If we recognize that denial represents valuing delusion more than reality, the seriousness of the danger carried by denial depends on the respective proportions of denial and truth in our lives. Our particular delusions may appear to provide us comfort and safety. As long as our lives continue to be sustained in significant part by what is true and healthy, denial will not seriously threaten our survival. But when what is true in our lives is overwhelmed by the lies we insist upon, our days grow shorter.

What is true for the individual is also true, in much more complex ways, of a nation and a culture. Many of us may know the individual story from our own experiences. We tragically may have encountered the person who destroys himself, his family, and perhaps a business and many other people, because he demands one more drink, or one more affair, or because he has to place one last bet. We hear that he has finally died alone in pitiful circumstances. Maybe he succumbs at last in an especially awful and desolate manner. He dies in a filthy hovel, or on the street. The destruction he causes may be terrible, but it remains limited. We may not be aware he has ceased to exist for months or even years after the fact.

Read the rest of the article

Arthur Silber’s [send him mail] blog is Once Upon a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues. He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles will be found at a companion blog, The Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s, he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily pursues today.

Arthur Silber Archives

DIGG THIS

Dave Lindorff tells several amusing and gratifying anecdotes about the approval with which people greeted his “Impeach Bush and Cheney” T-shirt on a recent airplane trip (the pilot, flight attendant and TSA inspectors all liked it, a lot), and goes on to write:

It seems clear to me: Americans have had it with the Bush administration.

Unfortunately, this shift is not yet clear to the power elite.

On the political front, the Democratic leadership in Congress still hasn’t budged on impeachment. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, cosseted in her wood-paneled Speaker’s suite, a continent away from her angry constituents, still insists that impeachment is “a waste of time,” while Rep. John Conyers, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, refuses to even discuss the Cheney impeachment bill that’s been sitting on his desk for months awaiting action.

Despite this shameful silence and obstructionism, though, my experience with the T-shirt tells me that the impeachment movement is sweeping the country. Cindy Sheehan, the pioneer peace and impeachment activist, has aborted her brief retirement and is threatening to run against Pelosi in the Speaker’s home district in San Francisco if she doesn’t stop the war funding and let impeachment proceed in the House.

In the meantime, the circulation of the debased newspapers of the nation, and the viewership of the debased network news programs, continue to plummet, as Americans increasingly recognize that they are not doing their job of informing the public.

It seems clear to me that a tectonic shift has finally occurred in the nation’s political mood. It wasn’t the November election, though. It has been the continued war and occupation of Iraq, and the craven inaction of the Democratic leadership in Congress.

Now, finally, ordinary people are getting fed up. Iraq vets are acting up and joining Iraq Veterans Against the War. Active duty soldiers like Erin Watada and Rev. Lennox Yearwood are standing up. What does this all mean?

Bush and Cheney can be driven from office!

This criminal, bloody war in Iraq can be ended!

Unfortunately,
while Bush and Cheney can be driven from office and the ongoing
crime in Iraq can be ended, neither of those things will
happen as long as the governing class remains absolute in its determination
to protect itself and its prerogatives.

The Democrats could defund the Iraq occupation — remember the filibuster — but they won’t. The plan always was and remains to stay in Iraq for the long haul. American world hegemony and global interventionism is the policy, and that policy requires bases around the world — and especially in the Middle East, which has resources over which the U.S. government will never give up control. And unless genuinely massive public protest compels them to act otherwise, the Democrats will never initiate impeachment proceedings against the Bush administration. To do so would upset the balance by which the nominally “opposed” parties continue the charade that enables the elites to perpetuate their rule.

I think the Clinton impeachment must be regarded historically as a one-off, a unique occurrence that has almost no further application and meaning. It resulted from a combination of events and influences that are highly unlikely to be repeated; in largest part, the impeachment was made possible because of the hubris of a relatively small group of determined and extraordinarily manipulative political operatives (aided by the typically lazy and unintelligent national press), welded to the remarkable immaturity of the American public whenever the subject turns to sex, although it should be noted that the general public demonstrated considerably greater mental acumen on that score than did the media or the political class. That particular amalgam all but banished coherent thought from the dominant national conversation for several years.

But to impeach Bush and Cheney for actual constitutional crimes…well, that’s an entirely different matter. That would be an occurrence of great moment: it would serve notice that Congress had drawn certain lines and had solemnly announced that certain actions are impermissible to government officials. That would constrain the governing class in its future behavior. Since the Democrats may control all the levers of power after the 2008 election, they themselves might be so constrained as a consequence. That would never do. As I have analyzed in some detail, it must always be remembered that the ruling elites are not like you and me, which is to say they are utterly unlike 99.9% of the Americans they claim to represent. They say they are devoted to fulfilling the wishes of “the people,” but that is only the cover used to delude Americans into ceding them more and more power, so that the ruling elites may satisfy those special interests of greatest concern to them (and whose support makes their election possible in the first instance) and continue their own lives of immense privilege and comfort. The ruling elites live in a world entirely unlike ours, and their motivations bear no resemblance to the concerns that dominate the lives of most of us. As the earlier essay discussed, they could not care less about “the people” for the most part. They will only offer faint concessions to “the people’s will” when expressions of that will become so overwhelming that the elites’ hold on power is thought to be threatened.

So, barring further extraordinary events, I think Pelosi will be successful in her efforts to keep impeachment “off the table.” What a pathetic comment on the state of American politics that is: the one constitutionally provided remedy that is unquestionably required, and for which a massive amount of evidence is already in the public record, is “off the table” — while initiating yet another criminal war of aggression, perhaps even using nuclear weapons, remains “on the table.” The moral inversion of our age is complete.

In this setting, Paul Craig Roberts offers an intriguing idea, but one which I also view as unworkable. After noting that “[t]he American political system has failed, Roberts writes:
Bush’s and Cheney’s lies and assaults on the US Constitution and American civil liberty, their plans to attack Iran, and the war crimes for which they are responsible provide an open and shut case for their impeachments. The latest polls show that 54% of Americans support impeachment of Vice President Cheney, with only 40% opposed. Bush hangs on by a hair with 45% favoring his impeachment and 46% opposed. But Democrats, like Republicans, have failed the electorate and refuse to do their duty. Congress is a creature of special interests and no longer represents the American people.

Obviously, some new method is needed for removing incompetent or dictatorial presidents and vice presidents.

Constitutional reform might be next to impossible, but before dismissing the possibility consider that according to British news reports, Britain’s new prime minister, Gordon Brown, intends a wide-ranging program of constitutional reform, including giving up the prime minister’s power to declare war.

The London Telegraph says: “The measures are intended to restore trust in politics after the by-passing of Parliament and the Cabinet, as well as the culture of spin and media manipulation, that characterized the Blair decade.”

If America is to remain a democracy, the people need refurbished powers to hold “government of the people, by the people, for the people” accountable. One way of doing this would be a vote of confidence by the people. The question can be put to a national referendum: “Shall the President remain in office?” “Shall the Vice President remain in office?”

The state of Florida does this for judges, including Florida’s Supreme Court, so there is precedent for allowing the people to decide whether officials may remain in office.

As the American people can no longer rely on elected officials to respond to public opinion, the people must do what they can to gather power back into their hands before they become the subjects of tyrants.

As I say, I find
this somewhat intriguing — but I also think Roberts’ contemplation
of this idea is born of desperation. Since the constitutionally provided
remedy of impeachment will almost certainly not be exercised, Roberts
understandably searches for another means of holding government officials
accountable, particularly in the present dire circumstances.

As a practical matter, I don’t see how a national referendum of this kind could be put in place in the next 18 months; in fact, it couldn’t be. But leaving that aside and assuming a national referendum could be quickly actualized, would that even be a good idea? I am convinced it would not be. Consider just the most obvious objections. First, this would make unchecked majority rule dispositive on urgent national questions, including the continued tenure of primary government officials. Please keep in mind that unchecked majority rule is not at all what the Constitution originally envisioned, and for very good reason. Unconstrained majority rule is one of the surest routes to the destruction of individual liberty and freedom.

