September 27, 2007
Free Burma!
Posted by zeynep at 09:19 PM | Comments (0)
April 19, 2007
So It Goes
"Meticulously planned," with "multiple victims." "Carnage," "tragedy," devastation." Those were the words used to describe a regular day in Iraq, yesterday, a day when 230 people met a violent death.
That's a 9/11, by the way, proportional to the population.
Many people have pointed out that the carnage in Virginia Tech is a small window into daily life in Iraq. Everday, they lose about a hundred of their sons and daughters. Millions have fled, an uncertain future awaits them. There seems to be no end in sight to the massacres, I discern no signs of political will from any of the involved parties towards trying to come up with, not a solution as that word seems unfit for any result that may come from the current horror, but a means to stop the blood flowing in the streets.
Meanwhile, I watched the PBS "America at Crossroads" series. While it clearly made by people who dislike Bush, it was so shallow that I can't t find another word to describe it. The Iraqis, it seems, just aren't properly trained. Somehow, they can blow up Americans and each other without running into skill shortages, but their lack of training holds them back from performing their duties. This was the narrative upon which the series mostly revolved.
Even when squeezed into the ill-fitting narrative, the segments still made it clear that the problem, as far as the occupation goes, is that the Iraqis are unwilling to do the bidding of an occupation army. They aren't untrained, per se.
And it is also clear that the American military has no idea what it wants to do. The soldiers, dressed as robocops, go around rounding up people that they have been told are the "bad guys," a phrase used repeatedly by the soldiers. Told by whom? A rival? A neighbor? Not clear. What happens to these bad guys? They disappear into a Gulag.
While American soldiers are going around attempting to round people up, IEDs explode on the roads. The soldiers carry their wounded and dead back into the base. Next day, they try to clear other roads of IEDs that are there because American soldiers are driving through those roads. Meanwhile the Sunni sectarians blow up markets and the shi'ite government death-squads execute sunnis, two serious problems the American soldiers are clearly incapable of doing anything about.
So it goes. Americans hunt IEDs, more of which blow up while they patrol the roads hunting for IEDs. Bombs go off in Shia neighborhoods. Sunni men turn up dead, shot execution style. Americans round up some men, reasons unclear. Another bomb goes off. All Iraqis who work with Americans cover their faces, which tells you all you need to know about the nature of the occupation. More men turned up strangled. PBS tells me that the Iraqi army is untrained. So it goes.
Posted by zeynep at 03:18 PM | Comments (2)
January 02, 2007
Hagiographs and Repressed Guilt
I presume that most decent men and women have already had it with the Ford hagiographies that just don't seem to stop. The men pardoned his buddy who gave him the presidency, proceeded to close the Vietnam chapter as far as we were concerned as if a great wrong had not been done to a people, and let war loose on East Timor. So he's as bad as most and not as bad as some of them. Why this non-stop flow of tears of adoration and tales of decency? At least that was the thought in my head as I rolled my eyes and clicked my mouse on the latest by Time, "Gerald Ford refused to take his private faith public" (I head he was good to puppies too, although surely not as good as Nixon was to Checkers.)
Then I got it, I think. The press corps is playing out its guilt. Most of the articles I read are barbs at the Bush administration, disguised as admiration of Ford. At this point in history an article, of all things, about not flaunting one's born again status can only be a barb against the W administration. Who would ever think about dragging that out from that era unless you were specifically looking for things one could use as comparisons?
I think the press corps is fuming at the W gang for exposing them as spineless lackeys who went along with power until it didn't matter. I think there is strong, real hatred mixed in with strong, real self-hatred and guilt... Will this mean that they will behave better the next time around? Don't hold your breath. Repressed, unresolved, unconfronted guilt is rarely the path towards decency or integrity.
(P.S. I believe I deserve credit for the repeated use of the word decent. I think it was very decent of me in this decent week of decent Ford's and not so decent Saddam's death.)
Posted by zeynep at 04:01 PM | Comments (2)
December 28, 2006
Decency
I think I saw about a few dozen headlines / op-ed pieces about how "decent" Gerald Ford was.
I won't comment on the Watergate era. But how is it decent to know that a war is wrong, to know that innocents will die by the thousands, to know that, as an ex-president, you would wield some inluence by joining the dissent before the war and yet "embargo" your remarks until after your death?
President George W. Bush and his top advisers made a "big mistake" in their justification for invading Iraq, Gerald Ford told journalist Bob Woodward in an interview embargoed until after the former president's death...
In a four-hour tape-recorded interview in July 2004, Ford "very strongly" disagreed with the justification for the 2003 invasion of Iraq advocated and carried out by key Bush advisers and veterans of his own administration -- Vice President Dick Cheney and former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- reported Woodward.
"Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq. They put the emphasis on weapons of mass destruction," Ford said.
"And now, I've never publicly said I thought they made a mistake, but I felt very strongly it was an error in how they should justify what they were going to do."
..The interview and a subsequent conversation in 2005 were done for a future book project, although Ford, who became president in 1974 after Richard Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal, said his comments could be published any time after his death, Woodward wrote.
Maybe this does go back to the Watergate pardon: don't rock the power structure regardless of the costs borne by others. Get along (with the powerful). Keep quiet (if the powers-that-be would like you to). Duck and turn your back.
If this is decent, what do they call cowardly?
Posted by zeynep at 12:21 PM | Comments (1)
November 09, 2006
Democrats Gain Control of the House and the Senate
But the big question remains: What will they do in Iraq?
Most things in Iraq are out of American hands, in terms of improving anything. We could certainly make things worse for us and for Iraq, I suppose.
If, however, democrats more or less "stay the course", as they seem intent on doing regardless whatever wordplay they are engaged in at the moment, the consequences could be so horrific that our current times will look like peace.
Iraq's already burning. The current schism being created and emnity being generated by our actions do have the potential to engulf the world in strife and flames for a long time. We must get the Democrats to try to actually change our policies drastically.
Posted by zeynep at 01:17 PM | Comments (2)
August 16, 2006
If You Needed Proof...
It really is true, the good die young. By this token, Pinochet should be among us for some time. Here's to hoping Pinochet's life includes a trial, unlike General Stroessner's.
Posted by zeynep at 09:39 PM | Comments (3)
May 16, 2006
I know! I know!
I think Bush wants to see how low he can go with his approval ratings. Take this "immigration" "initiative," with 6,000 national guard troops at the border. Too few, obviously, to stop poor, desperate migrants. Enough, however, to upset every constituency involved.
I mean, he should have some accomplishments he can call unique and his own, no?
Posted by zeynep at 07:29 AM | Comments (2)
April 22, 2006
The Best and the Brightest
I read this a few days ago, and have found myself still thinking about it:
For a few hours before the dinner, I called top lobbyists and asked a simple question, "Could Tom DeLay become a lobbyist now that he's leaving government?"The answer was a resounding "Yes." DeLay may have found himself on the wrong end of several ethics committee reports, they said. He may have been too radioactive a few years ago to run for speaker of the House. He may even have been too tainted by his ties to convicted felons to be reelected to Congress this year.
But he could still make a bundle on K Street, they concurred. Leaders of law and lobbying firms made it clear that they would happily hire him, especially if federal prosecutors don't indict him as part of the Abramoff affair.
All this said without irony. ... I don't know if it reflects worse on the politicians or the lobbyists.
Posted by zeynep at 09:29 PM | Comments (0)
March 01, 2006
Who Would Have Thought
So, we now have a video of the president being directly told that the levees might well be breached:
In dramatic and sometimes agonizing terms, federal disaster officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief before Hurricane Katrina struck that the storm could breach levees, put lives at risk in New Orleans’ Superdome and overwhelm rescuers, according to confidential video footage.Bush didn’t ask a single question during the final briefing before Katrina struck on Aug. 29, but he assured soon-to-be-battered state officials: “We are fully prepared.”
