The Geek has to admire a slick job when he sees one. Bolivian president Evo Morales has pulled off one super slick trick. No doubt about it.
Morales, Bolivia's first Indio president has signed a recall election bill into law. Pushed by his "white" opponents who hallucinated that the soccer playing one time peasant had been weakened by the results of the Santa Cruz provincial autonomy referendum on 4 May could be removed from office through a recall vote.
The bill which Morales signed provides for himself and all nine provincial governors to face recall in a special election on 10 August. So far, so good. Or so it seems.
The devil, of course, was hiding in the details. Apparently so blinded by the glorious vision of removing the uppity Indian from office, the opposition didn't look closely at the precise wording of the new legislation.
To be removed from office Morales or any of the nine governors must receive a "no" vote total that is greater in both absolute numbers and percentage of the vote cast than the votes they received in the last general election.
The Geek tips his hat to the shrewd high school dropout president.
Get a grip on this. Morales received approximately 1.5 million votes, or more than fifty-three percent of those cast. To be removed from office the "no" vote total must be greater than 1.5 million and the percentage must exceed the 53.7 percent.
There ain't no way that's going to happen.
Some of the governors aren't so fortunate. Take, for example, Jose Luis Paredes the governor of La Paz and an opponent of Morales. He won the Morales supporting state with thirty-eight percent of the vote. If thirty-nine percent of the voters check the "no" box, Paredes is out and the llama herder turned president gets to appoint a replacement.
Sweet?
You bet. There is no way that Morales is going to wake up sad come morning on the 11th of August.
Slickness may be enough to keep Morales in office. It may even be enough to remove pesky governors who don't march to the tune of Evo's Populist Band.
It isn't enough to assure the best future for Bolivia. It isn't even enough to give Morales a good write up in future history texts.
Morales, like his colleagues Hugo Chavez and Rafael Correa, is a populist. He came to power through the democratic process as did the other two. He, along with Chavez and, to some extent, Correa, doesn't like globalization.
More to the point, in common with the other two is the latest round of a long standing South American political disease.
The name of that disease?
Economic populism.
It is amazing how little so many South Americans fail to learn from their continent' political history.
Economic populism has a long record of abject (and often bloody) failure through the length and breadth of the continent. The narrative is always the same. It is always based on ethno-nationalism and a hyped sense that "we" (the locals, the working class, Los Indios, the peasants) are being heartlessly exploited by "them" (the ricos, the Norteamericanos, the "whites.")
The populist demagogue rouses fear and anger. Fear and anger produce enthusiasm and votes.
Badda-bing! The populist is elected. Ain't democracy grand?
Comes now the redistribution of land, the nationalization of basic industry, of financial institutions, the confiscation of wealth. Now the landless will have land. The jobless will have jobs. The poor will have wealth.
In the short term everything will look good as the history of Juan Peron in Argentina shows,
Eventually the wheels fall off the Great Socialist Vehicle. Inflation. Hyperinflation. Loss of agricultural and industrial productivity. Systemic inefficiency. Infrastructure collapse. An end to investment both foreign and domestic. Middle class flight.
The process used to take years, even decades. Now it can occur in months given the speed with which information moves and decisions made.
The Bolivian Slicky-Boy may be lucky. Lord knows, the ex-paratrooper Chavez has been.
Morales' running buddy, the inventor of "Socialism For the 21st Century" Hugo Chavez, has been a favorite son of Lady Luck. The rocketing price of oil has buoyed the more-or-less democratically elected semi-authoritarian.
While as many of the middle class as can get visas and plane tickets to Panama or points even more to the north, while the production of Venezuela's oil fields slides due to loss of skill and degradation of plant, Chavez has been able to fund the FARC insurgents in Columbia, make wink and nudge agreements with the mullahocracy in Iran and sign contracts for two gigabucks worth of Russian weapons.
Will Morales be so fortunate?
Bolivian natural gas is critical to both Argentina and Brazil. At least for the moment.
But how long will that last?
Large hydrocarbon deposits have been discovered in the waters of Brazil's Exclusive Economic Zone. With foreign direct investment and co-production agreements in the offing, Brazil will not only be able to meet its own needs but become a major exporter.
Assuming that the Brazilians do not engage in another of their recurrent flights of economic populism, the market forces will work in Brazil's favor. The country already has a firm industrial base and a fair amount of indigenous capital. Exportation of hydrocarbon, particularly natural gas, will enhance not only Brazil but countries such as Argentina who can use the resource beneficially.
For the market to work the context must be stable and predictable. This means that excesses of democracy must be avoided. It also means that the region must be free from both violence and threats of violence.
Here Evo Morales the current Fox of the Andes may be out foxing himself and his fellow Bolivians. By linking himself ideologically with Hugo Chavez who is shaping up as the The Continental Thug, Morales may be helping to assure the very instability which will undercut the potential of regional economic prosperity.
Take a look at history, Presidente Morales. Look at Argentina. At Juan Peron and the lingering effects of the Peronistas. Take a look at Mexico. Take a close look at what has happened recently in Mexico with the lack of foreign investment in the oilfields.
Take a long, hard look at history and think. Is this really in the best interests of Bolivia?
True, globalization is not an undiluted good (pace Alan Greenspan) and the "whites" have not been without major flaw, but is heavy handed, short-sighted seizure of land and resources the best way to provide the best future for all Bolivians?
Economic populism is a great way to get power. It is a piss-poor way to run a country.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Monday, May 12, 2008
Muhammad: The Lenin of Religion
Both Christianity and Islam are political institutions.
The Geek wants to make that clear. Both Christianity (irrespective of denomination) and Islam (regardless of sect) have sought and continue to seek the ability to directly, materially and substantially manipulate the perceptions, beliefs, and, therefore, the actions of people.
That's what politics is all about. Power.
Both Christianity and Islam use the same tool to gain, retain and expand power over people.
It's a great tool. A sovereign tool. An almost never fail tool. It's used by all who pant after power. All who in one way or another slaver over the thought of controlling others.
The tool?
Fear.
That's right. Fear. The increase of fear. The reduction of fear. Fear.
Fear, chum, yeah, it's wonderful. We all have it as the ready lever for others to yank.
There is one very big, very fundamental and very important difference between Christianity and Islam.
Jesus, the Itinerant Sage and Healer of Galilee whose kerygma was the foundation stone for the towering edifice called Christianity, did not exploit fear to gain either an audience or followers. Indeed, Jesus seemed to be of the view that fear was irrelevant to a full human life.
(Trouble accepting this? The Geek suggests the publications of the Jesus Seminar as a good starting point. On the web, http://jesusseminar.org/Jesus_Seminar/jesus_seminar.html.)
In the message of Jesus there is no mention of hell. No words of God's Wrath. No intimations of judgement. He does not embrace suffering. Neither does he argue that humans must tremble before the deity or kneel in submission to either God or messenger.
Later, even much, much later, as the words of the Wandering Sage and Healer were transmogrified into an institution, a Church seeking authority. Power was the lever of fear pulled. Pulled long and hard.
Jesus didn't seek power. He sought only to deliver a message. A simple, profound message that was easy to hear, easy to understand but hard to live.
Churches, Catholic and protestant alike were and are institutions. They exist to exercise power. Whether the power is used for good or ill is less relevant than the fact that churches are political institutions trafficking in the power business. They must have dogma and creed, liturgy and rituals, rules and standards of membership. They must define themselves by exclusion even as they seek to convert. In all that they do the basic tool is fear. Raise fear. Lower fear.
In this respect churches are just like governments. The difference resides in the ability of governments to use coercion in the here-and-now while churches must rely upon an eschatological system of rewards and punishment.
In short: follow the rules, follow the creed, follow the liturgy, follow Authority and you will be rewarded postmortem. Otherwise--that's right, the eternal cooker for you, pal.
Muhammad was to Jesus as Lenin was to Robert Owen, the gentle Nineteenth Century Utopian socialist.