Second, it is not at all difficult to imagine that the national referendum process would quickly be captured by those with enormous wealth and power to expend on such matters. Our national politics would quickly deteriorate into the clash of possibly numerous warring factions — with national leaders being regularly thrown out of office, for perhaps no valid reason at all or for an entirely false reason. This appears to me to be an almost certain way of destroying the last vestiges of national stability and turning our politics into an officially farcical free-for-all (the farce has only unofficial status at the moment), until those politics collapse altogether, perhaps with attendant violence.

But this is a measure of how far we’ve traveled: the political class refuses to surrender its own prerogatives of power and privilege, and the rest of us are left to wonder if there is anyone at all in government, save for a handful of exceptions, who genuinely gives a damn about what is right. And not even what is right: is there anyone in government who will oppose a national course which embraces genocide and unending wars of aggression, and which embodies the behavior of nothing so much as a homicidal maniac? Again, with only two or three exceptions, no one in Washington will condemn our actions for what they are — the actions of a murderous lunatic, for whom human life has no meaning whatsoever.

And so decent people desperately seek for solutions, however unlikely and however unworkable they may be. Aside from organizing public protest on a huge, unrelenting scale, including an uncompromising demand for impeachment proceedings to begin immediately and for the complete rejection of any attack on Iran in the present and foreseeable circumstances, I see no other possibilities at present.

Left to their own devices, the political class in Washington will do nothing to stop the gathering madness, and they will act only to spread the insanity further and make it significantly worse. It’s up to us now, as it has been for some time.

P.S. In reflecting further on these matters, I realized I should briefly clarify two points. First, I would not want to leave the impression that I admired Clinton’s presidency in any measurable degree, which I did not. True, he was not as unrelievedly awful as the current Bush, but that is faint praise indeed. The same could be said of almost every President, save two or three. Furthermore, I think a strong case could be made for having impeached Clinton — but the grounds for impeachment would have been very different, beginning with the abomination at Waco and including the “humanitarian” interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo. Of course, those were precisely the grounds that were excluded from consideration, for the very reason that both political parties are determined to preserve the exercise of state power in those particular forms. As a result, Clinton was impeached for reasons that were comparatively trivial when set against his profound abuses of power.

Second, I am an admirer of Paul Craig Roberts’ writing, and I agree with him much more often than not. Nevertheless, I consider this idea of national referenda to present several significant theoretical and practical problems. In an excerpt from Robert Higgs here, Higgs mentions the Ludlow Resolution, which was considered by Congress in the late 1930s. It “would have amended the Constitution to require approval in a national referendum before Congress could declare war, unless U.S. territory had been invaded.” Needless to say, Franklin Roosevelt “vigorously opposed” it, and the resolution was defeated.

I would almost always support any mechanism that might throw a monkey-wrench into the machinations of our federal overlords, and I find a national war referendum to be an especially admirable concept. How novel it would be for the people who might actually die in a war to decide whether it should be fought. But I wonder how effective such a referendum might be in today’s culture, given the relentless dumbing down of Americans generally and the incessant propaganda that sweeps over us hourly. If the information here is accurate, a majority of Americans would probably have approved the Iraq invasion in early 2003 — just as I think a majority of Americans might well approve an attack on Iran, in light of the repeated demonization of that country by our government and media. The latter point would be doubly true in the event of a Gulf of Tonkin-style incident, an occurrence far from unimaginable in the current circumstances.

But a national referendum on a subject such as going to war is enormously different from “votes of confidence” about particular national leaders. For the reasons indicated above, I think it very likely that votes of confidence would quickly be manipulated and used by the worst kind of political con men (and women) and opportunists. I continue to think that national votes of confidence of this kind would represent an unwise precedent, one easily corrupted and possibly dangerously destabilizing.

Arthur Silber’s [send him mail] blog is Once Upon a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues. He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles will be found at a companion blog, The Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s, he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily pursues today.

DIGG THIS

At this moment in the monstrously bloody course of American Empire, I suppose I might take the sardonically grateful point of view. At least we now have some direct experience of how easy it was for nauseatingly corrupt Roman leaders to impose their will upon the ignorant hordes, and literally to get away with murder. Hell, who needed to “get away” with murder? Bloody, painful, lingering, ungraspably sadistic murder was one of the major entertainments.

And so it is with us, for the majority of Americans are now both stupid and cruel. Comfort yourselves with fantasies about “good Americans” who “mean well” if you wish; the facts provide you scant support. The criminal slaughter in Iraq goes on from day to day…look, Paris Hilton is being dragged off to jail! Again! It becomes clearer with every day that passes that metastasizing mayhem in the Middle East is not an unfortunate byproduct of a plan gone awry: it was the goal from the start. It provides the perfect excuse for a significant American military presence for decades to come — which was also the plan from the beginning.

A number of Americans may be decent people individually; in the aggregate, they are entirely ignorant of history, both their own and everyone else’s. The elites who rule us are no better. The governing class insists that, from its inception, the United States was granted a special dispensation from God, or Nature, or some mysterious, never to be understood combination of galactic forces: we have been endowed with the “Truth” and the One True Way. It is our mission to share this Truth with the rest of the world. When some of the “lesser peoples” unaccountably resist recognizing the Truth which belongs to us and to us alone…well, that’s why God gave us the greatest military the world has ever seen. If resistance by these “others” proves especially nettlesome…well, that’s why nukes were invented. Why would God, or Nature, or the galactic forces provide such bounty to the United States if we were not meant to use it — or at least threaten to use it? After all, serious leaders know that all options must be kept on the table. Our table is the whole damned planet, baby! The fact that we are willing to obliterate it in its entirety and turn all of life into dust only proves the strength of our dedication to What Is Right. (We’ve already done this on a horrifying scale, you know, and then lied about every aspect of it. We had our reasons, and you are not to question them.)

If we knew anything about history, we would know that all such claims have been made many times before. Every notable civilization of the past was convinced it was the recipient of special favor; each fervently believed it was unique in this respect. We are not even unique in our claim to being unique. So it goes. And so they went, all those past civilizations. So we will, too — and soon, if we continue on our present path. In our determination to prevent anyone from questioning our status as Ultimate Guardians of the Truth, we may take the whole game down with us. Earlier empires couldn’t do that, but we can. This is not precisely a good thing.

Meanwhile, as our governing class courts further mayhem and more widespread murder, our media play their part in the charade. They resolutely refuse to tell us anything beyond the trivial. If you seek for signs that indicate what is still to come, the media will not provide any guidance to you. So you may well have missed two stories from the past week. They’re important stories, but almost no one will have told you that. The governing class only wants you to hear about those stories that make their rule easier. Besides, they are endowed with special knowledge denied to the rest of us. Most Americans don’t care in any event, not with so many great programs on the teevee.

In connection with the ongoing criminal occupation of Iraq, Jim Lobe writes:
It seems the Democratic-led House of Representatives Thursday approved an amendment that, contrary to the leadership’s intention, lays the legal groundwork for a protracted — if not “permanent” — U.S. military presence in Iraq.

During debate on the 2008 Foreign Operations bill, the House approved by voice vote an amendment submitted by Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King that inserted the word “permanent” before “basing rights agreement” in the following text:
“SEC. 685. None of the funds made available in this Act may be used by the Government of the United States to enter into a basing rights agreement between the United States and Iraq.”
As King has pointed out in the past, the United States has never had a “permanent” basing rights agreement with any country where, like Germany, Japan, and South Korea, Washington has based troops for decades. So the amendment, if it becomes law, means that the administration may now use funds to enter into any kind of basing rights agreement with the government of Iraq that it wishes — be it five, ten, 25 or even 50 years. Jim Fine of the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) explained the effect of the amendment in a memo last month after King almost succeeded in getting the same amendment attached to the defense authorization bill.
I derive considerable
amusement from the linguistic pretzel-logic of this approach. If the
world is going to come to an end, we might as well laugh as it does.
This is quite a neat trick, when you consider it: by prohibiting “permanent”
base agreements, you make possible a decades-long occupation,
perhaps even for 50 years or more. It has a certain elegance.