Contrast it to this::
On the September 1 broadcast of ABC's Good Morning America, President Bush acted as though the breach of the levees was an unforeseeable fluke occurrence: "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees."
Really, now. Who would have thought Saddam didn't have WMD? Who would have thought the Iraqis might not want to be occupied by an arrogant, incompetent foreign army that seems to give little importance to their lives and treasure? Who would have thought turning over Medicare perscription drug benefit into a gift for large pharmaceuticals might be expensive and troublesome? Who would have thought giving tax breaks to gas guzzling might not be the best strategy?
Who would have thought? Who thinks these thoughts? Must be those crazy critics who want to make Bin Ladin president instead of Dick Cheney.
Posted by zeynep at 09:10 PM | Comments (0)
February 02, 2006
SOTU
It was surreal. He just kept lying, on the warrantless wiretapping (it is not court-approved, although who knows now with the deck stacked), his energy policy, reconstruction (there is no new reconstruction money)... It was almost boring, too. If the stakes weren't deadly serious.
Here's a SOTU rebuttal that can be printed and shared.
Posted by zeynep at 07:18 AM | Comments (1)
January 31, 2006
Alito Confirmed
Alito Jr., the man who believes that the President is king, is confirmed for life.
Wohoo. Now, if whatever the king says is the law, shouldn't the Supreme Court abolish itself? I guess they need the fifth judge confirmed before they can do that.
Posted by zeynep at 02:29 PM | Comments (1)
January 28, 2006
Chavez Bad! We are Good!
Why is it bad for PDVSA (Venezuela's national oil company) to provide heating fuel to the needy through CITGO, but okay for USAID to be folded into the State Department -- where it will become an even more blatant tool of our foreign policy? (Besides, PDVSA does not require that people who purchase oil from CITGO also buy other Venezuelan products at arbitrary prices -- the way USAID forces "aid" recepients to purchase U.S. grains. Not only does this mean the aid money does not help the local economy and local production, it often results in great waste and expense as grains get transported accross oceans.)
Posted by zeynep at 09:35 AM | Comments (1)
January 26, 2006
Oops. Hamas Gets a Majority
Now, what was that about our commitment to spreading democracy in the Middle East?
Posted by zeynep at 05:47 PM | Comments (1)
January 02, 2006
Would Be Funny If It Weren't So Scary
It's scary how accurate this "parody" is:
A Brief Primer Designed to Help You Understand the Workings of Our New, Streamlined American System of Governmentby Jon Carroll
Perhaps you have been unable to follow the intricacies of the logic used by John Yoo, the UC Berkeley law professor who has emerged as the president's foremost apologist for all the stuff he has to apologize for. I have therefore prepared a brief, informal summary of the relevant arguments.
* * *
Why does the president have the power to unilaterally authorize wiretaps of American citizens?
Because he is the president.
Does the president always have that power?No. Only when he is fighting the war on terror does he have that power.
When will the war on terror be over?
The fight against terror is eternal. Terror is not a nation; it is a tactic. As long as the president is fighting a tactic, he can use any means he deems appropriate.
Why does the president have that power?
It's in the Constitution.
Where in the Constitution?It can be inferred from the Constitution. When the president is protecting America, he may by definition make any inference from the Constitution that he chooses. He is keeping America safe.
Who decides what measures are necessary to keep America safe?
The president.
Who has oversight over the actions of the president?
The president oversees his own actions. If at any time he determines that he is a danger to America, he has the right to wiretap himself, name himself an enemy combatant and spirit himself away to a secret prison in Egypt.
But isn't there a secret court, the FISA court, that has the power to authorize wiretapping warrants? Wasn't that court set up for just such situations when national security is at stake?
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court might disagree with the president. It might thwart his plans. It is a danger to the democracy that we hold so dear. We must never let the courts stand in the way of America's safety.So there are no guarantees that the president will act in the best interests of the country?
The president was elected by the people. They chose him; therefore he represents the will of the people. The people would never act against their own interests; therefore, the president can never act against the best interests of the people. It's a doctrine I like to call "the triumph of the will."
But surely the Congress was also elected by the people, and therefore also represents the will of the people. Is that not true?
Congress? Please.It's sounding more and more as if your version of the presidency resembles an absolute monarchy. Does it?
Of course not. We Americans hate kings. Kings must wear crowns and visit trade fairs and expositions. The president only wears a cowboy hat and visits military bases, and then only if he wants to.
Can the president authorize torture?
No. The president can only authorize appropriate means.
Could those appropriate means include torture?
It's not torture if the president says it's not torture. It's merely appropriate. Remember, America is under constant attack from terrorism. The president must use any means necessary to protect America.
Won't the American people object?
Not if they're scared enough.
...
On it goes...
Posted by zeynep at 07:45 PM | Comments (1)
January 01, 2006
It's All Very Simple, Really.
It just never ceases to amaze me how they can twist issues with such a straight face:
On Sunday, the president strongly defended a program that allows domestic spying on those suspected of having ties to terrorist groups. "If somebody from al-Qaida is calling you, we'd like to know why," Bush said in San Antonio.
As if that was ever the question. What they are doing is thwarting what weak oversight there was over domestic spying. Honestly, which judge in the United States would have denied the government the right to wiretap an actual terrorism suspect?
Further, their reckless and illegal domestic program spying program also endangers everyone for a very simple reason. Such a large dragnet is impossibly large to sift through in a meaningful way in real time. If they had a effort targeted at actual terror suspects, they might actually catch someone planning something.
Posted by zeynep at 08:43 PM | Comments (0)
December 26, 2005
One more bright idea...
... bites the dust:
The U.S. state department announced yesterday it was suspending publication of Hi Magazine, its glossy, monthly attempt to win the hearts and minds of young Arabs, part of a communications troika it established following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.In saying 'bye to Hi, the state department acknowledged the dialogue it had sought with the Arab world had become a one-way conversation.
...
The U.S. government has been spending $4.5 million (U.S.) annually since July 2003, trying to bring its own particular take on American life to a target Arab demographic aged 18-35.
Seriously, are they this stupid, or is all this propaganda actually aimed at the U.S. public (to help convince us we are doing something)? Or maybe its all just the bureaucrats trying to convince themselves.
Posted by zeynep at 01:28 PM | Comments (1)
December 24, 2005
What About Radon?
I suggest they do something useful for a change and add radon to their monitoring:
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The FBI has been covertly monitoring mosques and Muslim homes and businesses in U.S. cities for abnormal radiation levels since 2002, several government officials confirmed Friday.
Posted by zeynep at 12:21 PM | Comments (0)
December 20, 2005
Delay's high-life
I know, this is minor as things go. Still, it's a bit hard to imagine Delay's mindset. I guess he thinks he deserves it all...
As Tom DeLay became a king of campaign fundraising, he lived like one too. He visited cliff-top Caribbean resorts, golf courses designed by PGA champions and four-star restaurants — all courtesy of donors who bankrolled his political money empire.Over the past six years, the former House majority leader and his associates have visited places of luxury most Americans have never seen, often getting there aboard corporate jets arranged by lobbyists and other special interests.
Public documents reviewed by The Associated Press tell the story: at least 48 visits to golf clubs and resorts; 100 flights aboard company planes; 200 stays at hotels, many world-class; and 500 meals at restaurants, some averaging nearly $200 for a dinner for two.
Instead of his personal expense, the meals and trips for DeLay and his associates were paid with donations collected by the campaign committees, political action committees and children's charity the Texas Republican created during his rise to the top of Congress. His lawyer says the expenses are part of DeLay's effort to raise money from Republicans and to spread the GOP message.
Put them together and a lifestyle emerges.