Muhammad sought to create a political movement, a movement which would successfully unite under a single banner the fractionated society of the Arabian Peninsula. Without commenting on its theological attributes, suffice it to say that the Koran is a political document exploiting fear.
The content of the Koran is well rooted in the Arabian Peninsula's cultural context and is largely derivative in its theology. These aspects are not to be held against either the Koran or the collected sayings of Muhammad. Quite the contrary they are part of the core strength of Islam as a religio-political movement.
The consistency of the creedal statement with a recurrent emphasis upon the unity of religion with social and political life, the need for submission to the deity and the visions of rewards and, more importantly, punishments postmortem have given Islam its ideological power. In this department Islam trumps Christianity.
The pornography of hellfire and brimstone winds through Christianity like a river in the desert, occasionally disappearing for a stretch only to reemerge in full flow.
But, in Islam, hell is right there. In your face. Up close and personal. It even outranks paradise as a subject of lovingly detailed description. Even the Geek feels little shakes and shudders run up his back as he reads the travelogue of perdition.
Like the old theatrical saying has it: The villain gets the best lines.
Lenin said the purpose of terror is to terrorise.
Muhammad must have believed that the purpose of hell is to terrorise.
Of course he was right. Fear of death is a biggie on the chart of human apprehensions. Fear of what happens after death is right up there too--particularly if gruesome visions of hell have come along with mother's milk.
(Perhaps that is why Muslims so often address Allah as the Merciful and Compassionate, even in a declaration of intent to kill infidel women and children. They are hoping against hope that they will receive a little of that mercy, that compassion.)
From a practical perspective it is impossible to argue with Muhammad's approach. It gave him the organizing methodology for a highly successful political movement. The same approach is still at work today.
It is just as effective today. Fear of death and dread of hell are the tools of choice for assorted mullahs and ayatollahs today. It gives the ambitious a clear avenue to power. It gives individuals a reason to die in the hopes of paradise rather than to live under the threat of damnation.
The power of hell to stimulate political action including violent jihad is alive and well as we all know all too well. Quite possibly the suicide bombers and their ilk seek death not because they are enchanted by the possibilities of paradise with cool water and waiting soulless virgins but because living with the nagging image of the fire-filled pit becomes impossible.
Lenin terrorised his way to power. Stalin terrorised his way to expanded power. But terror has its limits. Humans become inured to it. It loses its black magic. It fades away into the background noise of life and the risks of life.
At some point fear reaches its limits as well. This is the ultimate weakness of a religion which relies too much upon it. Life is for living--not obsessing on eternity either with or without burning sulfur.
For awhile relief from fear may be found in hatred or joining with others to chant, "Death to (fill in the blank.)" For a while fear can be defeated by jihad, either violent or not. For a bit the fear might be limited by tossing acid in the face of an unveiled woman.
But not for ever.
The Soviets ultimately found that Lenin's dictum had very real limits. The Islamists who exploit the hellfire of the Koran to their political advantage will find limits as well.
Life is for living and as Jesus reputedly said, "Let the dead bury their dead."
The Geek wants to make that clear. Both Christianity (irrespective of denomination) and Islam (regardless of sect) have sought and continue to seek the ability to directly, materially and substantially manipulate the perceptions, beliefs, and, therefore, the actions of people.
That's what politics is all about. Power.
Both Christianity and Islam use the same tool to gain, retain and expand power over people.
It's a great tool. A sovereign tool. An almost never fail tool. It's used by all who pant after power. All who in one way or another slaver over the thought of controlling others.
The tool?
Fear.
That's right. Fear. The increase of fear. The reduction of fear. Fear.
Fear, chum, yeah, it's wonderful. We all have it as the ready lever for others to yank.
There is one very big, very fundamental and very important difference between Christianity and Islam.
Jesus, the Itinerant Sage and Healer of Galilee whose kerygma was the foundation stone for the towering edifice called Christianity, did not exploit fear to gain either an audience or followers. Indeed, Jesus seemed to be of the view that fear was irrelevant to a full human life.
(Trouble accepting this? The Geek suggests the publications of the Jesus Seminar as a good starting point. On the web, http://jesusseminar.org/Jesus_Seminar/jesus_seminar.html.)
In the message of Jesus there is no mention of hell. No words of God's Wrath. No intimations of judgement. He does not embrace suffering. Neither does he argue that humans must tremble before the deity or kneel in submission to either God or messenger.
Later, even much, much later, as the words of the Wandering Sage and Healer were transmogrified into an institution, a Church seeking authority. Power was the lever of fear pulled. Pulled long and hard.
Jesus didn't seek power. He sought only to deliver a message. A simple, profound message that was easy to hear, easy to understand but hard to live.
Churches, Catholic and protestant alike were and are institutions. They exist to exercise power. Whether the power is used for good or ill is less relevant than the fact that churches are political institutions trafficking in the power business. They must have dogma and creed, liturgy and rituals, rules and standards of membership. They must define themselves by exclusion even as they seek to convert. In all that they do the basic tool is fear. Raise fear. Lower fear.
In this respect churches are just like governments. The difference resides in the ability of governments to use coercion in the here-and-now while churches must rely upon an eschatological system of rewards and punishment.
In short: follow the rules, follow the creed, follow the liturgy, follow Authority and you will be rewarded postmortem. Otherwise--that's right, the eternal cooker for you, pal.
Muhammad was to Jesus as Lenin was to Robert Owen, the gentle Nineteenth Century Utopian socialist.
Muhammad sought to create a political movement, a movement which would successfully unite under a single banner the fractionated society of the Arabian Peninsula. Without commenting on its theological attributes, suffice it to say that the Koran is a political document exploiting fear.
The content of the Koran is well rooted in the Arabian Peninsula's cultural context and is largely derivative in its theology. These aspects are not to be held against either the Koran or the collected sayings of Muhammad. Quite the contrary they are part of the core strength of Islam as a religio-political movement.
The consistency of the creedal statement with a recurrent emphasis upon the unity of religion with social and political life, the need for submission to the deity and the visions of rewards and, more importantly, punishments postmortem have given Islam its ideological power. In this department Islam trumps Christianity.
The pornography of hellfire and brimstone winds through Christianity like a river in the desert, occasionally disappearing for a stretch only to reemerge in full flow.
But, in Islam, hell is right there. In your face. Up close and personal. It even outranks paradise as a subject of lovingly detailed description. Even the Geek feels little shakes and shudders run up his back as he reads the travelogue of perdition.
Like the old theatrical saying has it: The villain gets the best lines.
Lenin said the purpose of terror is to terrorise.
Muhammad must have believed that the purpose of hell is to terrorise.
Of course he was right. Fear of death is a biggie on the chart of human apprehensions. Fear of what happens after death is right up there too--particularly if gruesome visions of hell have come along with mother's milk.
(Perhaps that is why Muslims so often address Allah as the Merciful and Compassionate, even in a declaration of intent to kill infidel women and children. They are hoping against hope that they will receive a little of that mercy, that compassion.)
From a practical perspective it is impossible to argue with Muhammad's approach. It gave him the organizing methodology for a highly successful political movement. The same approach is still at work today.
It is just as effective today. Fear of death and dread of hell are the tools of choice for assorted mullahs and ayatollahs today. It gives the ambitious a clear avenue to power. It gives individuals a reason to die in the hopes of paradise rather than to live under the threat of damnation.
The power of hell to stimulate political action including violent jihad is alive and well as we all know all too well. Quite possibly the suicide bombers and their ilk seek death not because they are enchanted by the possibilities of paradise with cool water and waiting soulless virgins but because living with the nagging image of the fire-filled pit becomes impossible.
Lenin terrorised his way to power. Stalin terrorised his way to expanded power. But terror has its limits. Humans become inured to it. It loses its black magic. It fades away into the background noise of life and the risks of life.
At some point fear reaches its limits as well. This is the ultimate weakness of a religion which relies too much upon it. Life is for living--not obsessing on eternity either with or without burning sulfur.