But, c’mon, let’s stop kidding around. This was always the plan. No one hid it, or even tried to. For God’s sake, we have a global empire of military bases — close to 1,000 bases in over 130 countries around the world. Almost no one is talking about reducing any of that. No. One. The entire governing class, and virtually every national politician in both parties, believes in American world hegemony. Hegemony needs bases, baby! So about the Democratic leadership of the House: either they don’t understand what this language means and what its effect will be, in which case they are too stupid to be on the city council of Flat Ass, Alabama — or they know exactly what it means, in which case they belong in jail.

In fact, there are exactly two people in Congress seriously opposed to Imperial America, and both of them put in an appearance in connection with the second story. One of those individuals is Dennis Kucinich, who tells us what happened:
Today the House of Representatives passed H. Con.Res.21, a resolution that pressures the United Nations Security Council to charge Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with violating the 1948 Convention on Genocide and the United Nations Charter because of his alleged calls for the destruction of Israel.

“There is reasonable doubt with regard to the accuracy of the translations of President Ahmadinejad’s words in this resolution. President Ahmadinejad’s speeches can also be translated as a call for regime change, much in the same manner the Bush Administration has called for regime change in Iraq and Iran, making this resolution very ironic,” Kucinich said.

Kucinich attempted to insert into the Congressional Record two independent translations of the speech from The New York Times and Middle East Media Research Institute, which contain significant differences in the translations of the speech compared to the resolution before the House. However, Members objected formally and the attempt was blocked.

“When I learned of these translations, I felt obligated to bring it to the attention of the House. It seems that much has been lost in translation. Members have a right to know of the translations and the refusal to permit them to become a part of the Congressional Record does a disservice to Members.”

…

“I object to resolutions that lay the groundwork for an offensive, unprovoked war.

“The resolution passed by the House today sets a dangerous precedent in foreign affairs. A mistranslation could become a cause of war. The United States House may unwittingly be setting the stage for a war with Iran.

“We must make every effort to ascertain the truth because peace in the world may hang in the balance. The only way to definitively know what President Ahmadinejad meant is for the United States to engage in meaningful, diplomatic relations with the country of Iran.”

More about this
mistranslation will be found in this
entry from Juan Cole, and in this
article (some links via Eric
Garris).

Kucinich does make one serious mistake in his comments, when he says, “The United States House may unwittingly be setting the stage for a war with Iran.” C’mon, Dennis. The United States has a long history of aggressive war — the Spanish-American War and the Philippines occupation, Vietnam, numerous covert operations all over the world (including endless such operations in the Middle East ever since World War II), the Clinton interventions of the 1990s — on top of which, every leading national politician, including Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, agitates endlessly for confrontation with Iran. There is nothing remotely “unwitting” about any of this. Endless wars and unceasing slaughter didn’t just “happen” while we were minding our business elsewhere. We believe we are entitled to world hegemony. It is our destiny to rule the world. We will have our way. “Unwitting”? Please.

Two people — two — voted against the House resolution, Kucinich and Ron Paul. Of course, we all know they’re just silly people, laughingstocks in fact. They aren’t “serious.” If you aren’t committed to American hegemony, world empire, and the unprovoked murder of possibly millions of people, you aren’t “serious.” So they should shut up and go away somewhere.

I draw your attention to one further point buried in the middle of the Iran resolution:
Whereas Iran has aggressively pursued a clandestine effort to arm itself with nuclear weapons….
And that, as they
say, is the ball game. In this manner, the Democratic House
concedes, sanctifies, and gives its nearly unanimous support to the
major propaganda point of the Bush-Cheney-Israel drive to war with
Iran.

Thank God the Democrats took back Congress. That’s all I can say. Otherwise, who knows what might have happened! Why, we might be on our way to a nuclear world war!

Please note: Iran disputes, as it has always disputed, the truth of this charge. Moreover, it is very far from clear just how far Iran may have gotten in its pursuit of nuclear weapons, even if one assumes that is what they are doing.

And I repeat: even if Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, SO WHAT?

But now, the House is fully on board with the Bush-Cheney-Israel program. When Bush gives his speech announcing that bombing runs began four hours earlier, that some of Iran’s nuclear installations have already been destroyed, and that the rest of them will be similarly destroyed in another two or three days, on what grounds will the Democrats object? As war, possibly with nuclear weapons, spreads across the Middle East and beyond, on what grounds will the Democrats object?

Of course, if the Democrats actually disagreed, there are a number of actions they could take. But they do not disagree, so they won’t take those actions. In the same way, there are a number of actions leading liberal and progressive bloggers could take in an effort to get Democrats to at least try to prevent Armageddon. But they have done next to nothing, other than endlessly blather about how awful it would all be (with nary a mention of the invaluable aid to the Bush-Cheney-Israel war program now provided by the Democrats themselves), and there is no indication they ever will. So I say again that, if the worst should happen, I don’t want to hear a single goddamned word from any of these people.

And if the worst does happen, I plan to drink in copious quantities, take some excellent drugs, and f**k my brains out. And laugh a lot.

An Empire of Clowns. What a ridiculous, sickeningly homicidal, disgusting nation we’ve become.

Arthur Silber’s [send him mail] blog is Once Upon a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues. He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles will be found at a companion blog, The Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s, he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily pursues today.

DIGG THIS

With regard to the fearsome plot that might have, maybe, perhaps, in some other world subject to significantly different scientific laws, resulted in the Destruction of All the Universes for All Time Forevermore The End Period (and You and Everyone You Know Will Be Dead, Too!), is it possible to inject just a very small bit of reality into this discussion? From the Los Angeles Times:

The premise is right out of a disaster movie: Ignite the massive fuel tanks required to keep an international airport up and running each day, stand back, and watch a chain reaction of explosions throughout the labyrinth of pipelines running underneath the tarmac.

But aviation experts cautioned Saturday that the alleged plot targeting John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York would have faced many hurdles, not least of which is the fact that jet fuel does not easily explode.

“The level of catastrophe that may be created is much more limited than most people would expect,” said Rafi Ron, former head of security at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport. “The fuel that we are talking about is mostly jet fuel, which, unlike the gasoline most people put into their cars, is not that susceptible to explosion.”

That difficulty apparently concerned one of the alleged plotters — an engineer who, federal authorities said in their complaint, explained to his associates that the tanks at JFK would probably require two explosions to provide enough oxygen to ignite the fuel.

But even then, aviation security experts said, fire would not have spread through the pressurized pipelines that bring fuel out to airplanes parked at gates.

“The probability that an explosion would travel through the pipeline and destroy targets along the tarmac is almost nil,” said Ron, now president of New Age Security Solutions in Rockville, Md. “The exception would be pipelines that are not in use and contain vapor.”

And I remind you
that “the
suspects never got hold of explosive devices.”

All this conjecture assumes, of course, that major elements of this plot were not dreamed up and initially suggested by government agents trying to “protect” us, that the “truth” was not tortured out of a suspect and the like, as Scott Horton pointed out has been the case in every similar incident in recent years.

I urge you to keep the above points in mind as you read this remarkably enthusiastic descent into abject, ludicrously disproportionate hysteria, penned by Andrew McCarthy at Hysteria Headquarters, otherwise known as National Review Online:
War is about breaking the enemy’s will. Having laid bare the sorry state of our brains and our guts, jihadists are now zeroing in on the will’s final piece: our hearts.

That is the central lesson to be gleaned from Saturday’s news that four Muslim men have been charged with plotting to blow up John F. Kennedy International Airport, and with it much of Queens.

…

Defreitas, er, Mohammed is a naturalized United States citizen. He is another splash in that gorgeous mosaic of American Islam — the one over whose purportedly seamless assimilation the mainstream media was cooing just a few days ago, putting smiley-face spin on an alarming Rasmussen poll.

Alas, Defreitas/Mohammed turns out to be the part of the story the press dutifully buried in paragraph 19: He is that nettlesome one of every four American Muslim males who thinks mass-homicide strikes against civilians, like the one he and his cell were scheming, are a perfectly sensible way to settle grievances.