"A life to enjoy. The excuse to escape," Palmas del Mar, an oceanside Puerto Rican resort visited by DeLay, promised in a summer ad on its Web site as a golf ball bounced into a hole and an image of a sunset appeared.
The Caribbean vacation spot has casino gambling, horseback riding, snorkeling, deep-sea fishing and private beaches.
"He was very friendly. We always see the relaxed side of politicians," said Daniel Vassi, owner of the French bistro Chez Daniel at Palmas del Mar. Vassi said DeLay has eaten at his restaurant every year for the last three, and was last there in April with about 20 other people, including the resort's owners.
The restaurant is a cozy and popular place on the yacht-lined marina at Palmas del Mar. Dishes include bouillabaisse for about $35.50, Dover sole for $37.50 and filet mignon for $28.50. Palmas del Mar is also a DeLay donor, giving $5,000 to DeLay's Americans for a Republican Majority PAC in 2000.
Since he joined the House leadership as majority whip in 1995, DeLay has raised at least $35 million for his campaign, PACs, foundation and legal defense fund. He hasn't faced a serious re-election threat in recent years, giving him more leeway than candidates in close races to spend campaign money.
AP's review found DeLay's various organizations spent at least $1 million over the last six years on hotels, restaurants, golf resorts and corporate jet flights for their boss and his associates.
Come to think of it, he probably thinks he's already retired -- except of course he occasionally has to get some paperwork together for this formality called "elections."
Posted by zeynep at 07:13 PM | Comments (3)
October 03, 2005
The Crony Ways
Cronyism runs both ways, you know. You pick your buddies, they pick themselves. I help you, I help me, you help me, I help me.
The current supreme court nominee, whose dazzling accomplishments include being a city council member in Dallas, had been "leading the White House effort to help Bush choose nominees to the Supreme Court."
Remind you of anyone?
Dick Cheney, of course, who had been leading the vice-presidential search for the Bush campaign back in 2000 before he came back to nominate himsef -- a move apparently described, with admiration as "'the most Machiavellian fucking thing I’ve ever seen" by Cheney's "longtime friend Stuart Spencer.'"
It's all pretty funny if these guys weren't running the world, with their fingers on nucler triggers and all.
Posted by zeynep at 05:01 PM | Comments (1)
February 15, 2005
Prove it Ward!
You would have thought that with all the brouhaha over Ward Churchill's three-year-old essay, his too-happy critics would bother to do a bit of research, learn a fact or two, before jumping on the bandwagon. But, alas, there are no standards if you are defending the empire, whereas everything you've ever written will be gone over with a fine tooth comb if you are talking about its cruel nature.
So I came accross an almost comical piece, except the Denver Post ran it as if it were a serious op-ed. It's by Andrew Cohen, identified as "an attorney and a CBS News legal analyst." First he claims that Churchill's writing is "unintelligible":
First, it is terribly written. It reads like a souped-up high school paper written by a kid straight out of his first rhetoric class. Several passages are unintelligible.For example, Churchill writes: "Property before people, it seems - or at least the equation of property to people - is a value by no means restricted to America's boardrooms. And the sanctimony with which such putrid sentiments are enunciated turns out to be nauseatingly similar, whether mouthed by the CEO of Standard Oil or any of the swarm of comfort zone 'pacifists' queuing up to condemn the black book [sic] after it ever so slightly disturbed the functioning of business-as-usual in Seattle."
What does that mean? Many more passages reflect a level of ardor that seems ill-suited to the give and take of true political science.
Well, dude, if you can't tell a "black book" from the "black bloc," of course you won't be able to understand that passage. This is Churchill's standard critique of the mainstream --and self-identified "pacifist" left-- regarding their attitude towards the "black block," an anarchist political grouping. Most of the tension between those groups bubbled to the surface over the question of property destruction -- such as the infamous window breakings during the WTO Seattle protests in 1999. I mean there's nothing surprising that a random right-winger can't follow an internal left debate, but shouldn't you have to at least a bit of googling before being allowed to publish an op-ed on a subject that you are so ignorant about?
However, being utterly ignorant is no obstacle to this writer:
More important, however, is that there are no sources for the many astounding claims he makes in his piece. No footnotes. No endnotes. Perhaps they were not included because of space. But if Churchill wants to move past this controversy, if he wants to truly take a stand for academic rigor as well as academic freedom, he ought to reveal what those sources are. If he has the courage of his convictions - as I am sure he does - he ought to put his cards on the table and give the world, and his students, the proof behind his conclusions.Here are just a few of the factual conclusions Churchill makes in his essay that he ought to be required to show proof for:
He asserts that 500,000 Iraqi children died "as a predictable - in fact, widely predicted - result of the 1991 'surgical' bombing of their country's water purification and sewage facilities, as well as other 'infrastructural' targets upon which Iraq's civilian population depending for its very survival."
He cites a "wave of elation that swept America at reports of what was happening along the so-called 'Highway of Death:' perhaps 100,000 'towel-heads' and 'camel-jockeys' ... in full retreat, routed and effectively defenseless, many of them conscripted civilian laborers, slaughtered in a single day by jets firing the most hyper-lethal types of ordnance."
...
Ok, for the first one, let's start with Madeline Albright? Remember her? Secretary of State under Clinton? She not only acknowledged the number, she belives the price was worth it:
Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price--we think the price is worth it.
--60 Minutes (5/12/96)
The number, of course comes first from a 1995 U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and later a 1999 UNICEF report [Addition: FAO numbers were preliminary, and later challenged, but important in that they suggested the scale of the disaster. Most people refer to the UNICEF report.] The lowest estimate is "106,000 to 227,000" -- so, what should we do Andrew? Fire Ward Churchill if only a quarter of a million kids under the age of five died under the sanctions rather than half a million as UNICEF estimates?
The second, "highway of death," I'm tempted to leave as a googling exercise but one can at least check out the BBC version, which has a lower estimate, still in the tens of thousands, and some testimony from Ramsey Clark's War Crimes Tribunal... I mean, it's one thing to say "it was worth it; we had to kill them in order to stave off larger battles," and all the usual justifications one hears, but what do you with this kind of total denial?
There is much to discuss about that infamous essay -- but how can there be a reasonable discussion when the facts about the real world as it exists, not as it is depicted by the propaganda system, are treated as figments of one's imagination?
In any case, I hope more people start asking those questions. Let's discuss. How many hundreds of thousands of children under the age of five died due to our sanctions on Iraq? What is this "highway of death"? What happened during the Vietnam War? What are the human costs of IMF imposed "structural-adjustment programs"? Which dictators received U.S. support during the cold war? After? Did we mine the harbors of Nicaragua? What did the "contras" do there? Why do we have soldiers and bases all around the world? What's torture business that keeps popping up all over the headlines?
Posted by zeynep at 01:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
February 02, 2005
"Well you did say Jehovah"
He said it. He said it, said it, said it. He said the "I" word. "The fall of imperial communism was only a dream..." Imperial, imperial, imperial...
A much-needed lexical breakthrough, finally.
Mathias: Look, I don't think it ought to be blasphemy, just saying Jehovah.
Crowd: [Shocked] He said it again!
Edler: You're only making it worse for yourself.
Mathias: Making it worse? How could it be worse? Jehovah, Jehovah, Jehovah.
Crowd: Ooooooh!
Elder: I'm warning you... If you say Jehovah once more... [A stone flys by and hits the elder.] Right. Who threw that? Come on. Who threw that?
Crowd: She did she did, he, him, him, him, him, him, him.
Elder: Was it you?
Woman2: Yes.
Elder: Right...
Woman2: Well you did say Jehovah. ... [She gets stoned {the blasphemer}]
Elder: Stop, stop. Will you stop that... stop it. Now look. No-one is to stone anyone until I blow this whistle. Do you understand? Even, and I want to make this absolutely clear; even if they do say Jehovah. ---- [The skocked women stone the elder to death, ending in the dropping of a huge bolder on his fallen body.]