For awhile relief from fear may be found in hatred or joining with others to chant, "Death to (fill in the blank.)" For a while fear can be defeated by jihad, either violent or not. For a bit the fear might be limited by tossing acid in the face of an unveiled woman.
But not for ever.
The Soviets ultimately found that Lenin's dictum had very real limits. The Islamists who exploit the hellfire of the Koran to their political advantage will find limits as well.
Life is for living and as Jesus reputedly said, "Let the dead bury their dead."
Sunday, May 11, 2008
A Roosting Chicken Named Evo Morales
"The worst enemy of humanity is US capitalism. That is what provokes uprisings like ours. If the entire world doesn't acknowledge that nation states are not providing even minimally for health, education and nourishment, then fundamental human rights are being violated." So crows the rooster of Bolivia's Los Indios not only on his successful campaign for the presidency, but on an almost weekly basis for the past two years.
Evo Morales, a soccer playing former grower of coca, is, if anything, restrained in his view of US economic and foreign policy compared to Hugo Chavez. The motor-mouthed Venezuelan president is not only noted for insulting personalities as disparate as SecState Rice and the King of Spain but also for a unique ability as a political contortionist leaning simultaneously on the Commissars of Cuba and the Iranian mullahocracy.
In Ecuador, Rafael Correa is a comparatively low-intensity version of Morales and a near midget in the Uncle Sam bashing game next to Chavez. Dr Correa (PhD, economics, University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, 2001) distrusts the market, particularly the US dominated global one as an instrument for the concentration of wealth but apparently appreciates the weaknesses of command economies. Even though the doctor of the dismal science and the political party he created have embraced the Venezuelan notion "Socialism for the 21st Century," Correa does not seem quite so gripless as either one-time paratrooper and originator of "Socialism For the 21st Century," Chavez, or high school dropout Morales.
Nonetheless Correa shares a very important feature with his academically challenged colleague in Bolivia--the view that globalization, including transnational corporations and international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, favor not only the wealthy nations of the world but the domestic "white" elite.
Both believe fervently that the poor, particularly the indigenous descent peoples, Los Indios, get the short and very dirty end of the status and power stick.
The majority of the Bolivian population, unlike that of either Ecuador or Venezuela, is indigenous. Approximately fifty-five percent of all Bolivians are of ingenious ancestry. (In comparison Ecuador's population is sixty-five percent mestizo, twenty-five percent indigenous, seven percent white and three percent African. The CIA World Factbook gives no percentage breakdown for Venezuela.)
The majority of Bolivia's Los Indios lives in the mountains of the country's west. The eastern, resource rich provinces of the country led by Santa Clara are home to most of the "whites" and most of the wealth. Physically, economically and demographically there are two Bolivias. One is high altitude, barren, resource scarce and brown. The other is resource rich, flat and white.
That's the problem. A problem made worse by both globalization and the effects of democracy.
Bolivia has had more than its share of problems. More than 200 coups and counter coups blighted its existence down to 1982 when the first civilian government in recent history was voted into power. The civilian governments for the next quarter century were unable to deal effectively with endemic, deeply-rooted poverty, drug production, social unrest and corruption.
Morales was elected in 2005 by the largest margin on record. His platform was simple: castrate the long entrenched elite, empower the poor, use the hydrocarbon riches of the eastern provinces for the good of all and confiscate large estates for redistribution to the landless.
Utopian?
Quite probably.
Historically as well as today, Bolivia is one of the poorest and least developed countries in South America. Bolivian life expectancy is a full decade less than that in Venezuela. Nearly that many years behind Ecuador. Sixty percent of Bolivians live below the local poverty line. The lowest decile of the population has only three tenths of one percent of the gross national income while the highest decile enjoys nearly fifty percent.
Sounds bad? Right, maybe even obscenely rotten.
Now for the irony behind Morales.
It used to be worse. Much worse.
Bolivia went straight down the economic tubes in the early Eighties. The catastrophe not only brought civilians to power but spurred a series of basic economic, political and legal reforms. These in turn brought a sharp increase of private investment from both domestic and foreign sources. This development was followed, unsurprisingly, by strong economic growth and a drop in the poverty rate.
In short, from the late Eighties through the Nineties the good times (comparatively speaking) were rolling in Bolivia.
The discovery and initial exploitation of large natural gas deposits in the east were seen by the government as well as members of the elite as the cash cow from heaven. Plans were made to milk it by sending the hydrocarbon manna North. These plans died in an outbreak of violent protests and ethnic violence. Los Indios as an ethno-national identity was coming into effective existence during the years 2002-2005.
Evo Morales was not a simple peasant face-in-the-mob during this period of movement consolidation and expansion. No. Not hardly. His face was right out front. Accompanied by his mouth. A highly effective mouth backed by an able enough brain and a simple message.
The essence of the message?
Very simple. Even an illiterate llama herder breathing hard at 11,000 feet could grasp it.
The white guys are at it again. Just like when the Spanish came and ripped off the Incas. Now its the North Americans, the Europeans and their local stooges. They're going to rip us off again! Wealth and land to the poor and landless! Bolivia for the true Bolivians--Los Indios!
The good which globalization arguably had done for Bolivia a few years earlier was wiped out in the minds of the Bolivian majority by fear. Fear of an ethnic "other." The white guy. The guy in a suit carrying a brief case.
The guy who would grind the sons of the Incas further into the the arid rock of the Andes while the money in his brief case would stick to the hands of the "whites" in the flatlands. The "whites" who owned the land over the hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons which would go to the outside while Los Indios sold trinkets to tourists and shoveled llama poop.
Democracy is wonderful. if you have the numbers behind you. If you have the numbers lined up under the lash of fear and the carrot not of pie-in-the-sky but land and money in the here-and-now.
Also, wouldn't it be lovely (heh-heh) to watch those blanco ricos squirm as we give the orders for a change? Bolivia for Los Indios!
Lovely? You bet.
Nationalise the hydrocarbons! Seize the land! All power to the people! Watch the ricos sweat, bluster and beg!
Join with Venezuela and yank Uncle Sam's beard.
Sounds good. Even some Americans like the idea.
Then came the fourth of May in Santa Clara. The autonomy referendum. The wave of the future?
Perhaps. That's not certain. Not yet.
One thing is certain: Morales thinks so. So does Chavez. And Correa.
Another thing that is sure. It's another foreign policy chicken come home to roost in Foggy Bottom, the White House and Congress.
More on that later
Evo Morales, a soccer playing former grower of coca, is, if anything, restrained in his view of US economic and foreign policy compared to Hugo Chavez. The motor-mouthed Venezuelan president is not only noted for insulting personalities as disparate as SecState Rice and the King of Spain but also for a unique ability as a political contortionist leaning simultaneously on the Commissars of Cuba and the Iranian mullahocracy.
In Ecuador, Rafael Correa is a comparatively low-intensity version of Morales and a near midget in the Uncle Sam bashing game next to Chavez. Dr Correa (PhD, economics, University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, 2001) distrusts the market, particularly the US dominated global one as an instrument for the concentration of wealth but apparently appreciates the weaknesses of command economies. Even though the doctor of the dismal science and the political party he created have embraced the Venezuelan notion "Socialism for the 21st Century," Correa does not seem quite so gripless as either one-time paratrooper and originator of "Socialism For the 21st Century," Chavez, or high school dropout Morales.
Nonetheless Correa shares a very important feature with his academically challenged colleague in Bolivia--the view that globalization, including transnational corporations and international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, favor not only the wealthy nations of the world but the domestic "white" elite.
Both believe fervently that the poor, particularly the indigenous descent peoples, Los Indios, get the short and very dirty end of the status and power stick.
The majority of the Bolivian population, unlike that of either Ecuador or Venezuela, is indigenous. Approximately fifty-five percent of all Bolivians are of ingenious ancestry. (In comparison Ecuador's population is sixty-five percent mestizo, twenty-five percent indigenous, seven percent white and three percent African. The CIA World Factbook gives no percentage breakdown for Venezuela.)