…

Militant Islam, you see, is mustered in Iraq, where al Qaeda — the inspiration for Defreitas and his cohorts — has called America out. Like Defreitas & Co., Osama bin Laden and his ranks see themselves in a world war between the United States and a vision of Islam shared by tens of millions. (Think one-in-four, writ large). Iraq, they have decided, is their frontline, though very far from their only line. Everywhere, America is their target. Everywhere, terror — the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent men, women, and children — is their weapon of choice.

For the new Democratic Congress and its growing wake of jittery Republicans, that turns out to be a choice worth living with. Oh yes, they’ll sputter about how barbaric and unsavory it all is. But, like those one in four Muslim males, they’re prepared to let terror rule the day. …

Naturally, we’ll tell ourselves they’re not winning at all. They want Iraq? Let ‘em have it. Just like — when they killed enough of us — we let ‘em have Lebanon in 1983 and Somalia in 1993. Who, after all, needs these hellholes?

Except … militant Islam doesn’t just want the hellholes. It wants everything. It will take the hellholes. For now. But don’t think for a second they’ll be appeased.

…

They know there’s a war out there. Not just Iraq or Afghanistan, but Dar al Islam and Dar al Harb — jihadists versus civilization. Global. For us to win, it will not be enough to stabilize Baghdad, sow democracy and empower moderates. It’s about breaking the enemy’s will, as they are working feverishly to break ours.

Thanks to excellent police work, this time they were stopped. But there will be a next time, and another. The jihadists know what’s at stake. Do we?

This calls to
mind nothing so much as the climactic breakdown in a genuinely awful
Joan Crawford melodrama, after Crawford has slurped up five quarts
of cheap scotch and can now only burble incoherently:
You’re all trying to destroy me! You’re all against me, you bastards! You broke my heart, and now you want to kill me! But I won’t let you, do you hear me? I won’t let you! I’m going to live, damn you, I’m going to LIVE!
At which point,
the sobbing, screaming, disheveled, thoroughly pathetic Ms. Crawford
falls to the floor in a dead faint, completely undone by her own self-willed
and self-created histrionics.

It won’t play, McCarthy. And what can be entertaining in even a rotten film is not remotely entertaining in life, particularly when lots of people get killed, almost always entirely unnecessarily.

The United States now spends more on defense than almost the entire rest of the world combined. We have military power of a kind never before seen in history. We maintain approximately 1,000 bases in more than 130 countries around the globe. The idea that plots of this kind spring from a movement that constitutes some kind of “existential threat” to the United States is utterly asinine. In addition, none of these plots amounted to a damned thing and, as the above makes clear, even if this latest plot had gotten beyond the most primitive planning stage — if, you know, the Terrorists Who Would Eat Our Raw, Still Beating Hearts had actually managed to get some explosives, among other things — the damage would still have been fairly limited.

McCarthy’s article and all similar ones, of which there will undoubtedly be many in the coming week, do not represent political commentary or foreign policy analysis. They are the incoherent, deeply disturbed babblings that emanate from a profoundly damaged psychology. They are, as I have discussed at length before, the voice of Cho Seung-Hui:
I underscore the centrality of feelings of shame and humiliation in this kind of psychology, combined with a desperately felt need to prove one’s “masculine” self-worth, in a culture where masculinity is equated with dominance over one’s enemies to be achieved by physical violence, thus rendering those enemies either entirely submissive — or dead.
Fundamentalism
of any kind results in the identical type of psychological disturbance,
so it is no wonder that McCarthy feels he understands those genuine
enemies we have so well. He does — for he exhibits exactly the same
pathology.

Remember this passage from Robert Jay Lifton, excerpted in the earlier essay:
More than mere domination, the American superpower now seeks to control history. Such cosmic ambition is accompanied by an equally vast sense of entitlement — of special dispensation to pursue its aims. That entitlement stems partly from historic claims to special democratic virtue, but has much to do with an embrace of technological power translated into military terms. That is, a superpower — the world’s only superpower — is entitled to dominate and control precisely because it is a superpower.

The murderous events of 9/11 hardened that sense of entitlement as nothing else could have. Superpower syndrome did not require 9/11, but the attacks on the twin towers and the Pentagon rendered us an aggrieved superpower, a giant violated and made vulnerable, which no superpower can permit.

Indeed, at the core of superpower syndrome lies a powerful fear of vulnerability. A superpower’s victimization brings on both a sense of humiliation and an angry determination to restore, or even extend, the boundaries of a superpower-dominated world. Integral to superpower syndrome are its menacing nuclear stockpiles and their world-destroying capacity.

In important ways, the “war on terrorism” has represented an impulse to undo violently precisely the humiliation of 9/11.

…

The war on terrorism is apocalyptic, then, exactly because it is militarized and yet amorphous, without limits of time or place, and has no clear end. It therefore enters the realm of the infinite. Implied in its approach is that every last terrorist everywhere on the earth is to be hunted down until there are no more terrorists anywhere to threaten us, and in that way the world will be rid of evil.

…

The war on terrorism, then, took amorphous impulses toward combating terror and used them as a pretext for realizing a prior mission aimed at American global hegemony.

I am discussing
the roots and disastrous consequences of that “prior mission aimed
at American global hegemony” in my ongoing series, “Dominion
Over the World.” I emphasize that it is a mission fully embraced
by our entire governing class, and by all of the foreign policy establishment:
with only a few exceptions, all Republicans and Democrats alike
subscribe to this goal.

As I put the issue in the earlier article:
The similarities between Cho’s psychology and the forces that drive United States foreign policy ought to be startling, and profoundly disturbing: the feelings of vulnerability, victimization, humiliation and rage are the same — as is the determination to restore one’s own dominance through violence and murder. But be sure you appreciate the chronology and the causal chain that Lifton correctly identifies: just as Cho did not suddenly become a murderer on the morning of April 16, but only reached that awful destination after years of inexorable psychological development along one particular path, so too the United States was not instantaneously transformed into an unfocused, rage-filled international murderer after 9/11. As Lifton states, “The war on terrorism, then, took amorphous impulses toward combating terror and used them as a pretext for realizing a prior mission aimed at American global hegemony.”
I have no doubt
that people like McCarthy feel as if this conflict is “jihadists
versus civilization. Global,” but the fact that they feel that
way does not mean it’s true. It only indicates how deep the psychological
damage goes, and the extreme degree of distortion that has already
resulted. (I also note, without additional commentary here, that McCarthy
brings equal enthusiasm to the task of demonizing Muslim-Americans
as an undifferentiated group. I am certain that, if and when there
is another domestic attack, he, Malkin and all other similar types
will be demanding internment camps for all those who might, perhaps,
some day, if 10,000 intervening events all occurred in precisely the
required manner, represent some kind of threat to “normal, good” Americans.
They will doubtless insist that if we had only listened to their sage
advice, we would have rounded up all “those people” years before.)

It is the perspective and the policies offered by people with views like McCarthy’s that have brought us to where we are today, just as they were a crucial part of what led to 9/11. Now, as the solution which will save the United States, the world, and all the universes unto eternity, they demand that we eliminate every conceivable enemy for all time, that we rearrange other countries around the globe as we determine is required on the basis of our sole unappealable judgment, and that we impose our will on all of creation.

As I have said before, their belief system reduces very simply to this:
America is God. God’s Will be done.
But that is not
the solution, McCarthy. That, and you, are the problem,
and a very terrible one it is — and not just for us, but for the
entire world.

Arthur Silber’s [send him mail] blog is Once Upon a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues. He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles will be found at a companion blog, The Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s, he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily pursues today.

DIGG THIS

In Part II
of this series,”Why
the Stories We Tell Matter So Much,” I quoted Philip Pullman
(author of the genuinely wondrous, His
Dark Materials) on the critical importance of stories, and
of time for reading and reflection. At the conclusion of his remarks,
Pullman said:

We
don’t need lists of rights and wrongs, tables of do’s and don’ts:
we need books, time, and silence. Thou shalt not is soon forgotten,
but Once upon a time lasts forever.
It was because
of the immense significance of the stories we tell, of the narratives
that compel our attention and that very frequently move us to action,
and with Pullman’s comments in mind, that I titled this blog, “Once
Upon a Time.”