Woman3: Good shot.
Posted by zeynep at 10:08 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
George W. Bush and I Agree
"In any nation, casting your vote is an act of civic responsibility; for millions of Iraqis, it was also an act of personal courage, and they have earned the respect of us all."
Amen to that. Exactly why we should make sure that we end our occupation.
Posted by zeynep at 09:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
"Broader Middle East"! Yikes!
"To promote peace in the broader Middle East, we must confront regimes..."
Yikes! Broader Middle East? Is that a coded threat to China?
Posted by zeynep at 09:52 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
What Was the "Defense Department" then?
"We have created a new department of government to defend our homeland," says the president. That always gets me. If we needed a "Homeland Security Department" to defend the homeland, isn't that basically admitting Pentagon, a.k.a "Defense Department," isn't really engaged in "defense"?
Posted by zeynep at 09:45 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Did Cheney Applaud?
Did Cheney applaud "For the good of families, children, and society, I support a constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage"? My station cut away to a crowd shot... Did he or did he not applaud the declaration that his daughter was bad for families, children and society?
George W. just said we should show young men an ideal of manhood that "rejects violence." I hope the next conscientious objector uses that in his trial.
Posted by zeynep at 09:38 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Does Not Compute. Does Not Compute.
Listening to the SOTU, trying to adjust after my return... I just heard Bush say "environmentally responsible" and "nuclear" in one breath. "Safe" and "clean" as adjectives for "nuclear energy."
To keep our economy growing, we also need reliable supplies of affordable, environmentally responsible energy. Nearly four years ago, I submitted a comprehensive energy strategy that encourages conservation, alternative sources, a modernized electricity grid, and more production here at home, including safe, clean nuclear energy.
Now he just blatantly lied about the financial situation of Social Security. I can't wait till he gets to how we've done nothing but good in Iraq.
Posted by zeynep at 09:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 18, 2004
First They Came for the Muslims...
A Cornell University study finds that support for placing special serious restrictions on Muslim-Americans' civil liberties correlates with strength of religious belief and exposure to television news:
The survey showed that 27 percent of respondents supported requiring all Muslim-Americans to register where they lived with the federal government. Twenty-two percent favored racial profiling to identify potential terrorist threats. And 29 percent thought undercover agents should infiltrate Muslim civic and volunteer organizations to keep tabs on their activities and fund-raising....
While researchers said they were not surprised by the overall level of support for curtailing civil liberties, they were startled by the correlation with religion and exposure to television news.
What's next? A debate on whether all Muslims should be required to wear a crescent at all times?
Posted by zeynep at 11:05 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
December 02, 2004
Thank God Our Leaders Are Completely Different From Saddam Hussein
(This entry posted by Jonathan Schwarz)
I'm obsessed with the idea that America's leaders have a worldview alarmingly similar to Saddam Hussein (see here, here, here, here, here and here), Osama bin Laden (here and here) and the most hardline Iranian ayatollahs (here and here).
What's exciting about guest posting here is I can impose my peculiar fixation on a whole new group of people. So let's get started!
According to Out of the Ashes by Andrew and Patrick Cockburn, Saddam Hussein was recorded telling his senior commanders this shortly after the invasion of Kuwait in 1990:
"This decision to invade Kuwait we received almost ready-made from God. Our role is simply to carry it out."
Thank God George Bush is completely different from Saddam. In the sense he's eerily similar:
[Mahmoud] Abbas said that at Aqaba... Bush told him, "God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did..."
Next, Out of the Ashes explains why no one around Saddam advised him that his decision "ready-made from God" might not be such a hot idea:
"In that circle, the safest course is always to be ten percent more hawkish than the chief," says one veteran Russian diplomat long stationed in Baghdad. "You stay out of trouble that way."
This is, of course, exactly the same as the atmosphere within the upper reaches of the US government -- not just now, but for decades. You could find a million examples, but here's one in which Seymour Hersh explains our 1993 bombing of Baghdad for their purported assassination attempt against George HW Bush:
In interviews over the summer, many past and present American intelligence officials expressed little surprise that the Clinton Administration had predicated the bombing of Baghdad on such conflicting and dubious evidence. One C.I.A. analyst explained, "Of course nobody wants to say, 'There's nothing to it, Mr. President,' especially when other guys are pushing it. The President asks the intelligence analysts for the bottom line: Is this for real or not? You can't really lose by saying yes." That hard-line attitude—"hanging tough" in a crisis—has marked many of America's intelligence failures since the beginning of the Cold War.
Finally, here's another quote from Out of the Ashes, about occurrences in Iraq as Saddam consolidated power in the late seventies:
The body of one senior leader was returned to his house in Baghdad in a pickup truck. The body showed signs of torture. A note attached to the corpse said the leader had died of a heart attack...
Boy, things sure have changed:
One senior source inside the Iraqi Assistance Centre, the organisation set up by the coalition to compensate Iraqis for loss or death, yesterday claimed that US military doctors routinely wrote "heart attack" on the death certificate of prisoners who had died from other causes, sometimes during interrogation.
Yes indeed. Thank god our leaders are completely different from Saddam Hussein.
Posted by jonathan at 08:04 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 23, 2004
What's Wrong With These People?
Hundreds of thousands of people around Ukraine seem determined not to acccept "Central Election Commission's announcement that Kremlin-backed Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych had narrowly won Sunday's runoff vote." Their excuse? Exit polls showing the presidential challenger Viktor Yushchenko leading and reports of significant fraud, intimidation and media bias in favour of the official victor.
Jeez, what's the big deal? Why can't they go shopping instead? Isn't there a game on tonight? What's with this 200,000 people camping out in the streets in sub-zero temperatures -- now in their third day?
Let me be clear that there is no doubt that the United States is also trying to illegitimately meddle in this election. I don't know enough to judge what kind of a politician Yushchenko will turn out to be. I don't know if he will be a disappointment to these people who are trying so hard to see him as their next president. That's certainly a possibility.
Here's what's important, though. The people of Ukraine are providing a striking example of what happens when people actually care about democracy, about their right to vote. This is what happens when there is a popular will to actually challenge possibly fraudulent election results.
Posted by zeynep at 04:20 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack
November 16, 2004
How Stupid Is This Going to Get?
So, the Democrats have chosen Harry Reid of Nevada as the Senate minority leader:
Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada won election as leader of the shrunken Democratic minority on Tuesday and said he stands ready to cooperate with Republicans or confront them as he deems necessary....
Seconding [Reid's] nomination was Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, who occasionally vexed Daschle by crossing party lines. "I said he will lead this caucus into a new era and oppose where necessary, compromise where possible and avoid the obstructionist label," Nelson said of his closed-door remarks.With the exception of abortion rights and gun control, both of which he opposes, Reid's recent voting record on major issues puts him in the mainstream of Senate Democrats.
The Democrats are still worried about the "obstructionist" label? They pick this absolutely uninspiring, anti-gun control Senator whose only talent seems to be back-room dealings? When it's abundantly clear that the Republicans will not deal? Don't they understand that the obstructionist label will be there no matter what the they do or don't do? Remember how a triple-amputee vet got turned into a Saddam Hussein supporter? (Or, was it an Bin Ladin supporter? Hard to keep up with the smear-machine.)
They've already indicated that they will roll the red carpet for Gonzales who had declared the Geneva Conventions "quaint" and non-binding on the U.S., and the U.S. constitution non-binding on Texas. Rice will presumably breeze through after a few obligatory questions about "Bin Ladin Determined to Attack Inside the United States" memo, which she claimed did not warn that Bin Ladin was determined to attack inside the United States. I mean, it's one thing to lose but it's another to act like total, absolute losers.