The majority of Bolivia's Los Indios lives in the mountains of the country's west. The eastern, resource rich provinces of the country led by Santa Clara are home to most of the "whites" and most of the wealth. Physically, economically and demographically there are two Bolivias. One is high altitude, barren, resource scarce and brown. The other is resource rich, flat and white.
That's the problem. A problem made worse by both globalization and the effects of democracy.
Bolivia has had more than its share of problems. More than 200 coups and counter coups blighted its existence down to 1982 when the first civilian government in recent history was voted into power. The civilian governments for the next quarter century were unable to deal effectively with endemic, deeply-rooted poverty, drug production, social unrest and corruption.
Morales was elected in 2005 by the largest margin on record. His platform was simple: castrate the long entrenched elite, empower the poor, use the hydrocarbon riches of the eastern provinces for the good of all and confiscate large estates for redistribution to the landless.
Utopian?
Quite probably.
Historically as well as today, Bolivia is one of the poorest and least developed countries in South America. Bolivian life expectancy is a full decade less than that in Venezuela. Nearly that many years behind Ecuador. Sixty percent of Bolivians live below the local poverty line. The lowest decile of the population has only three tenths of one percent of the gross national income while the highest decile enjoys nearly fifty percent.
Sounds bad? Right, maybe even obscenely rotten.
Now for the irony behind Morales.
It used to be worse. Much worse.
Bolivia went straight down the economic tubes in the early Eighties. The catastrophe not only brought civilians to power but spurred a series of basic economic, political and legal reforms. These in turn brought a sharp increase of private investment from both domestic and foreign sources. This development was followed, unsurprisingly, by strong economic growth and a drop in the poverty rate.
In short, from the late Eighties through the Nineties the good times (comparatively speaking) were rolling in Bolivia.
The discovery and initial exploitation of large natural gas deposits in the east were seen by the government as well as members of the elite as the cash cow from heaven. Plans were made to milk it by sending the hydrocarbon manna North. These plans died in an outbreak of violent protests and ethnic violence. Los Indios as an ethno-national identity was coming into effective existence during the years 2002-2005.
Evo Morales was not a simple peasant face-in-the-mob during this period of movement consolidation and expansion. No. Not hardly. His face was right out front. Accompanied by his mouth. A highly effective mouth backed by an able enough brain and a simple message.
The essence of the message?
Very simple. Even an illiterate llama herder breathing hard at 11,000 feet could grasp it.
The white guys are at it again. Just like when the Spanish came and ripped off the Incas. Now its the North Americans, the Europeans and their local stooges. They're going to rip us off again! Wealth and land to the poor and landless! Bolivia for the true Bolivians--Los Indios!
The good which globalization arguably had done for Bolivia a few years earlier was wiped out in the minds of the Bolivian majority by fear. Fear of an ethnic "other." The white guy. The guy in a suit carrying a brief case.
The guy who would grind the sons of the Incas further into the the arid rock of the Andes while the money in his brief case would stick to the hands of the "whites" in the flatlands. The "whites" who owned the land over the hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons which would go to the outside while Los Indios sold trinkets to tourists and shoveled llama poop.
Democracy is wonderful. if you have the numbers behind you. If you have the numbers lined up under the lash of fear and the carrot not of pie-in-the-sky but land and money in the here-and-now.
Also, wouldn't it be lovely (heh-heh) to watch those blanco ricos squirm as we give the orders for a change? Bolivia for Los Indios!
Lovely? You bet.
Nationalise the hydrocarbons! Seize the land! All power to the people! Watch the ricos sweat, bluster and beg!
Join with Venezuela and yank Uncle Sam's beard.
Sounds good. Even some Americans like the idea.
Then came the fourth of May in Santa Clara. The autonomy referendum. The wave of the future?
Perhaps. That's not certain. Not yet.
One thing is certain: Morales thinks so. So does Chavez. And Correa.
Another thing that is sure. It's another foreign policy chicken come home to roost in Foggy Bottom, the White House and Congress.
More on that later
Saturday, May 10, 2008
More Chickens Coming Home
As anyone who has not been in a persistent vegetative state knows, Senator Obama's one time pastor, Reverend Wright, stated infamously that the attacks of 9/11 were simply America's foreign policy chickens coming home to rest. On that the Reverend was more wrong than right.
Only an agenda driven mind would draw a straight line connecting the dots of US actions during World War II, the Cold War and the Persian Gulf War of 1991 with the WTC and Pentagon jihadists. (OOPS! Sorry! Bad History Geek! That term can't be used anymore according to sensitivity folks at the National Counterterrorism Center, Homeland Security and State Department)
Still the concept of home roosting chickens is useful. Bad policy will ultimately lead to bad results. Or, at best, poorly thought through policy will come back to bite us in the patootie. The law of unintended consequences guarantees that.
Consider globalization of markets.
Consider democratization.
Over the past quarter century or so, under administrations of both parties the US has huffed, puffed and proclaimed that the combination of economic globalization and national democratization would bring a plethora of peace, love and flower power to the world. We have used all the instruments of national power, both hard and soft, to bring the blessings of stock markets, shopping malls and ballot boxes to the benighted of the Earth.
We have crowed on an annual basis that democracy was on the march everywhere from Albania to Zimbabwe. With the exception of a handful of truly icky-poo places like North Korea, Cuba and Syria, the voices of the people were being heard.
Yeah. Right.
During the same period we have heard so many loudly sung hymns of praise to free enterprise and open markets that it seemed the heavens were opening for the Second Coming of Adam Smith. From Washington and Wall Street the tune never changed--A Mighty Fortress Is the Market.
Yeah. Right.
It's not that the Geekmo is opposed to either democracy or free enterprise. They're both OK. In their place and under adult supervision.
So, why the rant, Geek?
Simple. The chickens are coming home to roost.
Consider three terms. Ethnonationalism. Economically dominant minorities. Politically dominant majorities.
Say what?
These concepts do not come easily to the American mind in the late 20th or early 21st Centuries. They are, quite literally, foreign to us. They are not foreign, however, to folks in the Mideast or Africa. Neither are they far from the minds of people in Indonesia, the Philippines, Venezuela, Ecuador, or Bolivia.
These terms have real world power. They were behind the elections of Vladimir Putin, Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales. They haunt the narrow streets of Sadir City. They lurk in the shadows of Pakistan's frontier areas.
They even coexist with the Quran at camps from Algeria to the Philippines. They nestle, suitably coded, cheek to cheek with tips on how to grow anthrax or make an IED on websites.
Ethnic identity is a wonderfully slippery beast. A shape shifter of great fluidity. At once it is seemingly objective--the color of skin, the native language, the religious beliefs and perfectly subjective--how do I define myself? In it nature and artifact combine seamlessly.
Ethnic identity is a perfect tool for the manipulation of people.
The other two terms are self-evident in their meaning. In some countries such as the Philippines or Indonesia, a small, very small, minority of people belonging to an ethnically definable group dominate the economy, own most of the wealth, control most of the means of finance, production and distribution. At the regional level the same dynamic might be seen: think Israel in relation to the rest of the Mideast.
On the global level the West or even the US alone can be defined as the economically dominant minority. (Get a grip on that one and tuck it away for future reference. The Geek will be getting back to it, if not today then in the not-too-distant future.)
Politically dominant majority needs no elaboration. It need only be highlighted that the notion of majority rulership only matters in a democracy. The democracy doesn't have to be real. Appearance is enough. The motions of elections complete with speeches, votes being cast and counted is sufficient. (All the more so if Jimmy Carter is standing by to smile benignly on the charade.)
For twenty years the Geek has scratched his head wondering why the US pursued the goals of globalization AND democratization.
He had no trouble with the first. Globalization has been (at least until quite recently) good for the US. Perhaps second only to the PRC the US has benefited from the global movement of goods and capital. The influx of both goodies and money provided Americans with much to buy and the borrowed money with which to by it.
