In a recent article, Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair pedaled an idea that is gaining currency among many disaffected voters in the US. That is the notion that "as regards impact on humanity, it's hard to figure how big a slice [sic] of the planet would register a dime's worth of difference between" John Kerry and George W. Bush (Cockburn, St, Clair. Counterpunch, 2/20-22). Indeed, the similarities between these two men outnumber their differences, as Cockburn and St. Clair skillfully point out, but this is not a quantitative argument, solely. The quality of the fissures between this incumbent and his challenger sit in the belly of this discussion. Indeed, it's in the bellies of impoverished people the world over that "a dime's difference" is felt the deepest.

There is, simply, no argument that any reasonable person can make against the fact that Kerry will be, at the worst, less bad for the majority peoples of the earth than Bush has been. You need look no further than Bush's first act as acting president, the "Global Gag Rule," a pernicious attack on the world's majority (women) that Kerry (or any Democrat) would not have launched. Kerry voted against Bush's Unborn Victims of Violence Act, an act Bush claims will aid "the United States of America [in] building a culture of life" (David Stout, NY Times Editorial, 4/1/04), but is really just another chink hammered into Roe's armor. As Planned Parenthood explains:

"The global gag rule is a throwback to 1984, when President Reagan first imposed the restrictions, which were then revoked by President Clinton in 1993. It uses the power of the purse to control what foreign family planning organizations do and say with their own funds. Under the global gag rule, foreign family planning agencies may not receive U.S. assistance if they provide abortion services, including counseling or referrals on abortion, or lobby to make or keep abortion legal in their own country. " http://www.plannedparenthood.org/gag/

Planned Parenthood further states that upwards of 75,000 women die each year due to unsafe abortion practices, and Bush's decree will only exacerbate this pandemic, as it cuts funds from organizations that provide an array of family planning services, not only abortion counseling.

Under the global gag rule, providers can't discuss the full range of options, including the availability of abortion, with clients facing an unplanned pregnancy. These restrictions defy medical ethics, preventing doctors from fulfilling their responsibility to provide complete information to their clients. This sort of government intrusion into the doctor-patient relationship would be intolerable in the U.S. - yet this is exactly what the global gag rule does in other countries. (Ibid.)

The Global Gag Rule Impact Project (http://64.224.182.238/globalgagrule/) has just issued an extensive report, Access Denied, that identifies the consequences of this policy in Kenya, Romania, Zambia and Ethiopia. In one instance, the report explains:

"Marie Stopes International Kenya (MSI Kenya) has been providing services in Kenya since 1985. Prior to the Global Gag Rule, MSI Kenya had 21 clinics offering services such as screening and treatment of malaria, screening for cervical cancer, as well as infant and child health care check-ups, vitamin A tablets and immunizations. For 10 years, the now-closed Mathare Valley clinic in a slum neighborhood of Nairobi was the only health facility serving a community of 300,000 people. Because women in this area seldom, if ever, leave the community, the loss of services from the clinic is enormous. The women interviewed said they may be forced to forgo contraception and health care for themselves and their children."

In short, Cockburn and St. Clair's dime is the difference between life and death, literally, for over 75,000 women (and their partners and their children--annually.

The Philippines gives us another window into the impact that a dime can have on people's lives. Bulatlat.com (an on-line daily news journal) cites a recent report by the Philippine National Wages and Productivity Commission (NWPC) which details average daily income throughout the islands.

As of January 2004, a Metro Manila-based private sector worker only earned a minimum daily wage of $4.97, but the family living wage was already at $10.52 a day. On a monthly basis, this meant that the worker's gross monthly pay of $109.33 was not enough to meet the food and non-food needs of a family of six amounting to $315.73. This clearly resulted in a average deficit of $206.40 monthly. (http://bulatlat.com/news/4-6/4-6-poor.html)

These workers represent the better-off people in the Philippines; they are the middle class, if you will, and the privately employed, for the government workers make, on average, less than the above figures. Most Filipinos are calling for a wage increase of approximately one dollar per day, which would still leave them roughly $175 short of what is necessary for them to meet their basic monthly needs.

And these people are not impoverished, according to the World Bank. "Poverty," as defined by this institution, is living on no more than $2.10 per day (which encompasses 50 percent of Filipinos living on the islands). Globally, two-point-seven billion people subsist on 21 dimes, or less, each day (www.worldbank.org/research/povmonitor/). That's a lot of people. A whole lot. In case you were wondering, it's almost half of all the living, breathing human beings on this planet.

Half!

A dime a day in the "global south" is a family's meal. A dime a day for a month approximates a full day's pay for a Filipino worker. Over the course of a year it's the rough equivalent of one month's wages (far more for, say, a Ugandan, 80 percent of whom live on less than one dollar per day, what the Bank quaintly calls "absolute poverty").

Do you think a "dime," in these terms, would make a difference to you? Could you, or I, make it on such a paltry amount of necessary income? Without qualification? And what if someone tried to take that dime from you? And what if they succeeded? What course of action would you chart?

I wonder, can Mr. Cockburn or Mr. St. Clair think of even one thing they could purchase with a dime. Let alone a staple food item.

The poor and hungry masses of the world, in an attempt to recover their daily dimes, have issued a clear call to us Americans who are the only people with the power to heed it: Defeat Bush. Very few people actually believe that Kerry will save the world. To the most vulnerable, that's hardly the point, anyway. What is material are the materials, perniciously denied under the Bush-Cheney regime. We can, and must, vote these men and women out of office. It is the only viable way we have, at this moment in history, to affect this goal and/or create any measure of accountability within our government. And those who put forth the idea that it's inimical to vote for "the lesser of two evils" should reflect on what "greater evil" means, actually, to the majority peoples of the world.

In addition to voting Bush out (not in its stead, though), and since my teacher and mentor June Jordan taught me to always offer reasonable, measurable actions that everybody can take, here's a proposition for Messrs. Cockburn and St. Clair (indeed, for all who read this): Pledge five percent of your salaries, and I'll do the same (I'm a Brooklyn, New York middle school teacher, formerly of Seattle) to one of the family planning organizations whose funding was cut due to Bush's first imperial act (see the above website for a list of organizations). By taking such an action, we can engage meaningfully in mitigating the violence raining down on poor women and their families throughout the global south.

Are you game, Mr. Cockburn? Mr. St. Clair?

Brothers, can you spare a dime?