Posted by zeynep at 04:06 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
November 11, 2004
Nuclear Whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu Has Been Rearrested -- Do Something.
A few years ago, a friend of mine told me of his visit to the Robben Island prison in South Africa, where Nelson Mandela was jailed for 27 years. My friend, a journalist from India who reports mostly on the harsh lives and struggles of the "untouchable" castes, and a bunch of the usual dignitaries were taken to the island during an international conference. Robben Island has now become a tourist attraction, apparently, an obligatory visit.
But, of course, some things never become ordinary and encountering true human courage is one of those. The visitors were greeted by an old black man who would act as their guide. He welcomed them by saying, "Ladies and gentleman, welcome to Robben Island, one of the apartheid regime's prison. I spent 15 years here for your freedom."
Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear whistleblower who spent 18 years in jail in Israel --more than 11 of it in solitary confinement-- trying to further the cause of our freedom to live free of the most horrific weapons of mass destruction, has just been rearrested. The pretext is the flimsiest: that he was revealing "classified information." The whole world knows Vanunu has no more secrets to reveal; he has already told the world all that he knew from his time as a technician at the secret Israeli nuclear plant in Dimona.
His real crime is that he wasn't broken by the prison, by the solitary confinement. He wasn't even bitter: he emerged from the long ordeal as a calm, confident believer in peace, a steady opponent of nuclear weapons. The Israeli goverment slapped on him ridiculous restrictions: can't talk to foreigners, can't talk to press, can't leave the country, can't do this, can't do that. It's obvious that what they are afraid of is not some alleged secrets that he possesses, but his brave voice.
Vanunu did not seek to be a hero, he was just looking for a job when he landed at the heart of Israel's nuclear program. He has, however, more than lived up to the challenge life thrust upon him. His rearrest is a crucial test for all of us. It's clear his arrest was timed to take place when most news organizations were covering Arafat's death. They are betting we will ignore this outrage.
If we let Mordechai Vanunu once again be disappeared into the Israeli jails, who will want to fight for our freedom again? If he can be snatched by "20 police commandos wearing bulletproof vests and wielding machine guns" without worldwide outrage, who will want to be a whistleblower again?
Right now, the campaign that was formed earlier to demand his release is putting out a call to everyone to contact the Israeli Embassy to demand his release. Here are the phone numbers in the United States:
Israeli Embassy: (202) 364-5500
email: ambassador_sec@israelemb.org
fax: 202-364-5607
Public & Interreligious Affairs: (202) 364-5542
Political Department: (202)364-5581/2
Press Office: (202) 364-5538
If you are not in the United States, contact the Israeli ambassador in your country: http://www.embassyworld.com/embassy/israel1.html.
I urge you to pick up the phone and call the embassy. Then write a fax. Then write an email. Then organize a demonstration in front of the embassy. Call your paper and demand that they cover this story.
And be outraged not because it's the right thing to do and what has happened is outrageous, but also because if we run out of his kind of people though abandoning them when they need us, we have no hope left.
Posted by zeynep at 12:47 PM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
Arafat Dies
Ramzy Baroud of the Palestine Chronicle puts it all in perspective:
As a child I often witnessed Israeli soldiers forcing young Palestinians to their knees in my refugee camp in Gaza, threatening to beat them if they did not spit upon a photo of Yasser Arafat. "Say Arafat is a jackass," the soldiers would scream. No one would exchange his safety for insulting an image of Arafat. They would endure pain and injury, but would say nothing.It was not the character of Arafat that induced such resilience but what the man represented. This explains why Gazans stood enthralled as Abu Ammar spoke upon his return following the signing of Oslo. Retrospectively, it also explains the level of betrayal that many Palestinians felt when their icon, who in some ways had been deified in his exile, failed to live up to their expectations upon his return to the homeland.
...
In the days that follow Israel, the US and Arab regimes will be scrambling to ensure that the post-Arafat era serves them best. In the case of Arab governments this era must absolve them from any meaningful responsibility towards Palestine and her people. But Palestinians are resilient. They will learn how to deal with life without Arafat and his mystique. Their national unity remains and it will strengthen their fight, even in grief. Warriors, sages and leaders come and go, some linger a bit more than others, but the march to freedom will certainly carry on, for the "mountain cannot be shaken by the wind".
Posted by zeynep at 12:33 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
November 10, 2004
Mr. Torture-Is-Okay-and-Texas-Not-Part-Of-U.S. About to Be Appointed Attorney General
How surprising:
The officials, who asked to remain unidentified, said Bush was moving quickly to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of Attorney General John Ashcroft, which was announced on Tuesday night.[Alberto] Gonzales, 49, is a trusted adviser to Bush and a former Texas Supreme Court justice and often considered a possible Bush nominee to the Supreme Court.
Former Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson had been considered a candidate for attorney general, but after Bush's re-election last week he made it clear he wanted to remain general counsel at PepsiCo Inc.
If he is selected, Gonzales' Senate confirmation hearing would likely delve into what role he played in a legal opinion that defined the treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq, which critics said contributed to the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, a charge denied by the administration.
In classified memos that were released in June, administration lawyers argued that Bush, as commander in chief, was not restricted by prohibitions on torture enshrined in U.S. law and international treaties due to the president's "complete authority over the conduct of war," including interrogations.
For those of you trying to keep up with who's who in this great administration remember that last year, in his capacity of White House legal counsel, Alberto Gonzales authored memos which basically argued that we should declare that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to our actions because this "substantially reduced the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. 2441)." -- because violating the Geneva Conventions is illegal under that act.
Got that? If you declare the law does not apply, it's harder for them to prosecute you for breaking that law, he's arguing. It's like the speeder declaring the speed limit does not apply. (I wrote a run-down of the various memos and legal opinions here.)
But wait, it gets better. Gonzales had opined in 1997 that the State of Texas was not bound by international treaties signed by the United States -- when Texas executed a Mexican-national who was interrogated and tried without letting him contact his embassy and made to sign a confession in English, which he thought was an immigration document -- clearly a violation of international treaties in this matter. Here's part of what I wrote about it then:
The current White House chief legal counsel Alberto Gonzales, who had been widely rumored to be the next Supreme Court Nominee before authoring the latest memos arguing the president was not bound by international or domestic law, had opined in the past that the State of Texas was not bound by international treaties signed by the United States.There goes a few hundred years of precedent along with the United States constitution, but, hey, we got to execute a Mexican national who did not speak English and who signed a murder confession thinking it was an immigration document, without a translator or lawyer present
...
I wondered if [Gonzales] found it odd that nobody asked for his passport when he left Texas for D.C.
Ashcroft, go forth in comfort. You have been one-upped.
Posted by zeynep at 12:34 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
November 05, 2004
Advice on How to Win Elections: Kill a Retarded Man, Don't Oppose Racism
Here's Nicholas Kristoff, with more of the brilliant advice everyone's throwing at the Democrats about how to win:
I wish that winning were just a matter of presentation. But it's not. It involves compromising on principles. Bill Clinton won his credibility in the heartland partly by going home to Little Rock during the 1992 campaign to preside over the execution of a mentally disabled convict named Ricky Ray Rector.There was a moral ambiguity about Mr. Clinton's clambering to power over Mr. Rector's corpse. But unless Democrats compromise, they'll be proud and true and losers.
So what do the Democrats need to do?
...
• Pick battles of substance, not symbolism. The battle over Georgia's Confederate flag cost Roy Barnes his governorship and perhaps Max Cleland his Senate seat, but didn't help one working mother or jobless worker. It was a gift to Republicans.