The second, democratization, really boggled the Geek. At first he hoped that seemingly rational political leaders were simply shoveling feel good platitudes to the multitude. You know, the good old domestic consumption for political gain gambit.
Wasn't so. We (or at least a passel of politicos, pundits and professors) were serious as a heart attack.
The Geek hears the rustle of wings in the distance. Chickens. One of them is named Bolivia.
Only an agenda driven mind would draw a straight line connecting the dots of US actions during World War II, the Cold War and the Persian Gulf War of 1991 with the WTC and Pentagon jihadists. (OOPS! Sorry! Bad History Geek! That term can't be used anymore according to sensitivity folks at the National Counterterrorism Center, Homeland Security and State Department)
Still the concept of home roosting chickens is useful. Bad policy will ultimately lead to bad results. Or, at best, poorly thought through policy will come back to bite us in the patootie. The law of unintended consequences guarantees that.
Consider globalization of markets.
Consider democratization.
Over the past quarter century or so, under administrations of both parties the US has huffed, puffed and proclaimed that the combination of economic globalization and national democratization would bring a plethora of peace, love and flower power to the world. We have used all the instruments of national power, both hard and soft, to bring the blessings of stock markets, shopping malls and ballot boxes to the benighted of the Earth.
We have crowed on an annual basis that democracy was on the march everywhere from Albania to Zimbabwe. With the exception of a handful of truly icky-poo places like North Korea, Cuba and Syria, the voices of the people were being heard.
Yeah. Right.
During the same period we have heard so many loudly sung hymns of praise to free enterprise and open markets that it seemed the heavens were opening for the Second Coming of Adam Smith. From Washington and Wall Street the tune never changed--A Mighty Fortress Is the Market.
Yeah. Right.
It's not that the Geekmo is opposed to either democracy or free enterprise. They're both OK. In their place and under adult supervision.
So, why the rant, Geek?
Simple. The chickens are coming home to roost.
Consider three terms. Ethnonationalism. Economically dominant minorities. Politically dominant majorities.
Say what?
These concepts do not come easily to the American mind in the late 20th or early 21st Centuries. They are, quite literally, foreign to us. They are not foreign, however, to folks in the Mideast or Africa. Neither are they far from the minds of people in Indonesia, the Philippines, Venezuela, Ecuador, or Bolivia.
These terms have real world power. They were behind the elections of Vladimir Putin, Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales. They haunt the narrow streets of Sadir City. They lurk in the shadows of Pakistan's frontier areas.
They even coexist with the Quran at camps from Algeria to the Philippines. They nestle, suitably coded, cheek to cheek with tips on how to grow anthrax or make an IED on websites.
Ethnic identity is a wonderfully slippery beast. A shape shifter of great fluidity. At once it is seemingly objective--the color of skin, the native language, the religious beliefs and perfectly subjective--how do I define myself? In it nature and artifact combine seamlessly.
Ethnic identity is a perfect tool for the manipulation of people.
The other two terms are self-evident in their meaning. In some countries such as the Philippines or Indonesia, a small, very small, minority of people belonging to an ethnically definable group dominate the economy, own most of the wealth, control most of the means of finance, production and distribution. At the regional level the same dynamic might be seen: think Israel in relation to the rest of the Mideast.
On the global level the West or even the US alone can be defined as the economically dominant minority. (Get a grip on that one and tuck it away for future reference. The Geek will be getting back to it, if not today then in the not-too-distant future.)
Politically dominant majority needs no elaboration. It need only be highlighted that the notion of majority rulership only matters in a democracy. The democracy doesn't have to be real. Appearance is enough. The motions of elections complete with speeches, votes being cast and counted is sufficient. (All the more so if Jimmy Carter is standing by to smile benignly on the charade.)
For twenty years the Geek has scratched his head wondering why the US pursued the goals of globalization AND democratization.
He had no trouble with the first. Globalization has been (at least until quite recently) good for the US. Perhaps second only to the PRC the US has benefited from the global movement of goods and capital. The influx of both goodies and money provided Americans with much to buy and the borrowed money with which to by it.
The second, democratization, really boggled the Geek. At first he hoped that seemingly rational political leaders were simply shoveling feel good platitudes to the multitude. You know, the good old domestic consumption for political gain gambit.
Wasn't so. We (or at least a passel of politicos, pundits and professors) were serious as a heart attack.
The Geek hears the rustle of wings in the distance. Chickens. One of them is named Bolivia.
Friday, December 14, 2007
The Liberty City 7--The Black Panthers Revisited?
The Geek does not consider the recent (non) verdicts to be a "major" setback to Federal efforts directed against "homegrown" terrorism or the domestic funding of overseas terror groups. It wasn't a defeat for genuine law enforcement; it was an example of how the Feds don't learn from history. Not even from their own.
Back in the late Sixties and early Seventies there was a national organisation called the Black Panther Party (BPP). It started in Oakland, CA and spread rapidly across the country with major branches in Chicago and New York City.
To put it simply: The Black Panthers scared the pants off both the US government and most Americans.
The Panthers were labeled "terrorists." Not once or twice but over and over again. Not just by the easily scared and those who pander to fear. No. The label was almost universal in its application.
The BPP didn't help its image by widely quoted outbursts of rhetorical overkill. It didn't cool fears with recurrent photos of its leaders and members brandishing guns and angry expressions.
The Federal government launched a suppressive effort. Local police "intelligence" squads pawed the ground to join the FBI in the effort to squash the BPP like a bunch of grapes.
With a (metaphorical) whoop and holler the local cops and the Feeb went after the Panthers with means that were not fair but most assuredly foul. These included not only the usual employment of "technical" surveillance (you know, wiretaps and bugs), mail covers, physical surveillance including photography, breaking and entering, theft.
The efforts against the BPP relied as well on the use of informers, often cops in radical clothing.
The line between informing and provoking is neither sharp nor clear. Informing might be a legal albeit tasteless practice. Provoking criminal actions, including conspiracy, is not.
The effort paid off with a number of high profile arrests and trials. Most of the trials ended in acquittals, hung juries, or guilty verdicts overturned on appeal.
The reason?
The informers, the centerpiece of the government's case, turned out to have been the driving force of the alleged conspiracy. The informer had become the provoker. Often the only overt action required to demonstrate the existence of a criminal conspiracy was performed by or at the strenuous urgings of the informer.
Now, get a grip on this. The purpose of the arrests, the trials, and all the surrounding media hype was not, repeat, not to obtain a conviction.
In the campaign against the BPP, the intent of all the actions, both legal and illegal, was the organisational disruption of the party. The goal with the Panthers was the same as it had been a decade earlier with the Communist Party USA. Fatal organisational disruption.
The goal was achieved. The BPP joined the CPUSA in the scrap heap of failed political parties.
The efforts taken against the Panthers, the tactics used against the CPUSA, were neither nice nor necessary. Nonetheless, their effectiveness cannot be doubted.
So much for the videotape of history. Now for the Liberty City Seven.
As the government's case unfolded these past weeks, the Geek was struck by the similarities with the Panther trials. The defendants were members of a politically, socially, and economically marginalised segment of American society. They were given to wild talk, boasts that bestowed upon the speaker an aura of potency.
Like so many of the Panthers, the Liberty City 7 talked the talk of potency because their lives gave no opportunity to walk the walk of the truly potent.
The defendants may, again like so many of the Panthers thirty plus years earlier, have had an eye firmly on the main chance. "Hey, man, if there's money in this al-Qaeda dude, lets get ours."
What that means is that the defense contention that the Seven were out to scam the scamster not launch Big Sears into low Earth orbit is inherently credible.
No wonder the jury took nine days to throw up their hands on six of the Seven while acquitting the seventh.
Is there a lesson to this?
Of course there is. The Geek is not given to bloviating for its own sake. The lesson is at least twofold.
The first lesson is this. Organisational disruption works only when there is an organisation to disrupt. There wasn't one in this case. In other cases such as the Holy Land Foundation case there is. Thus, even mis-trials are good.
