous for a doctor to live in the same town where he terminates pregnancies.

Another crafty way to circumvent Roe. v. Wade is requiring clinics to adhere to strict building codes and equipment requirements. In Texas, a new law enforcing such nonsense will go into effect on Sept. 1. The result will be that women in poor rural areas, such as the Rio Grande Valley, will have to travel up to 150 miles to find a clinic. With the entire south eviscerating the right to choose, women may soon have to travel as far as 300 miles to end their pregnancies.

This is an outrageous attack on the poor who can’t afford to travel, or can’t get time off from their low wage jobs. These backward laws only serve the whims of hypocritical rich Republicans who can preach against abortion, yet clandestinely fly their daughters to Blue States to end their unintended pregnancies.

The anti-abortion industry isn’t even circumspect about the genuine reason for such ridiculous measures. “These incremental laws are part of a greater strategy to end abortion in our country,” Tanya Britton, a board member for Pro-Life Mississippi, told the New York Times.

The United States Supreme Court needs to get its act together and stop messing with women’s lives. Either abortion is legal or it isn’t – and it is their job to stop the game playing and categorically decide. It is pure silliness to be asking random judges to decide on the nebulous question of what constitutes an “undue burden.” If a wealthy person has access to a private jet, then flying to France may not be an undue burden, while it may be a hardship to travel thirty miles for a woman without a car who works double shifts at the Waffle House to make ends meet.

If American women don’t have access to abortion clinics in their own neighborhoods – it is an undue burden — and if it weren’t for the “pro-life” thugs such facilities would be widely available. This legislative cat and mouse game that insults our intelligence must end. The anti-abortion movement has made its end game clear and it is up to the Supreme Court to finally embrace or reject the right to choose.
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June 2, 2014 • News • 5336

Wayne Besen Hosts Political Current Events Show on Chicago’s Progressive Talk

CHICAGO – Chicago’s independent progressive talk, WCPT, announced today the addition of a new show to the line-up, “I’ve Got Issues” featuring author and human rights advocate Wayne Besen. The weekly show is on Saturday, 4-6 pm Central.

“In this critical election year, we need strong voices to frame the issues and help steer America in a progressive direction,” said Charles Gross, President of Newsweb Radio Company, which owns WCPT. “We are excited about this hard-hitting new show that will debate the critical local and national issues that affect our lives.”

“I’ve spent my entire life fighting for progressive causes and I’m honored to have this unique platform to advance the issues that I care deeply about,” said Wayne Besen, host of “I’ve Got Issues.” “There are those who want to turn back the clock in America, and our job as progressives is to keep the clock ticking forward. This show will be a vehicle for promoting innovative ideas and key progressive solutions.”

Besen is the founder and Executive Director of Chicago-based Truth Wins Out (TWO), a non-profit organization that works to demolish the very foundation of anti-gay prejudice. He is also the founder of TWO’s Center Against Religious Extremism, which monitors, counters, and ultimately serves as a bulwark against theocracy at home and the export of hate abroad by religious extremists. In 2011, TWO made national news with its undercover investigation that proved Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and her husband Marcus own a clinic, Bachmann & Associates, that practiced “ex-gay” therapy, where people were advised to “pray away the gay.”

Besen is also the author of Anything But Straight: Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the Ex-Gay Myth (Haworth, 2003). He has been quoted or appeared in leading news and political talk venues including: The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA Today, NPR’s All Things Considered, NBC’s Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, ABC’s World News Tonight with Diane Sawyer, ABC’s Nightline, ABC’s Good Morning America, MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC’s The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, MSNBC News with Thomas Roberts, CNN’s AC360, Fox’s O’Reilly Factor, FOX’s The Sean Hannity Show, and Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

WCPT is one of the last independently owned radio stations in the country. Because it is not part of a conglomerate, their hosts have the freedom to speak their minds. The station believes that a blue city and a blue state deserve a Progressive Talk radio station that is entertaining, informative, irreverent and chock full of smart, funny shows with a progressive perspective. “I’ve Got Issues” will be available on 820-AM, 92.7 FM in the north, 92.5 in the west, and 99.9 in the south.