You would have thought even a white guy would realize that racism is not a question of symbolism, especially not in the South. Confederate flag bearers are not just celebrating one of the greatest crimes in human history, but claiming their intent to keep white privilege intact. Yes, there are other complications to this story -- the downward mobility of the white lower middle class, the rapidly changing cultural landscape, etc. Still, hasn't history shown us victims are fully capable of turning vicious against those on lower-rungs, against whom they can maintain feelings of superiority and supremacy?
But, anyway, what more do you need to say about the state of our "moral values" when a widely-published, well-respected pundit can say in a matter-of-fact fashion that executing a retarded man is the way to win election in the heartland.
I guess this is what Bush means by "culture of life" -- the more you kill, the more "values" you acquire, the more votes you get. And we're supposed to believe that this heartland is against abortion because they value life and not because they seek control over women?
UPDATE: I should have mentioned that Ricky Ray Rector, the mentally disabled convict --he was practically lobotimized after shooting himself in the head right after shooting and killing a police officer-- that Clinton rushed back to Arkansas to execute during the 1992 presidential campaign was black. That wasn't hard to guess though, was it?
Posted by zeynep at 11:54 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Reaching Across the Aisle
Isn't it unbelievable that some people, Democratic presidential candidates among them, still haven't figured this out: "If Bush 'reaches across the aisle,' it will be to strangle his opponents."
After stealing the first election, the Bushies ruled like they were elected king. After perhaps stealing, perhaps winning (will we ever know with all these machines that the Republicans made sure had no paper trail or serious auditing and all the "spoiled" ballots?) this election with a three percent margin, they will now rule like they were appointed God.
Posted by zeynep at 03:14 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
November 04, 2004
"I may be an idiot, but I'm not a pedophile"
Saw this over at Eschaton.
ANDERSON COOPER: But Democrats argue look, John Kerry doesn't support gay marriage. I mean he doesn't want a constitutional amendment about it, but he didn't support gay marriage. Why is it that the Republicans have been able to benefit from that whereas the Democrats did not? Is it simply the question of the constitutional -- the federal amendment?JERRY FALWELL: Well, nobody believes John Kerry on that because his voting record, pro choice, his voting record on the family issues, does -- belies his statement. And the fact that he would not support a federal marriage amendment, it equates in our minds as someone 150 years ago saying I'm personally opposed to slavery, but if my neighbor wants to own one or two that's OK. We don't buy that.
Got that? Opposing gay marriage is similar to opposing slavery. And you shouldn't doubt that many of these people also oppose all sex outside of a monogamous, legally-wed union between a man and a woman. (Not oppose as in something one would personally not participate in, but oppose as in have an obligation to stop from occurring.) Here's a clearer formulation from the AP interview with Senator Rick Santorum last year:
SANTORUM: Every society in the history of man has upheld the institution of marriage as a bond between a man and a woman. Why? Because society is based on one thing: that society is based on the future of the society. And that's what? Children. Monogamous relationships. In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing. And when you destroy that you have a dramatic impact on the quality _AP: I'm sorry, I didn't think I was going to talk about "man on dog" with a United States senator, it's sort of freaking me out.
SANTORUM: And that's sort of where we are in today's world, unfortunately. The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire. And we're seeing it in our society.
Why does a man bring up "man on child, man on dog" out of the blue, when the question has nothing to do with either? I mean, how close to the surface is "man on dog" for Senator Santorum that he blurts it out in this unrelated context?
Most social taboos arise around things that are tempting, so it's not a total coincidence that more than a few leading anti-gay crusaders have been exposed while surfing gay phone lines and chatrooms. Similarly, I've been wondering about the homophobia apparently sweeping some parts the country. How can we understand the psycho-social roots of all this discomfort? Although these are issues with strong historical roots, the current articulation of these conflicts is probably very much linked to the hyper-sexualized, porn-drenched cultural media environment that we inhabit.
You might also remember this exchange between Jerry Falwell and Hussein Ibish of the American-Arab Anti- Discrimination Committee. This is right after Falwell has claimed that the Southern Baptist reverend who called the muslim prophet Mohammad a "demon-possessed pedophile" was not "attacking Islam or Muslim people."
IBISH: If you think it's not an attack on people's faith to call their prophet demon possessed, then you're an idiot, all right?(CROSSTALK)
IBISH: I mean, if I called Jesus demon possessed...
CARLSON: Now, I want you to stop for a second, Mr. Ibish, and I want you to respond. Hold on -- hold on.
(CROSSTALK)
FALWELL: I may be an idiot, but I'm not a pedophile.
IBISH: I'm not a pedophile, either. Congratulations.
Well, who asked you? It always strikes me as a wee-bit odd when a grown man announces that he's not a pedophile when nobody has either asked or accused him of such.
A curious cultural moment.
Posted by zeynep at 03:50 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
November 03, 2004
Are They Getting Different News?
In Sao Paulo, Brazil, Wagner Markues, 54, also preferred Kerry and wondered why the race was so close."We don't understand America now," he said. "Are they getting different news than us about the scandals in the Iraqi prisons, and the children and civilians who are getting killed?"
Posted by zeynep at 09:02 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
Will of the People
Justin Podur has a must-read post over at the The Killing Train -- definitely worth much discussion:
It looks like even if the United States electoral system was capable of expressing the people’s choice, the people would choose George W Bush.It looks like voters in a dozen states decided to ban gay marriage, by huge margins, deciding to ruin other people’s lives with no benefit to themselves.
That means that it is time to admit something. The greatest divide in the world today is not between the US elite and its people, or the US elite and the people of the world. It is between the US people and the rest of the world. The first time around, George W Bush was not elected. When the United States planted cluster bombs all over Afghanistan, disrupted the aid effort there, killed thousands of people, and occupied the country, it could be interpreted as the actions of a rogue group who had stolen the elections and used terrorism as a pretext to wage war. When the United States invaded Iraq, killing 100,000 at the latest count, it could be argued that no one had really asked the American people about it and that the American people had been lied to. When the United States kidnapped Haiti’s president and installed a paramilitary dictatorship, it could be argued that these were the actions of an unelected group with contempt for democracy.
With this election, all of those actions have been retroactively justified by the majority of the American people.
The first time around the Bush people acted without a mandate. Today, the only constituency that could have stopped them has given them a mandate to go beyond what they have done.
Posted by zeynep at 04:00 PM | Comments (15) | TrackBack
Gays are the New Jews
The results of the election are very scary.
For one thing, the rest of the world will see this as the American people affirming a sharp imperial stance towards the rest of the world as well as approving the illegitimate occupation of Iraq. The implications of this perception are truly scary: this is regardless of what we know about Kerry and his pro-war campaign. Bush has just been elected with a majority of the popular vote. It will now be much easier for the likes of Osama Bin Ladin to recruit, pointing to the election of this administration composed of thoroughly exposed liars, our continuing disregard for Iraqi lives, the apparent ease with which we shrugged off the Abu Ghraib torture scandal...
For another thing, this election should never have happened --and accepted as legitimate-- with unverifiable voting machines manufactured by Bush supporters, under rules harking back to Jim Crow designed to make voting as hard and as frustrating as possible for people in minority neighborhoods, where the machines were sparser and lines much longer, and people with jobs who can't take the day off to wait in line for five hours. Yet, it happened this way and it's being reported as if it all were relatively glitch-free. The fact that such an inherently racist, anti-poor arrangement is being portrayed as legitimate and acceptable without much contestation does not bode well for the future.
Also, it's very clear from exit polls and other data that many of Bush's supporter were energized and mobilized by the "Ban Gay Marriage" amendments. The initiatives in all eleven states passed with wide margins. One exit poll shows that the issue with the highest "Which ONE issue mattered most in deciding how you voted today" rating was "Moral Values," with 21 percent of respondents choosing that option over the economy, terrorism, Iraq, health-care, taxes and education. And an overwhelming majority of people who professed to care about "moral values" voted for Bush -- 78 percent.