The second lesson is this. The government at all levels treads a very fine line between using legal (and less than legal) methods to protect society against genuine threats and employing the manifold coercive tools at its disposal against small men with big mouths or unpleasant ideas.
In the Holy Land Foundation matter and others, the Federal government stood on the correct side of the line. With the Liberty City Seven case, it did not.
Moral of the story: Target selection is critical. That means choose only those targets which are genuine threats. With its resources, government at all levels should be able to parse between impotent loud talkers and real deal wannabe terrorists. It ought to be able to identify those whose actions fund or support off-shore terrorist groups and ignore those individuals who support humanitarian enterprises.
At the least the feds ought to realize that every time they come a cropper by failing to properly identify and prosecute a genuine threat, they not only boost the confidence of real blackhats, they lower the trust in the good judgement (and taste) of the government on the part of the rest of us.
Back in the late Sixties and early Seventies there was a national organisation called the Black Panther Party (BPP). It started in Oakland, CA and spread rapidly across the country with major branches in Chicago and New York City.
To put it simply: The Black Panthers scared the pants off both the US government and most Americans.
The Panthers were labeled "terrorists." Not once or twice but over and over again. Not just by the easily scared and those who pander to fear. No. The label was almost universal in its application.
The BPP didn't help its image by widely quoted outbursts of rhetorical overkill. It didn't cool fears with recurrent photos of its leaders and members brandishing guns and angry expressions.
The Federal government launched a suppressive effort. Local police "intelligence" squads pawed the ground to join the FBI in the effort to squash the BPP like a bunch of grapes.
With a (metaphorical) whoop and holler the local cops and the Feeb went after the Panthers with means that were not fair but most assuredly foul. These included not only the usual employment of "technical" surveillance (you know, wiretaps and bugs), mail covers, physical surveillance including photography, breaking and entering, theft.
The efforts against the BPP relied as well on the use of informers, often cops in radical clothing.
The line between informing and provoking is neither sharp nor clear. Informing might be a legal albeit tasteless practice. Provoking criminal actions, including conspiracy, is not.
The effort paid off with a number of high profile arrests and trials. Most of the trials ended in acquittals, hung juries, or guilty verdicts overturned on appeal.
The reason?
The informers, the centerpiece of the government's case, turned out to have been the driving force of the alleged conspiracy. The informer had become the provoker. Often the only overt action required to demonstrate the existence of a criminal conspiracy was performed by or at the strenuous urgings of the informer.
Now, get a grip on this. The purpose of the arrests, the trials, and all the surrounding media hype was not, repeat, not to obtain a conviction.
In the campaign against the BPP, the intent of all the actions, both legal and illegal, was the organisational disruption of the party. The goal with the Panthers was the same as it had been a decade earlier with the Communist Party USA. Fatal organisational disruption.
The goal was achieved. The BPP joined the CPUSA in the scrap heap of failed political parties.
The efforts taken against the Panthers, the tactics used against the CPUSA, were neither nice nor necessary. Nonetheless, their effectiveness cannot be doubted.
So much for the videotape of history. Now for the Liberty City Seven.
As the government's case unfolded these past weeks, the Geek was struck by the similarities with the Panther trials. The defendants were members of a politically, socially, and economically marginalised segment of American society. They were given to wild talk, boasts that bestowed upon the speaker an aura of potency.
Like so many of the Panthers, the Liberty City 7 talked the talk of potency because their lives gave no opportunity to walk the walk of the truly potent.
The defendants may, again like so many of the Panthers thirty plus years earlier, have had an eye firmly on the main chance. "Hey, man, if there's money in this al-Qaeda dude, lets get ours."
What that means is that the defense contention that the Seven were out to scam the scamster not launch Big Sears into low Earth orbit is inherently credible.
No wonder the jury took nine days to throw up their hands on six of the Seven while acquitting the seventh.
Is there a lesson to this?
Of course there is. The Geek is not given to bloviating for its own sake. The lesson is at least twofold.
The first lesson is this. Organisational disruption works only when there is an organisation to disrupt. There wasn't one in this case. In other cases such as the Holy Land Foundation case there is. Thus, even mis-trials are good.
The second lesson is this. The government at all levels treads a very fine line between using legal (and less than legal) methods to protect society against genuine threats and employing the manifold coercive tools at its disposal against small men with big mouths or unpleasant ideas.
In the Holy Land Foundation matter and others, the Federal government stood on the correct side of the line. With the Liberty City Seven case, it did not.
Moral of the story: Target selection is critical. That means choose only those targets which are genuine threats. With its resources, government at all levels should be able to parse between impotent loud talkers and real deal wannabe terrorists. It ought to be able to identify those whose actions fund or support off-shore terrorist groups and ignore those individuals who support humanitarian enterprises.
At the least the feds ought to realize that every time they come a cropper by failing to properly identify and prosecute a genuine threat, they not only boost the confidence of real blackhats, they lower the trust in the good judgement (and taste) of the government on the part of the rest of us.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Will The OIC Ever Understand Freedom of Expression?
Not a chance--if the recent statement of the Secretary General of the Organization of the Islamic Conference is any indication.
Flying well under the radar of the Western mainstream media, the fifty plus members of the OIC held a two day meeting in Istanbul to consider ways and means of countering a phenomenon the member states don't like.
The term used by the OIC is "Islamophobia."
More correctly, the little something which annoys the OIC is called "Free Speech."
Prof. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, OIC Secretary General kicked off the International Conference on Islamophobia with a florid diatribe against the "defamation" of Islam. See http://www.oic-oci.org/oicnew/topic_detail.asp?t_id=711.
In the course of his remarks, the professor not only demonstrates that he has no concept of free speech, open inquiry, or the clash of ideas, he exhibits a complete lack of historical awareness and caps it off by proving Sam Huntington was right--we are engaged in a "clash of civilizations."
"Prove it!" You challenge.
OK, let's listen in. Here is how the prof sees freedom of expression. To put it simply, he understands it as one big "yes, but."
Then there is the GenSec's take on history. Read on, "No Muslim has ever been accused of demonizing or vilifying any of the sacred religious Christian symbols or national one." It is a fact of history that Muslims have demonized and vilified both Christian and Western national symbols. It is ludicrous to say otherwise.
(The only rival in the ludicrousness department might be the "apology" of some overly politically correct people offered to Muslims for the Crusades. The Geek might think that the "apology" was justified if the Muslims offered a similar mea culpa for the conquest of the Iberian peninsula, or the attempted conquest of Vienna. More to the point of reality, "apologies" for historical realities are utterly irrelevant exercises in feel-good verbiage.)
The SecGen pays lip service to the "dialogue between civilizations," but the essential subtext indicates that the OIC actually believes in a "clash of civilizations."
"The subtext?" You ask.
Consider the first field of the OIC's website, http://www.oic-oci.org/oicnew/index.asp. It shows a global map with the member countries shown in red. Now, play along with the Geek in a little thought experiment. Picture the headlines in, say, the Washington Post, or the London Times, if an OCC (Organization of the Christian Conference) were to be formed. Were to post a website with a global map where all the predominantly or exclusively Christian countries were displayed in blue.
Pretty ugly, right?
Of course, the world will never have to deal with an OCC or a map where blue countries cover the majority of the world. The historical trajectory of the post-Reformation period militates against the idea of an OCC taking form regardless of the fantasies of some Christian evangelicals. Politics and religion in the West may be linked by values or ideas, but they are not joined hip and head as Islam posits and Islamists demand.
Get a grip on this. In the preliminaries to the recent Annapolis Conference, the Palestinian Authority negotiators made it clear that the PA would not accept characterising Israel as a Jewish State. Presumably, the OIC has no problem with this stance or, if it does, the problem has been well hidden.
Yet neither the PA nor the OIC have any difficulty with the Islamic Republic of Iran or the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. There is no indication that the OIC would make a face at any of the member countries designating themselves as Islamic.