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June 2, 2014 • Uncategorized • 5892

Supreme Blunder On Prayer Ruling

(Weekly Column)

The United States Supreme Court blundered supremely this week when it ruled 5-4 that the Constitution allows town boards to begin their meetings with sectarian prayers. The decision gave free rein to obnoxious zealots to shove their personal religious flavors down the throats of other citizens in what should be neutral government settings.

It has always been rude, un-Christian behavior to recite prayers in “Jesus’ name” in venues with non-Christians. Now, unfortunately, such boorishness was given the Supreme Court’s imprimatur and opened the fundamentalist floodgates to aggressive proselytizing at government events.

I know the ramifications of this decision from personal experience. As a Jewish teenager who had lived in suburban Texas, I had to suffer through many such prayers, which were intended to isolate those who did not share the fundie faith. The frequent purpose of such intolerant invocations was to send a message to non-Christians, moderate Christians and non-believers: “This is a fundamentalist Christian nation. Our religion is superior, yours is inferior, and we have the right to absolute dominion. You may live here, but never forget who is in charge.”

That the US Supreme Court thought this form of serial religious harassment was acceptable, shows how extreme, insensitive, and out of touch with of reality a majority of the justices truly are. Those who voted to enshrine prejudiced prayer in government spaces were the usual suspects: Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. It particularly was disappointing, however, that Justice Anthony Kennedy used his swing vote to codify such craziness.

Indeed, Kennedy’s reasoning was downright bizarre: “Adults often encounter speech they find disagreeable. Legislative bodies do not engage in impermissible coercion merely by exposing constituents to prayer they would rather not hear and in which they need not participate.”

Does Kennedy live in the real world?

Clearly, a court or legislative chamber that parades a consistent drumbeat of preachers who deliver fundamentalist prayers is promoting a viewpoint that screams “bias.” It tells petitioners of government, or those who face state sanctions, that they may not get a fair shake if they don’t hold “conservatively correct” beliefs. This scenario is particularly dangerous in rural settings where Christian extremists will feel no compunction about turning government into tent revivals.

There is also the potential for Biblical boondoggles where taxpayers are forced to sponsor what amounts to free advertising for a municipalities favored religion. This represents more than a chip at the wall separating church and state – it is a defacement of this wall with graffiti, followed by steroidal muscleman repeatedly slamming it with a sledgehammer.

Furthermore, this monstrosity of a ruling further revealed the irrationality and radicalism of Justice Clarence Thomas. Thomas actually disputed the very notion that the 1st Amendment’s ban on the “establishment” of religion even applies to state and local governments.

Does this man actually want America to become a patchwork of divisive religious municipalities? Where one town is known as “Catholicville” and the next one over “Pentecostal Land” and the next one “Muslim Town?” Is this really his perverted vision for our nation?

This pathological drive to divide Americans by faith – sort of like Bosnia, Ireland, or Iraq — is truly mind-boggling. It’s as if Thomas doesn’t read newspapers and is completely oblivious to the strife and violence caused by pitting religious believers against each other.

All government entities should be completely neutral and devoid of religious content that seems to favor certain faiths. This is the only way to ensure fairness and not exclude people in this in this increasingly diverse nation that is becoming less religious.

If people want a prayer there are churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques specifically designed for that function. Having prayer to open a city council meeting is as ridiculous as opening a Sunday church sermon by discussing potholes or municipal bonds. It is crystal clear that prayer in government settings is a slippery way for religious groups to proselytize on the taxpayer’s dime.

Of course, America is getting what it deserves. Despite the fact that Republicans reliably crash the economy and insert religious demagogues into positions of power – the people don’t consistently vote for politicians that support rational, non-sectarian policies. For all the damage George W. Bush and obstinate Tea Bag members of Congress did to this country, America is poised to reward this odious party by potentially handing them the keys to the Senate, to go with their set to the House of Representatives.

If a Republican wins the White House in 2016 and has a GOP Senate to confirm court nominees – we can expect more Justices like Scalia and Thomas to be confirmed. This would set back this country for generations. In such a dire scenario, we can kiss gay marriage goodbye, as well as a woman’s right to choose.

This week’s absurd court decision on prayer reminds us that elections matter and Supreme Court Justices can degrade this nation and drag it down for decades after they are confirmed.
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