And you know the "moral values" is a code word for opposition to gay marriage and, to a lesser degree this time around, abortion. And some of the gay marriage amendments that passed do a lot more than define marriage as a heterosexual union: many also strip gay couples of the most basic, simple rights. Parental rights, visitation rights, medical decision-making, joint benefits are all under attack. This clearly is nothing more than a frenzy of bigotry since people could have penned these laws to ban only non-heterosexual marriage without such sweeping restrictions of the rights of gay people.
I have written about this in the past: many progressives understandably concentrate on issues like the fact that we are occupying Iraq rather than go out and work on things like marriage rights and health benefits for gay couples. And frankly, Americans of most stripes are very privileged compared to the rest of the world -- the AIDS holocaust in Africa is obviously a much more important issue than whether or not a gay couple can take the same mortgage tax deduction as straight couples.
But that's not the real issue here. Here's what's happening in a nutshell: a proto-fascist administration is whipping up support and clouding the political picture by aggressively targeting an already despised, small minority that is, for the most part, expressing no other wish than to assimilate as who they are. Many members of that minority are already relatively integrated into the existing power structure. Most are not poor or marginal but wish for not much more than being accepted into the existing institutional structures: the very structures that many progressives spend their lives fighting to change (for example, the military). Yes, the obvious anology is the Jews in pre-WWII Germany.
The anti-gay amendments that have just passed are comparable to the 1935 Nuremberg Laws in their function, if not their scope and final intent. These laws were passed in 1935, stripping Jews of many of their basic civic rights and erecting impassable barriers to the increasing assimilation of the Jewish minority into Germany.
I'm obviously not expecting an attempt to exterminate the gays. Anyway, as the Cheneys found out, homosexuality is not confined to any one group of easily identifiable people. Rather, what I'm saying is that the political uses of these amendments are similar to the Nuremberg Laws because they are the ideological stick with which the proto-fascist leadership can line up its own troops, while also creating and maintaining a political hegemony and monopoly over the majority of people, many of whom will also end up victimized by its very policies.
Posted by zeynep at 12:35 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
November 01, 2004
Elections
A lot of people have responded to my post about Vote Pact, a means to strategic voting being promoted by Nader's campaign, as if I was advocating lesser-evilism or arguing for not voting for David Cobb or Nader. Frankly, I was pointing out what I perceive to be the possible global ramifications of a Bush election win; I am quite certain that will not be pretty. Most rest of the world would perceive this to mean an endorsement of the aggressive current course. Of course, neither will it be pretty if Kerry wins and we let him keep his campaign promise of escalating the war on Iraq.
The more important point I wanted to make was that, as far as our imperial foreign policy is concerned, voting has become mostly a charade -- who you vote for is almost meaningless without a determined, sustained effort to change the bipartisan consensus on belligerence. The occupation of Iraq may become the defining issue of our generation, and our challenge is not trivial. It's certainly not reducible to this election.
And as for the details: I find it odd that some people are casting voting for Nader as the only way to be anti-war. A few days ago, I watched Nader give a relatively lengthy interview to Paula Zahn without mentioning the occupation or the war on Iraq. In spring of this year Nader was giving stump speeches without once mentioning the war -- until the question and answer period when he would inevitably be asked. (Even his latest 20 reasons to vote for Nader / Camejo does not mention the word Iraq, war or occupation -- and before you point out that he is against the war, I know that. I'm just saying that he is and has always been a consumer activist first and foremost, concentrating on domestic issues rather than U.S. foreign policy. This is not blame, anger or resentment: I'm just pointing out what I see).
Because of all that, I've had a more favorable view of the Green Party candidate David Cobb because whenever I heard him speak publicly, he always talked of the immorality of the war and the occupation first. (Admittedly, my sample wasn't that large). For that reason, and because the Green party will exist as an organization after the election --and I value organization over clusters of people around popular figures-- I've been partial to the Green's campaign. But I know of the ways in which the Green Party is not a healthy, functioning organization so I'm under no illusions there either. I'm sure there are even people out there who will vote for Kerry thinking it will be easier to organize an anti-war movement against his administration. Such are political assessments one may agree or disagree with, and I find it peculiar to try to judge somebody's character, or their degree of commitment to the anti-war cause based on one thing alone, their electoral strategy, without assessing what they have been doing before and after that day.
Quite frankly, I find the question of which third-party candidate one may be partial towards to be of very little importance given the enormity of the problem we face. And I'm discouraged that so many people have tried to present that choice as the test of one's character and one's commitment to justice and to peace.
I would really like to challenge those who get really worked up about the election and think somehow not voting for Nader is proof of demonstration of "loss of nerve," of "fear", "running scared", or some of the other macho aphorisms that get thrown around. For me, this isn't about talking tough; this is about changing our political system and curbing --and hopefully eliminating-- our imperialism. Voting this way or that way is a very, very small part of such a goal and to see so many people see that small symbolic act as a litmus test of courage is sad. Since when did courage become associated with acts so small, so insignificant? Let's let courage stand for acts that are truly courageous: putting one's life, liberty and limited time on this earth on the line to fight against injustice, suffering and evil.
To everyone who is voting for Kerry because they are against Bush and the war, I say: what's more important than your vote is that you get out there and fight tooth and nail against the Kerry administration which is certain to be belligerent, perhaps in finer, more refined ways than Bush.
To everyone who's voting for Nader thinking that's the correct way to stand up to the two-party duopoly I say: the duopoly is quite happy if all you do is show up on election day, vote for Nader and become relatively dormant until the next election. In fact, the real work is between elections. If you worked harder during the election season than before or after, I'd urge you to reconsider your priorities. Are you out to thumb your nose at the duopoly (and the liberal establishment that certainly went strategically overboard with the Anybody but Bush message) or to really change our system? And I ask because I wonder -- where's the energy behind implementing Instant Runoff Voting, which would give teeth to a vote outside the duopoly candidates? Where's the energy to organize an effective, powerful anti-war campaign? True commitment is longer than a day and bigger than an election.
Posted by zeynep at 12:17 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
October 28, 2004
[If All You Do is] Vote, They Die
I see that Nader's campaign page has linked to Vote Pact. Frankly, I think it's a sign of political ineptness that it took this long for him to recognize that the realities of the first-past-the-post, winner-takes-all system we have in this country makes it necessary to consider strategic voting. I know he was asked about this at the very first press conference that he announced his candidacy back in spring so he certainly didn't have to wait until the week before the election to actually take it up at least on his website.
Readers of this page know that I harbor no illusions about Kerry. I do, however, wish that he wins rather than Bush if for no other reason that it will send a terrible, terrible message to the rest of the world if Bush wins an election. Right now, most people around the world believe that, in general, Americans don't support these immoral policies and that Bush is only president because he stole the election. Frankly, I think we are more complicit in this crime than that charitable interpretation. But, if Bush were to actually win an election -- rather than steal it a second time, certainly a strong possibility -- we might lose any semblance of connectedness to the rest of the planet's citizenry. After the World Trade Center attacks, Le Monde ran a "We're All Americans" headline. People around the world watched the towers burn and cried for the victims. Yes, sure, Bush is disliked globally. However, many people around the world distinguish between the American people and this administration. A Bush election victory would change that.
Put briefly, Vote Pact is the idea that you find a reluctant would-be Bush supporter and make a pact to both vote for third party candidate of your choice -- since it takes one vote away from both Kerry and Bush, the only winners are the third parties, currently completely erased by the electoral system. Absentee ballots would allow people to sit down and verify each others pledge.