Now, think for a moment what the reaction of the OIC's Secretary General would be if a country would rename itself a Christian republic. There is no doubt in the Geek's mind that such an action would be quickly and loudly decried as "Islamophobic." Heck, the resulting brouhaha would make the lunatic protests over the Danish cartoons last summer (over which the SecGen spills more than a few words) look like love making.
In short, the subtext of the OIC as represented in its Secretary General's speech is simple: What's ours is ours. What's yours is negotiable.
Admittedly, there have been some awfully stupid actions taken by Western governments to limit speech, inquiry, and debate in recent days and years. One need only recall the "Truth in History" laws of Germany and Austria which criminalise something called Holocaust Denial. Many of the speech codes adopted by American universities in the search for sensitivity protecting political correctness fall in the same category of idiocy.
What the OIC obviously wants is much more than either of these examples. What it wants is nothing less than either a highly constricting self-censorship on the part of Western media, academia, and politics or imposition of such limitations by the United Nations.
The UN General Assembly is no advocate of free speech. It is no upholder of free inquiry. It is no friend of wide open, free swinging debate. This has been shown not simply by the repressive measures imposed on journalists (including bloggers) and academics. It has been shown not only by past actions taken by the UN or a subdivision thereof to limit journalism or satellite broadcasting.
The generally negative, not to say destructive, view of free speech afflicting the UN has been shown in recent weeks by the expressed attitude of its Special Rapporteur on Racism, who has been a major cheerleader for governmental action against "Islamophobia" which he, like the OIC, equates with the worst excesses of racism.
Get a grip on this unpleasant reality. The OIC, and presumably the majority of the countries which comprise it, are hellbent on imposing limits on us in the West. The organization wants to stuff a gag to end all gags in our collective mouth.
It's simple. If you can't say something nice (that is something we at the OIC like) about Islam or Muslims--say nothing at all.
Get a grip on this, OIC. The answer to speech you don't like hearing isn't censorship. It isn't a gag. It isn't accusations of "racism." The answer to speech you don't like is more speech.
Why don't you blokes try something new? Try entering the debate. Try listening to opposing views. Try to heal your hyper-sensitivity to words or pictures that might be considered (even by non-Muslims) offensive.
Heck, guys, debating sure beats suicide bombing.
You really ought to try it.
Flying well under the radar of the Western mainstream media, the fifty plus members of the OIC held a two day meeting in Istanbul to consider ways and means of countering a phenomenon the member states don't like.
The term used by the OIC is "Islamophobia."
More correctly, the little something which annoys the OIC is called "Free Speech."
Prof. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, OIC Secretary General kicked off the International Conference on Islamophobia with a florid diatribe against the "defamation" of Islam. See http://www.oic-oci.org/oicnew/topic_detail.asp?t_id=711.
In the course of his remarks, the professor not only demonstrates that he has no concept of free speech, open inquiry, or the clash of ideas, he exhibits a complete lack of historical awareness and caps it off by proving Sam Huntington was right--we are engaged in a "clash of civilizations."
"Prove it!" You challenge.
OK, let's listen in. Here is how the prof sees freedom of expression. To put it simply, he understands it as one big "yes, but."
Another bone of content with the proponents of Islamophobia is the question of the freedom of expression. Although all agree that any freedoms are always linked to responsibility, such as respecting human rights, and avoiding any form of incitement to hatred or defamation of religion, we find that some circles inPerhaps the General Secretary has been too busy constructing this tortured logic to have noticed that Muslims have a great experience at inciting hatred and defamation of religion. If he needs a refresher in this, the professor needs only to go to Cairo and wander through the bookstores. If this is too hard, he can check http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/eng/eng_n/hi41207e.htm and link on to a number of other excellent examples of Islamic "literature" which defames and incites hatred for Judaism.
the West tend to ignore this basic universal and moral value. There is a
tendency here to consider that narrow and local interpretation of the universal
values, comes above any other given value, thus putting the local, ethical or
moral values in total contradiction with the universal values.
Then there is the GenSec's take on history. Read on, "No Muslim has ever been accused of demonizing or vilifying any of the sacred religious Christian symbols or national one." It is a fact of history that Muslims have demonized and vilified both Christian and Western national symbols. It is ludicrous to say otherwise.
(The only rival in the ludicrousness department might be the "apology" of some overly politically correct people offered to Muslims for the Crusades. The Geek might think that the "apology" was justified if the Muslims offered a similar mea culpa for the conquest of the Iberian peninsula, or the attempted conquest of Vienna. More to the point of reality, "apologies" for historical realities are utterly irrelevant exercises in feel-good verbiage.)
The SecGen pays lip service to the "dialogue between civilizations," but the essential subtext indicates that the OIC actually believes in a "clash of civilizations."
"The subtext?" You ask.
Consider the first field of the OIC's website, http://www.oic-oci.org/oicnew/index.asp. It shows a global map with the member countries shown in red. Now, play along with the Geek in a little thought experiment. Picture the headlines in, say, the Washington Post, or the London Times, if an OCC (Organization of the Christian Conference) were to be formed. Were to post a website with a global map where all the predominantly or exclusively Christian countries were displayed in blue.
Pretty ugly, right?
Of course, the world will never have to deal with an OCC or a map where blue countries cover the majority of the world. The historical trajectory of the post-Reformation period militates against the idea of an OCC taking form regardless of the fantasies of some Christian evangelicals. Politics and religion in the West may be linked by values or ideas, but they are not joined hip and head as Islam posits and Islamists demand.
Get a grip on this. In the preliminaries to the recent Annapolis Conference, the Palestinian Authority negotiators made it clear that the PA would not accept characterising Israel as a Jewish State. Presumably, the OIC has no problem with this stance or, if it does, the problem has been well hidden.
Yet neither the PA nor the OIC have any difficulty with the Islamic Republic of Iran or the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. There is no indication that the OIC would make a face at any of the member countries designating themselves as Islamic.
Now, think for a moment what the reaction of the OIC's Secretary General would be if a country would rename itself a Christian republic. There is no doubt in the Geek's mind that such an action would be quickly and loudly decried as "Islamophobic." Heck, the resulting brouhaha would make the lunatic protests over the Danish cartoons last summer (over which the SecGen spills more than a few words) look like love making.
In short, the subtext of the OIC as represented in its Secretary General's speech is simple: What's ours is ours. What's yours is negotiable.
Admittedly, there have been some awfully stupid actions taken by Western governments to limit speech, inquiry, and debate in recent days and years. One need only recall the "Truth in History" laws of Germany and Austria which criminalise something called Holocaust Denial. Many of the speech codes adopted by American universities in the search for sensitivity protecting political correctness fall in the same category of idiocy.
What the OIC obviously wants is much more than either of these examples. What it wants is nothing less than either a highly constricting self-censorship on the part of Western media, academia, and politics or imposition of such limitations by the United Nations.
The UN General Assembly is no advocate of free speech. It is no upholder of free inquiry. It is no friend of wide open, free swinging debate. This has been shown not simply by the repressive measures imposed on journalists (including bloggers) and academics. It has been shown not only by past actions taken by the UN or a subdivision thereof to limit journalism or satellite broadcasting.
The generally negative, not to say destructive, view of free speech afflicting the UN has been shown in recent weeks by the expressed attitude of its Special Rapporteur on Racism, who has been a major cheerleader for governmental action against "Islamophobia" which he, like the OIC, equates with the worst excesses of racism.
Get a grip on this unpleasant reality. The OIC, and presumably the majority of the countries which comprise it, are hellbent on imposing limits on us in the West. The organization wants to stuff a gag to end all gags in our collective mouth.
It's simple. If you can't say something nice (that is something we at the OIC like) about Islam or Muslims--say nothing at all.
Get a grip on this, OIC. The answer to speech you don't like hearing isn't censorship. It isn't a gag. It isn't accusations of "racism." The answer to speech you don't like is more speech.
Why don't you blokes try something new? Try entering the debate. Try listening to opposing views. Try to heal your hyper-sensitivity to words or pictures that might be considered (even by non-Muslims) offensive.