Earlier in
that same essay, I wrote:
As
concisely stated by Philip Pullman at the beginning of this essay,
we cannot live without stories. It is therefore of vital importance
whether the stories we choose to tell are creative or destructive
with regard to their deepest meanings and implications, whether
they encourage a reverence for life in general and for the sanctity
of each particular life, or lead to a casual dismissal of the value
of others’ lives if those others are “different” or obstruct our
own desires, and – if our stories purport to capture actual
events, past or present – whether they are accurate and solidly
grounded in demonstrable fact, or misleading and distorted. As I
have discussed in many essays and will analyze further, most of
the stories that permeate our national discussion today are grossly
wrong, and most often dangerously wrong.
The major narrative
to which I have devoted a number of essays – a narrative which
is profoundly false both in its general outlines and in every detail,
and one which has been and continues to be literally lethal in its
effects – is the tale of “American exceptionalism.” Assuming
that one knows even a minimal amount of history (which, I grant, is
far too often a completely unjustified assumption today, even and
especially with regard to the “best educated” Americans and the members
of our ruling class), and if one considers this mythology with any
degree of honesty, its inconsistencies, outright contradictions, and
numerous points of incoherence quickly become apparent. Yet the overwhelming
majority of Americans continue to believe this fable, and the regular
invocation of America’s “unique” characteristics, which make us “better”
than any other people who have ever lived and which, for reasons that
are never explained, entitle us to direct events across the globe,
is nothing less than a religious ritual.

At the opening
of the
last installment, I summarized certain common errors regarding
American history committed by many liberals and conservatives. In
large part, those errors arise and continue to find new life because
of many people’s adherence to this American mythology. People with
views across the political spectrum are unable to recognize the
realities of American political and social history because those
realities would fundamentally challenge the fable to which they
are so devoted: conservatives cling to the notion that American
progress and superiority are the result of free and unfettered capitalism,
that is, the result of the operations of private business in an
essentially laissez-faire environment, while liberals see the steady
advance of America as due in significant part to the growing influence
of the interests and wisdom of “the common people.” As one result,
both groups have the identical blind spot: both appear unable to
fully appreciate the joining together of government power with certain
influential (and usually exceedingly wealthy) private citizens and
businesses. This combination, which began in the late nineteenth
century, gathered force in the two decades following 1900, and was
firmly cemented in place by World War I and then the New Deal, resulted
in the creation of a class made up of the American elites. It is
in these elites that almost all power is concentrated, both the
power of the state and the power of the dominant private interests.

For most Americans,
full recognition of this reality is impossible, for it renders maintenance
of the American fable of “responsive democracy” all but impossible.
All our politicians appeal with thought-deadening monotony to the
“will of the people.” The fiction that the actions of the state
and of the elites embody that “will” is the unappealable justification
for whatever the ruling class might do, whether or not it is true
(which it frequently is not). If public opinion on a particular
question reaches a pitch and intensity that cannot be ignored, the
ruling class might make temporary concessions to the public’s demands.
This is why I suggested a
series of actions to focus public protest about what still seems
to be the inevitability of an attack on Iran, under either the current
administration or a future
Democratic one. The program I put forth doesn’t contradict these
points about the power of the ruling elites; in extraordinary circumstances
and on a particular issue, the elites will heed “the people’s voice,”
if it becomes so insistent and is offered on a large enough scale
that continuing to ignore it might threaten the elites’ hold on
power. But such occasions are extraordinary; for the most
part, politicians and other members of the elites couldn’t care
less about what “the people” want. Yet the fable must be maintained,
and “the people” need to be reassured that the state acts in accordance
with their desires. We still have what, for the elites, must be
an increasingly annoying formality, regular elections – even
though elections are now almost entirely an empty charade drained
of all substance and meaning.

So the American
mythology continues intact, untarnished and unthreatened by unpleasant
facts. I had numerous reasons for referring to us as “A
Nation of Stupid Children, Who Refuse to Give Up the Lies.”
Even intelligent and sometimes admirable prominent public voices
give new life to the fable that sustains us. Bob Herbert is one
of only a handful of commentators for whom I have significant respect;
Herbert writes with great power and eloquence about the
profound evil of torture, and he is often passionate in his
defense of the powerless who are frequently treated with unimaginable
cruelty. But our central myth is so pervasive that even Herbert
absorbs it, and increases its reach. For example, in a column titled,
“The
System’s Broken,” from October 30, 2006, Herbert wrote:
The
system is broken. Most politicians would rather sacrifice their
first born than tell voters the honest truth about tough issues.
Big money and gerrymandering have placed government out of the reach
of most Americans. While some changes in the House are expected
this year, the Brookings Institution and the Cato Institute tell
us (in a joint report) that since 1998, House incumbents have won
more than 98 percent of their re-election races.

Millions
of thoughtful Americans have become so estranged from the political
process that they’ve tuned out entirely. Voters hungry for a serious
discussion of complex issues are fed a steady diet of ideological
talking heads hurling insults in one- or two-minute television
segments.

DePauw University
held a two-day conference last week on issues confronting the
U.S. I was struck by the extent to which the people who attended
the forums were interested in seeking out practical, nonpartisan,
nonideological solutions to the wide range of problems discussed.

The frustration
with the current state of government and politics was palpable.
One man, Ned Lamkin, asked me if it wouldn’t be a good idea to
create some sort of national forum for a serious extended discussion
of ways to fix, or at least improve, the system. He’s on to something.

Among other
things, I’d love to see a nonpartisan series of high-profile, nationally
televised town hall meetings that would explore ways of making government
and politics fairer, more open and more responsive to the will of
the people.

American-style
democracy needs to be energized, revitalized. The people currently
in charge are not up to the task. It’s time to bring the intelligence,
creativity and energy of the broader population into the quest
for constructive change.

While I’m somewhat
sympathetic to the perspective Herbert expresses here, to say that
his proposed solution is naive is to be exceedingly and foolishly
kind. A “series of high-profile, nationally televised town hall
meetings” – as against a vast and intricate system of power
that has become deeply entrenched in every aspect of our nation’s
life and activities over more than one hundred years?

Herbert regularly
returns to his praise for the great wisdom embodied in “the will
of the people,” as in a column dated January 29, 2007, “More
than Antiwar“:
You
can say what you want about the people opposed to this wretched
war in Iraq, try to stereotype them any way you can. But you couldn’t
walk among them for more than a few minutes on Saturday without
realizing that they love their country as much as anyone ever has.
They love it enough to try to save it.

…

The goal
of the crowd was to get the attention of Congress and persuade
it to move vigorously to reverse the Bush war policies. But the
thought that kept returning as I watched the earnestly smiling
faces, so many of them no longer young, was the way these protesters
had somehow managed to keep the faith. They still believed, after
all the years and all the lies, that they could make a difference.
They still believed their government would listen to them and
respond. [It
will not listen to them, and it will not respond.]

…

The public
is way out in front of the politicians on this issue. But the
importance of Saturday’s march does not lie primarily in whether
it hastens a turnaround of U.S. policy on the war. The fact that
so many Americans were willing to travel from every region of
the country to march against the war was a reaffirmation of the
public’s commitment to our peaceful democratic processes.

It is
in that unique and unflagging commitment, not in our terrifying
military power, that the continued promise and greatness of America
are to be found.

This belief in
the “promise and greatness” of “the American people” drenches our
political debates, and makes serious, adult discussion a goal
that is all but unattainable. You find it on the right, as in these
comments
from Romney at the first Republican debate in early May:
MR.
VANDEHEI: Governor Romney, Daniel Dukovnic (sp) from Walnut Creek,
California, wants to know: What do you dislike most about America?

MR. ROMNEY:
Gosh. I love America. I’m afraid I’m going to be at a loss for words,
because America for me is not just our rolling mountains and hills
and streams and great cities, it’s the American people. And the
American people are the greatest people in the world. What makes
America the greatest nation in the world is the heart of the American
people – hard-working, innovative, risk-taking, God- loving,
family-oriented American people.