But, more importantly, I think something is wrong if who to vote for is your biggest decision this year. Election's have become a charade to give people the illusion of participation while all real means of participation are curtailed further and further. I can certainly understand people voting for Kerry in non-swing states. But it's a bit like what they say about saving a life -- if you save it, you're responsible for it. Or the rule attributed to Pottery Barn (that Pottery Barn vehemently denies is their policy) -- you break it, you own it. Many people are voting for Kerry because they are against the war. I hope those people will be very actively engaged in making sure Kerry does not carry out his campaign promises such as escalating the bombing of Fallujah and Ramadi; something he criticized Bush for not doing enough of.
And obviously, voting for an anti-war candidate like David Cobb does not absolve us of our responsibility in curtailing our government's immorality. No matter who wins, that's our government. That's the machine. Are we going to be cooperative little clogs in the machine or are we going to at least try our best to make it stop? The substantive question isn't whether or not you're voting your conscience on Election Day; the real question is whether you have your conscience guiding you every other day. Some get out the vote campaigns have been using the slogan Vote or Die. The unfortunate truth of the matter is if all we do is vote, they will continue to die.
Posted by zeynep at 11:33 PM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
October 25, 2004
Fifty-first state weighs in
In a survey of 1,285 Iraqis, 58.6 percent said the American elections didn't matter to them. Many said the election process was fixed and that U.S. policy toward Iraq wouldn't change no matter who won.
Posted by zeynep at 09:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 14, 2004
The Debates
Wouldn't it be great if they spent as much time talking about issues rather than trying to control their posture, smirk, likeability, whatever else it is they spend hours prepping.
I think the Bush Project has hit a snag, though: it's called George W. Bush. The idea of a brush-clearin', plain talkin', bible thumpin' president to be marketed through tightly-controlled access coupled with merciless destruction of challengers through any means necessary was brilliant. It worked just fine until now, and you gotta admit anything that gets you the presidency of the United States of America for four year is a pretty successful program.
It just doesn't work when Bush has to answer questions, wired or not -- not even softball questions. Can Rove Inc. overcome the snag? I wouldn't count it out, but they are in a lot more trouble than I would've predicted -- especially given the remarkable incompetence and vapidity displayed by the Democrats.
Posted by zeynep at 12:04 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 08, 2004
"town hall" "debates"
Audience members will have their microphones shut off after they ask a question. No follow-up is allowed. All questions are pre-screened. If anyone tries to ask a different question than the one that was pre-screened, the microphone will be turned off.
Viva democracy.
Well, the "debate" has just started. I think they injected a lot of botox into Bush's face to stop him from frowning, smirking and otherwise acting like a spoiled, petulant son of privilege.
By the way, did you know botulism toxin --i.e. botox-- was one of the weapons of mass destruction that Iraq was accused of stocking? Does that mean that Los Angeles should be considered to be part of the axis of evil -- given the massive stocks of botulism toxin that are actually stored in that city?
Posted by zeynep at 09:04 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
October 05, 2004
The Anti-War Movement and Electoral Politics
Empire Notes has important comments on the topic:
Across the political spectrum, people know that we were right and they were wrong. Yet there has hardly been a peep out of the antiwar movement. There RNC protest was great, but it was basically an anti-Bush protest – there wasn’t even any messaging about the just-concluded offensive against Najaf in which probably 2000 or more people were killed.
Posted by zeynep at 11:43 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
VP Debate
Painful to watch. It is amazing how much Cheney lies. And Edwards follows the "run to the right of Bush/Cheney" strategy. The "journalist" didn't even try. Don't you love democracy in action.
Posted by zeynep at 10:38 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 30, 2004
The Fake Debate Organized by the Fake Commission
From an AP report about some irrelevant decision by the Commission on Presidential Debates:
The commission is a nonprofit and nonpartisan corporation that has sponsored all the presidential debates since 1988.
Excuse me? Since when is a front organization for the Democratic and Republican parties, established to ensure nothing important is discussed let alone debated, nonpartisan? Bipartisan, yes, nonpartisan, no.
Posted by zeynep at 07:48 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 28, 2004
Coming Soon: Staged Elections (in Iraq, Afghanistan and maybe in the U.S.)
Something’s very wrong in Iraq and administration’s trying desperately to hide this fact from the American people -- in fact, all the political moves by the administration at this point are directed at us, not Iraqis. I think it’s fair to say that there is little to no effort at convincing or winning over people of Iraq: such an effort would at least require stopping the greatly destructive aerial bombing of Baghdad and Fallujah, withdrawing the U.S. military from the streets, spending money on the already-crumbling infrastructure, allowing for real elections....
But none of that will happen anytime soon because we, not the people of Iraq, are the target audience. So, we get Ayad Allawi touring D.C. as part of Bush’s reelection campaign; we get the U.S. military press releases about bombing “safe houses” in Sadr City and Fallujah that nobody in Iraq believes; and we are now witnessing the initial stages of getting us to accept pretend elections as imperfect but real elections.
All this is to placate and misinform the American people. The people in Iraq will know sham elections from real ones, of course. And of course, imperfect elections can be acceptable at certain times in history; however, what they are trying to market are sham, not imperfect, elections.
This propaganda effort reminds me of the story about the cloud cover over German cities the Allied censors did not want reported to the British and American public during World War II. As Walter Cronkite recounts in a Newsweek article, the information wasn’t being withheld from the Germans:
Once in England the censors held up my report that the Eighth Air Force had bombed Germany through a solid cloud cover. This was politically sensitive; our air staff maintained that we were practicing only precision bombing on military targets. But the censors released my story when I pointed out the obvious--Germans on the ground and the Luftwaffe attacking bombers knew the clouds were there. The truth was not being withheld from Germans but Americans.
Just as such, the propaganda system is currently aimed squarely and almost solely at us. (The opinions of people of Iraq have long ago ceased to matter except to the degree they can kill American soldiers. Is that not a horrible incentive system we have set up here?)
Pretend elections are the last leg of the pretense edifice of the war on Iraq. The Weapons of Mass Destruction have turned into Weapons of Mass Destruction Related Program Activities in My Head. Terrorism threat posed by Saddam Hussein has turned into massively-increased actual terrorism threat due to our occupation of Iraq. Reconstruction, it seems, is just another name for transferring Iraq’s oil money to Halliburton. So it’s crucial for the propaganda system that they make us believe that at least --at least-- Iraq and Afghanistan will have real elections.
It was relatively unsurprising to learn that CIA had plans to secretly throw its weight behind candidates favored by the administration. It was also almost predictable that Rummy would lecture us about how a bit of election would be better than none -- which, of course, is true in the abstract but is no excuse when we are one of the main forces behind limiting electoral possibilities. In fact, that’s the last big lie that is gathering some attention: the last thing the administration wants is real elections in either Afghanistan or in Iraq. But, it desperately needs the appearance of some form of elections.
Empire Notes has been covering all this and more about sham elections in detail -- here’s a great piece about sham elections and here’s analysis of the New York Times and Washington Post editorials on the topic. All are must-read. In fact, Empire Notes makes a plea that people mobilize now to try to expose this latest scandal while there is still time to do something about it -- especially with elections scheduled for January in Iraq. I totally agree. For once, I hope, we can try to be ahead of their sleazy curve.
I guess my one hope is that having suffered through one stolen election, the American people will be more sensitive to the attempts to deny people of Afghanistan and Iraq a chance at real elections -- especially after they were told that this chance was why they had to endure so much suffering, death and destruction.
Posted by zeynep at 09:07 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
September 22, 2004
Bribocracy
A university of Chicago professor has calculated how much Wall Street would collect in fees if social security would be partly privatized:
President Bush's push to create individual investment accounts in the Social Security system would hand financial services firms a windfall totaling $940 billion over 75 years, according to a University of Chicago study to be released today.
And, here are Bush’s top 10 donors from this election cycle, according to the Center for Public Integrity:
Pricewaterhouse Coopers $488,600
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co. $486,125
Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. $455,904
UBS AG Inc $368,900
Goldman Sachs Group $295