Heck, guys, debating sure beats suicide bombing.
You really ought to try it.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
The Iran Nuke NIE--Politics Or Good Work?
Having spent a good chunk of years as a close student of the whacky world of intelligence, the Geek must profess himself mystified and baffled by the bloviation and hyperventilation crowding the mainstream media and blogosphere over the new NIE regarding Iran's nuclear weapons program.
Sure the new NIE is antipodal to the 2005 effort.
So what?
Get a grip on this. An intelligence estimate is never fixed in stone for all eternity--unless, of course, the intelligence community is totally out to lunch.
There are many, to the Geek at least, self-evident reasons for this reality. First, new information surfaces. Second, the analysts may revisit old information with new eyes. Third, the target may change its intentions, actions, capabilities.
In the present case all three factors were present.
It has been acknowledged that new information regarding the Iranian program emerged over the summer and early fall. The success of the (formerly) covert program to encourage defections from the Iranian nuclear effort which started in 2005 has been obliquely acknowledged. Finally, the new information including the success of the "brain drain" operation encouraged reopening the old files and looking at their content with newly opened eyes.
Not surprisingly, this interlocking set of considerations occasioned an analytical product at great variance with the previous one. For this the intelligence community deserves high marks and thanks from We the People. The community did its job--and did it well.
To do the job, and, more importantly, to release an unclassified summary, required the executives of the sixteen agencies involved ignore command pollution from the neocon ninnies in and around the White House. To the further credit of these executives, the political sensitivities of the current administration and its allies were ignored so the product might be released.
Despite the fact that the NIE in no way discounts the threat Iran will or might present to the US and other countries in the not too distant future, neocon ninnies have taken it under attack. Senator John Ensign (R-NV) has said that he will introduce a bill establishing a bipartisan commission to assess the NIE and report back to Congress in six months. Take a look at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/06/AR2007120602457.html.
The model is the 1995 effort by congresswallahs to discredit a controversial NIE which concluded there was no likelihood of any country beyond the major nuclear powers (Russia and China) obtaining a missile capability which would directly threaten the US before 2010. The Republicans didn't like this. (Neither did a posse of neocon Democrats.) The result was the formation of a commission under the command of Donald (Don't You Be Dissing Me!) Rumsfield. To the shock of no one with an IQ above single digits, the Rumsfield Commission concluded that the NIE was wrong as a soup sandwich, muttering darkly to the effect that virtually every country other than Somalia could possess arsenals bulging with ICBMs before fifteen years were out.
(We are now only two years from the deadline year. How many countries beyond the old nuclear club members have ICBM capability? How many are projected to demonstrate one within the next twenty-four months?)
The intelligence community did not play politics with the 1995 NIE. Neither did it make policy. It did its job. Did it well. Very well when it is considered that the time frame was lengthy.
The intelligence community is not playing politics with the new Iranian nuke NIE. Neither is it making policy. It is doing its job.
The neocon ninnies howled back in 1995. They are howling now. John Bolton, a man noted for his ability and willingness to call upon others to fight, bleed and die, has termed the NIE a "quasi-putsch." http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-bolton9dec09,1,233789.story?coll=la-headlines-world. If that isn't politicising the NIE, what is?
Norman Podhoertz, the Gramps of all neocons, is equally intemperate even though he eschews Bolton's colorful language. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/06/AR2007120602457.html. But, the former editor of Commentary and current advisor to Rudy Giuliani, has long been in favor of bombing Iran. It is not surprising that he would be darkly suspicious of any piece of paper arguing that there was no immediate need for this action--particularly one signed off by all sixteen agencies of the intelligence community.
The politics have come. Not from the analysts or executives of the intelligence community. No. Not them. The source of politicization has been those whose ox has been gored. The folks who were so wrong on Iraq. The neocon ninnies.
Intelligence estimates can be and have been wrong. The Geek thought those regarding Iraq's weapons of mass destruction back in 2002 were of the grilled watermelon sort. He believed the same of the 2005 view of Iran's nuclear weapons program.
The latest estimate doesn't cloy in the Geek's nose. But, the reactions of Bolton, Ensign, Podhoretz and the "experts" at the American Enterprise Institute do.
Sure the new NIE is antipodal to the 2005 effort.
So what?
Get a grip on this. An intelligence estimate is never fixed in stone for all eternity--unless, of course, the intelligence community is totally out to lunch.
There are many, to the Geek at least, self-evident reasons for this reality. First, new information surfaces. Second, the analysts may revisit old information with new eyes. Third, the target may change its intentions, actions, capabilities.
In the present case all three factors were present.
It has been acknowledged that new information regarding the Iranian program emerged over the summer and early fall. The success of the (formerly) covert program to encourage defections from the Iranian nuclear effort which started in 2005 has been obliquely acknowledged. Finally, the new information including the success of the "brain drain" operation encouraged reopening the old files and looking at their content with newly opened eyes.
Not surprisingly, this interlocking set of considerations occasioned an analytical product at great variance with the previous one. For this the intelligence community deserves high marks and thanks from We the People. The community did its job--and did it well.
To do the job, and, more importantly, to release an unclassified summary, required the executives of the sixteen agencies involved ignore command pollution from the neocon ninnies in and around the White House. To the further credit of these executives, the political sensitivities of the current administration and its allies were ignored so the product might be released.
Despite the fact that the NIE in no way discounts the threat Iran will or might present to the US and other countries in the not too distant future, neocon ninnies have taken it under attack. Senator John Ensign (R-NV) has said that he will introduce a bill establishing a bipartisan commission to assess the NIE and report back to Congress in six months. Take a look at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/06/AR2007120602457.html.
The model is the 1995 effort by congresswallahs to discredit a controversial NIE which concluded there was no likelihood of any country beyond the major nuclear powers (Russia and China) obtaining a missile capability which would directly threaten the US before 2010. The Republicans didn't like this. (Neither did a posse of neocon Democrats.) The result was the formation of a commission under the command of Donald (Don't You Be Dissing Me!) Rumsfield. To the shock of no one with an IQ above single digits, the Rumsfield Commission concluded that the NIE was wrong as a soup sandwich, muttering darkly to the effect that virtually every country other than Somalia could possess arsenals bulging with ICBMs before fifteen years were out.
(We are now only two years from the deadline year. How many countries beyond the old nuclear club members have ICBM capability? How many are projected to demonstrate one within the next twenty-four months?)
The intelligence community did not play politics with the 1995 NIE. Neither did it make policy. It did its job. Did it well. Very well when it is considered that the time frame was lengthy.
The intelligence community is not playing politics with the new Iranian nuke NIE. Neither is it making policy. It is doing its job.
The neocon ninnies howled back in 1995. They are howling now. John Bolton, a man noted for his ability and willingness to call upon others to fight, bleed and die, has termed the NIE a "quasi-putsch." http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-bolton9dec09,1,233789.story?coll=la-headlines-world. If that isn't politicising the NIE, what is?
Norman Podhoertz, the Gramps of all neocons, is equally intemperate even though he eschews Bolton's colorful language. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/06/AR2007120602457.html. But, the former editor of Commentary and current advisor to Rudy Giuliani, has long been in favor of bombing Iran. It is not surprising that he would be darkly suspicious of any piece of paper arguing that there was no immediate need for this action--particularly one signed off by all sixteen agencies of the intelligence community.
The politics have come. Not from the analysts or executives of the intelligence community. No. Not them. The source of politicization has been those whose ox has been gored. The folks who were so wrong on Iraq. The neocon ninnies.
Intelligence estimates can be and have been wrong. The Geek thought those regarding Iraq's weapons of mass destruction back in 2002 were of the grilled watermelon sort. He believed the same of the 2005 view of Iran's nuclear weapons program.
The latest estimate doesn't cloy in the Geek's nose. But, the reactions of Bolton, Ensign, Podhoretz and the "experts" at the American Enterprise Institute do.
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