It’s
that optimism we thank Ronald Reagan for. Thank you, Mrs. Reagan,
for opening up this place in his memory for us. It is that optimism
about this great people that makes us the greatest nation on Earth.

With regard to
the noxious idea that “the American people are the greatest people
in the world,” I am compelled to repeat some earlier remarks, from
Part VII of this series, “The
Mythology of the ‘Good Guy’ American”:
We
see our success, and our power on the world stage, as inherently
tied to superior moral virtue. We are so successful because
we are uniquely virtuous, and our national power confirms our morality,
in relation to which all other peoples and all other countries can
only suffer in comparison. One of the many dangerous and inevitable
consequences of this view is an often virulent racism that has been
reflected in our treatment of many very numerous groups of people:
the Native Americans, the slaves who were brought here and were
an integral part of the new country’s economy, Germans
in World War I (German-Americans were the “scum of the melting pot,”
who now needed to be gotten “rid of”), the
Japanese in World War II (the “yellow Japs,” who were “regularly
compared” to “monkeys, baboons, and gorillas”), and a number of
other foreigners and immigrants. Very recently, we witnessed the
sickening spectacle of this atavistic racism unleashed in the wake
of Hurricane Katrina.

…

One point
is crucial: a critical part of our national mythology is the insistence
on viewing our nation and ourselves as Americans in comparative
terms. When we insist that we are uniquely “good” and “virtuous,”
this logically necessitates a further conclusion: we are better
than everyone else. We are “the Good Guys.” The emphasis is not
only on “Good,” but on “the”: we are the Good Guys
in a way that no one else is, or can ever be. (On this issue,
also see this
post from yesterday, in response to
this.)

And the paeans
to “the will of the people” come from the left and from progressives,
as in this entry
from Matt Stoller, which is almost stupendously wonderful in its
mind-destroying inanity:
I’m
going to follow on Chris’s posts on diversity by explaining why
I blog. I have a certain set of values, and I want to see the political
system adopt those values, including transparency, honesty, and
civic democracy. My hypothesis is that these values are shared by
a wide group, and that organizing through the blogs is one route
to pressuring for social change. In other words, blogging is just
a means to power for a progressive movement that I want to see succeed.

And surprisingly,
it’s not actually easy to have an impact on the political system.
As weird as it sounds, a link from Atrios or Firedoglake, or a
mention in the New York Times, does not change the political system.
[Who woulda thunk?!] It is in fact a lot of work to get a change
to happen.

The balance of
Stoller’s post, which identifies strategies that are not effective
and those that might be, leads one to conclude that a rather unsophisticated
irony might be the sought-after tone in remarks such as, “it’s not
actually easy to have an impact on the political system.” It might
be observed that for a political operative, for whom effective and
clear communication is essential, the intended message and tone could
be conveyed with just a bit more precision. And Stoller seems to genuinely
believe that he is identifying an unappreciated fact that escapes
most people when he remarks, “It is in fact a lot of work to get a
change to happen.” What can one say? Perhaps: D’oh! So let us be fair:
let no one accuse certain progressive operatives of intellectual brilliance
or original insight.

True, Stoller
acknowledges that, “There’s a small group of people who make policy
in politics,” but his overall argument (and his writing more generally)
makes clear that the full reality of the complex mechanisms through
which power is achieved, maintained, expanded and directed is entirely
beyond his grasp. (It is possible that Stoller understands all of
this, and also knows the vacuous phrases that he needs to throw
up and out periodically, to assuage certain of his less than bright
followers. If he does understand it, that, of course, would be unspeakably
worse. But I seriously doubt he’s that bright.) And then, of course,
there is the unstated but clearly implied self-congratulation at
the end: “There are big opportunities here. Seize them. No one is
stopping you but you.” You can be assured that Stoller is not stopping
Stoller. His post is entirely appropriately titled, “Building Power.”
I note, without further explication, that you should read Stoller’s
post in conjunction with a genuinely awful
entry from Chris Bowers, and you will then understand why I
now think of them as the Evil Twins of Progressive Politics. The
lust for power consumes them – and I implore you to remember
that power always must mean power over other people. As those
who seek power always do, they regularly camouflage their lust with
sentimental tripe about “transparency, honesty and civic democracy.”
If people studied and remembered history, they would realize that
every leader, including the most brutally vicious and murderous,
has always appealed to “the will of the people.” It is on the basis
of such platitudinous, vapid twaddle that crimes of immense scale
and horror are committed.

As Romney’s
remarks make clear, the belief that the “heart of the American people”
makes America “the greatest nation in the world” is one regularly
trotted out by Republicans. However, I note again that these hackneyed
phrases are primarily a public relations ploy, designed to drug
unthinking Americans into apathy, secure in the conviction that
the state is following their “will.” On the right side of the spectrum,
especially among many neoconservatives, the deep contempt for “ordinary”
Americans is now occasionally acknowledged explicitly, together
with the belief that these citizen-dolts must be told
“noble” Straussian lies to get them to behave properly.

But among
progressives, the appeals to the wisdom and infinite goodness of
“the American people” are unending. So exactly which Americans are
they talking about? We can safely assume they probably don’t mean
the 62 million people who voted for Bush in 2004, long after the
criminally murderous nature of his policies had been made unequivocally
clear, or the millions of Americans who still support Bush even
today. They probably don’t mean those Americans who enjoy hearty
laughs watching repeated
acts of torture on 24, and who wish only that their government
used similar methods still more systematically (as if we don’t use
them systematically
enough already). But here is where the genuinely religious nature
of this belief in the innate goodness of “the people” becomes clearer.
We should first note that, whenever political leaders or would-be
wielders of power appeal to “civic democracy” or “the will of the
people,” they operate on a crucial but unspoken assumption: that
the people they invoke just happen to agree with them. When these
seekers after power use the state to force people to act in certain
ways, they will only be doing what the people themselves want, for
the beliefs of “the people” coincidentally overlap with their own
at every important point. I repeat that every bloodthirsty dictator
has said the same.

But note a
further religious element involved. Every fervent “believer” thinks
that if only others saw the truth as he does, if they only had all
the “facts,” they would be overwhelmed by his particular vision,
and come to see its indisputable veracity. In exactly the same way,
all these seekers of political power think that if only “the people”
had all the “facts” (which are the ones they view as important,
and no others), they would embrace every significant part of their
political program. This avoids one obvious and fundamental aspect
of human nature, and human behavior: people can have precisely the
same information – yet they will reach vastly different conclusions
because they operate on the basis of different moral premises
and values. People make different choices; as we all know, those
choices are often entirely unlike ours, and not infrequently directly
opposed to ours. Keep in mind that the state is a
system of obedience: the essence of the state is force
and compulsion. If you violate the state’s requirements,
you will pay a penalty. But this reality is washed away with appeals
to “the will of the people”: the power-seekers convince themselves
that you are only being forced to act in ways that you would choose
yourself. This is only a very brief beginning on what is an inordinately
complex subject; I will return to these issues in much more detail
in an upcoming series about the primitive tribalism that has overwhelmed
our politics today.

Let’s return
to the mythical “good American.” In a very valuable article from
the indispensable Robert Higgs, “How
Does the War Party Get Away With It?” (published in September
2003), Higgs eloquently makes a number of the same points I refer
to above:
Presidents
decide to go to war in the context of a favorably disposed mass
culture. Painful as it is for members of the Peace Party to admit,
many Americans take pleasure in “kicking ass,” and they do not much
care whose ass is being kicked or why. So long as Americans are
dishing out death and destruction to a plausible foreign enemy,
the red-white-and-blue jingos are happy. If you think I'm engaging
in hyperbole, you need to get out more. Visit a barbershop, stand
in line at the post office, or have a drink at your neighborhood
tavern and listen to the conversations going on around you. The
sheer bellicosity of many ordinary people’s views is as undeniable
as it is shocking. Something in their diet seems to be causing a
remarkable volume of murderous, barely suppressed rage.

…

No one
should be surprised by the cultural proclivity for violence, of
course, because Americans have always been a violent people in
a violent land. Once the Europeans had committed themselves to
reside on this continent, they undertook to slaughter the Indians
and steal their land, and to bullwhip African slaves into submission
and live off their laboru2014endeavors they pursued with considerable
success over the next two and a half centuries. Absent other convenient
victims, they have battered and killed one another on the slightest
pretext, or for the simple pleasure of doing so, with guns, knives,
and bare hands. If you take them to be a u201Cpeace-loving people,u201D
you haven't been paying attention. Such violent people are easily
led to war.

Public
ignorance compounds the inclinations fostered by the mass culture.
Study after study and poll after poll have confirmed that most
Americans know next to nothing about public affairs. Of course,
the intricacies of foreign policy are as alien to them as the
dark side of the moon, but their ignorance runs much deeper. They
can't explain the simplest elements of the political system; they
don't know what the Constitution says or means; and they can't
identify their political representatives or what those persons
ostensibly stand for. They know scarcely anything about history,
and what they think they know is usually incorrect. People so
densely ignorant that they have no inkling of how their forebears
were bamboozled and sacrificed on the altar of Mars the last time
around are easily bamboozled and readily sacrificed the next time
around.

Earlier in the
same article, Higgs is similarly eloquent and perceptive on the major
theme of this essay:
In
view of the evident futility, and worse, of nearly every war the
United States has fought during the past century, how does the War
Party manage to propel this nation into one catastrophe after another,
each of them clearly foreseen by at least a substantial minority
who failed to dissuade their fellow citizens from still another
march into calamity?

An adequate
answer might fill a volume, but some elements of that answer can
be sketched briefly. The essential components are autocratic government,
favorably disposed mass culture, public ignorance and misplaced
trust, cooperative mass media, and political exploitation for
personal and institutional advantage.

By “autocratic
government,” I refer to the reality of how foreign policy is actually
made in the United States. Notwithstanding the trappings of our
political system's democratic procedures, checks and balances,
elections, and so forth, the making of foreign policy involves
only a handful of people decisively. When the president and his
coterie of top advisers decide to go to war, they just go, and
nobody can stop them. The “intelligence” agencies, the diplomatic
corps, and the armed forces do as they are told. Members of Congress
cower and speak in mealy-mouthed phrases framed to ensure that
no matter how the war turns out, they can share any credit and
deny any blame. No one has effective capacity to block the president,
and few officials care to do so in any event, even if they object.
Rarely does anyone display the minimal decency of resigning his
military commission or his appointment in the bureaucracy. In
short, in our system the president has come to hold the power
of war and peace exclusively in his hands, notwithstanding anything
to the contrary written in the Constitution or the laws. He might
as well be Caesar.

(In the
late 1930s, Congress considered the Ludlow Resolution, which would
have amended the Constitution to require approval in a national
referendum before Congress could declare war, unless U.S. territory
had been invaded. Franklin D. Roosevelt vigorously opposed such
an amendment, writing to the Speaker of the House on January 6,
1938, that its adoption “would cripple any President in his conduct
of our foreign relations,” and the resolution was narrowly voted
down [209 to 188] in the House soon afterward. Can't let the inmates
run the asylum, now can we?)

Higgs has more,
and I encourage you to
read it.

To fill in
these identifications with some further detail, I turn once again
to Christopher Layne, whose very valuable book, The
Peace of Illusions: American Grand Strategy From 1940 to the Present,
I excerpted in Part III, “The
Open Door to Worldwide Hegemony.” In his concluding chapter
(at pp. 200-201), Layne writes (the highlights are mine, and I’ve
omitted the footnotes, with the exception of one indicated by an
asterisk):
By
abandoning hegemony in favor of offshore balancing, could the United
States have maintained its security at a lower price? If the United
States, at an earlier stage, could have extricated itself from the
hegemonic dimension of its cold war strategy, and its concomitant
burdens, it would have been in its interest to do so. This, of course,
raises another important question: Why has the United States stuck
so long with its hegemonic strategy? Were U.S. policymakers foolish,
or were they willfully indifferent to the burdens placed on the
United States by its grand strategy?

The answer
is both complex (a topic worthy of a book in its own right) and
yet simple. In his book Myths of Empire, Jack Snyder talks
about elites “hijacking” the state. This fails to make the point
quite strongly enough. Dominant elites do not hijack the state;
they are the state. The United States pursued hegemony
because that grand strategy has served the interests of the dominant
elites that have formed the core of the U.S. foreign policy establishment
since at least the late 1930s, when the New Deal resulted in the
domestic political triumph of what Thomas Ferguson calls “multinational
liberalism.” At the core of the multinational liberal coalition
were large capital-intensive corporations that looked to overseas
markets and outward-looking investment banks. This coalition displaced
the so-called system of 1896, which was organized around labor-intensive
industries that favored economic nationalism and opposed strategic
internationalism. [That last sentence is not entirely correct
in my view, as I will explain when I return to the actual history
of the Progressive movement, as opposed to the widely accepted
mythology about its achievements.]

The multinational
liberal coalition that cemented its hold on power during the New
Deal had its roots deep in the Eastern establishment: it also
included the national media, important foundations, the big Wall
Street law firms, and organizations such as the Council on Foreign
Relations.* This coalition favored economic and political Open
Doors and the strategic internationalism that accompanied them.
Although the bipartisan consensus among the U.S. foreign policy
establishment favoring strategic internationalism and U.S. hegemony
that was forged some six decades ago has occasionally been tested
– notably during the Vietnam War – it has proved remarkably
durable. Unless it undergoes a Damascene-like intellectual conversion,
as long as the present foreign policy elite remains in power the
United States will remain wedded to a hegemonic grand strategy.
It probably will take a major domestic political realignment –
perhaps triggered by setbacks abroad or a severe economic crisis
at home – to bring about a change in American grand strategy.

The asterisk following
the reference to the Council on Foreign Relations refers to a footnote
that is also worth reproducing:
The
terms “dominant elite” and “foreign policy establishment” as used
here carry no ideological connotations. It is well recognized that
a dominant elite and a foreign policy establishment do exist in
the United States. In their fascinating – and very mainstream
– portrait of Averell Harriman, Dean Acheson, Charles Bohlen,
John McCloy, George Kennan, and Robert Lovett, Isaacson and Thomas
explain that they selected these six because
they
represent a cross section of the postwar policy Establishment.
The values they embodied were nurtured in prep schools, at college
clubs, in the boardrooms of Wall Street, and at dinner parties
in Washington. They shared a vision of public service as a lofty
calling and an aversion to partisan politics. They had a pragmatic
and businesslike preference for realpolitik over ideology. As
internationalists who respected the manners and traditions of
Europe, they waged a common struggle against the pervasive isolationism
of their time. (Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise
Men: Six Friends and the World They Made [New York: Simon
and Schuster, 1986], 25)

The idea that
the United States operates or even could operate to any significant
degree like a vast town meeting of 300 million people is utter nonsense.
To think for even a moment that nationally televised town meetings
or a fictitious “responsive, civic democracy” could, at this late
date, seriously impact a complex, sprawling system of immense, almost
unimaginable power is absolutely fantastic. And even if such a “civic
democracy” were somehow made operational in some science fiction universe,
when one considers the actual nature and predilections of far too
many Americans, if their “will” were to be fully enacted, the results
might well horrify even those who regularly offer their sentimental,
empty, cloying appeals to Americans’ inherent “goodness.”

This is the
reality that the widely accepted mythology is designed to avoid,
a reality that rests upon an intricate series of connections among
government, corporations, national media, foundations, law firms,
and additional elements (including, very significantly, a massive
defense industry). These are the elites who run our government,
and who direct our lives. These are the elites who continue the
slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people who never threatened
us and the destruction of entire countries that never attacked us,
and who ache for still another war. These are the elites who oversee
death and destruction on a vast scale, who seek to eliminate what
little
remains of our liberties, and who are never satisfied. No matter
how much power they have, they always want more, unto the
end of time. You can comfort yourself with delusions about “civic
democracy” and “national town meetings,” but this reality is the
one that runs your life in countless ways, and that might end it
someday.

I suppose
I could briefly summarize the argument in the following manner:
Grow up. Be adults about this. And for God’s sake, be serious.

May
19, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

Almost one
month ago, I wrote about the elaborate, sickening, and sickeningly
immoral
charade that had gone on in Congress with regard to Iraq spending
bills. I realize the central truth that I discussed in that essay
is one that most people adamantly refuse to accept. Nonetheless,
it remains indisputably true: for our ruling elites, the suffering
and death of innocent people, American, Iraqi or of any other nationality,
are not of primary importance. In the perverse scheme of their priorities,
such matters appear well down on the list. Their major and often
sole concern is political power: its acquisition, its maintenance
and its expansion. Tactics of only one kind are their concern: the
means by which their own power is maintained and enhanced.

It is deeply
regrettable, and also inevitable – since the world of political
blogs cannot be other than a reflection of the larger culture –
that this same indifference to human pain and suffering infects
the approach of the great majority of political bloggers. For all
their ferocious opposition to the Bush administration and to Republicans
generally, liberal and progressive bloggers act as if they are largely
indifferent to bringing about a quick end to the incomprehensibly
deadly Iraq occupation. They certainly demonstrate no sustained,
serious effort to pressure Congressional Democrats into defunding
the war – or into acting to oppose an attack on Iran in every
way possible. The concerns of these bloggers and the Washington
Democrats are perfectly coextensive: they will condemn the Iraq
war and act to block an attack on Iran only to the degree such actions
will not endanger their perceived political opportunities in 2008.
All of them are happy to follow in the wake of public opinion; genuine
leadership and daring to educate and motivate the American public
are out of the question. Profound courage and opposition to the
“consensus” view in the manner that a Robert
La Follette once demonstrated is inconceivable; these bloggers
and their political representatives have no interest in such matters.
They remember only that La Follette was viciously attacked and vilified
in his lifetime; they forget (if they even know) that La Follette
nonetheless saw a series of personal political triumphs. Most significantly,
they forget (if they even understand) that history proved La Follette
to have been entirely correct in his unrelenting opposition to the
U.S. entrance into World War I. The verdict of history and the avoidance
of unnecessary human suffering and death do not concern such people;
only political power does. (In very large part, the conduct of our
political class and of most bloggers is the consequence of the most
barbaric and primitive kind of tribalism. Their goal is the elevation
to power of their tribe, and the diminution of the power
of the other tribe; almost all other matters are inconsequential
details to this kind of psychology. I will be discussing tribalism,
its roots, and its far-reaching, immensely destructive effects in
a new series of essays, which I hope to begin in the next several
days.)

The Washington
charade continues without interruption, as the bloody slaughter
in Iraq goes on every hour of every day. Proving still another time
in an infinite series of such demonstrations that it has learned
nothing over the last six years, the NYT plasters an entirely
false headline on its story: “War
Bill Passes House, Requiring an Iraq Pullout.” In fact, the
bill “requires” no such thing; it certainly does not require an
“Iraq pullout.” The charade goes on unchallenged only because our
governing class and our major media institutions know they can count
on the majority of Americans to be ignorant of the relevant facts
and/or largely disinterested in acquiring them. Realizing that it
is anathema to the manner in which political conversations are to
be conducted, let’s review some of the critical facts on this issue.

The Times
story begins:
The
House on Wednesday narrowly approved a $124 billion war spending
bill that would require American troops to begin withdrawing from
Iraq by Oct. 1, setting the stage for the first veto fight between
President Bush and majority Democrats.

Only hours
after Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander in Iraq, told lawmakers
he needed more time to gauge the effectiveness of a troop buildup
there, the House voted 218 to 208 to pass a measure that sought
the removal of most combat forces by next spring. Mr.
Bush has said unequivocally and repeatedly that he will veto it.

“Last fall,
the American people voted for a new direction in Iraq,” said Speaker
Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California. “They made it clear that
our troops must be given all they need to do their jobs, but that
our troops must be brought home responsibly, safely, and soon.”

You have to go
on to the second page of the story (where most readers never go) to
get a glimpse of the truth:
After
the briefing, Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority
leader, disputed criticisms that Democrats were trying to end the
war before giving the administration’s plan a chance to succeed.

“Nobody
is saying get out tomorrow,” Mr. Hoyer said, noting that the legislation
would allow American troops to stay in Iraq to battle terrorist
groups.

Ah, yes. That
little exception about “battl[ing] terrorist groups.” Gareth Porter
notes the
following:
The
language on a timetable for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq voted out
of the House-Senate conference committee this week contains large
loopholes that would apparently allow U.S. troops to continue carrying
out military operations in Iraq’s Sunni heartland indefinitely.

The plan,
coming from the Democratic majority in Congress, makes an exemption
from a 180-day timetable for completion of “redeployment” of U.S.
troops from Iraq to allow “targeted special actions limited in
duration and scope to killing or capturing members of al-Qaeda
and other terrorist organizations of global reach.”

The al-Qaeda
exemption, along with a second exemption allowing U.S. forces
to re-enter Iraq to protect those remaining behind to train and
equip Iraqi security forces and to protect other U.S. military
forces, appears to approve the presence in Iraq of tens of thousands
of U.S. occupation troops for many years to come.

The large
loopholes in the Democratic withdrawal plan come against the background
of the failure of the U.S. war against the insurgency — including
al-Qaeda — in Anbar and other Sunni provinces and the emergence
of a major war within the Sunni insurgency between non-jihadi
resistance groups and al-Qaeda.

The Sunni
resistance organizations represent a clear alternative to an endless
U.S. occupation of hostile Sunni provinces that has driven many
activists into the arms of al-Qaeda.

Although
the wording in the House-Senate appropriations bill appears to
suggest a very limited mandate for operations against al-Qaeda,
at least one influential Democratic figure, Senate Foreign Relations
Committee Chairman Joe Biden, intends to interpret it broadly
enough to allow the administration to continue at roughly the
present level of U.S. military operations in Anbar province, even
after the U.S. has withdrawn its troops from the Baghdad area.

The Democrats
have been entirely consistent about these “loopholes.” John Kerry
specified the same exceptions in his NYT op-ed piece one year
ago. As I commented
at the time it appeared:

Everything
that is wrong and destructive about United States foreign policy
over the last century is reflected in John Kerry’s op-ed article
in the NYT last week. Furthermore, the overall tone and
perspective that Kerry brings to the question of what we should
now do in Iraq are deeply objectionable. In personal terms, I
can only describe Kerry’s approach as sickening in the extreme.
What is additionally shocking to me is the extent to which almost
no one has commented on exactly why it is so sickening;
instead, the majority of Democrats and liberals, for example,
praise Kerry for his “bravery” and “courage.” But there is nothing
in the least brave about Kerry’s article, because of a huge dishonesty
buried in the middle of his proposed strategy.

Of course,
Kerry isn’t proposing that we withdraw all American combat
forces – none of which, I repeat, are there for any legitimate
reason. Oh, no: “Only troops essential to finishing the job of
training Iraqi forces should remain.” And: “To increase the pressure
on Iraq’s leaders, we must redeploy American forces to garrisoned
status. Troops should be used for security backup, training and
emergency response…”

That’s
a handy loophole – one big enough to drive a decades-long
occupation through, even if it is “only” an occupation confined
to those “enduring bases” we’re spending so much money on. In
this manner, Iraq will remain our staging platform for our neverending
efforts to control the future of the Middle East, just as we have
attempted to do ever since World War I.

See the earlier
post for further details.

Let’s return
to the contention that the Democrats are proposing a “troop withdrawal”
(and I emphasize that it is, of course, non-binding). They are proposing
only a withdrawal of “combat troops,” and not even all of those.
Here’s a key fact about those combat troops, from the NYT
last
December:
Frontline
combat troops in the 15 brigades carrying out the American fight
in Iraq – which the Iraq Study Group says could be largely
withdrawn in just over a year – represent about 23 percent
of the 140,000 military personnel committed to the overall war effort
there.

On any
given day, according to military officers in Baghdad, only about
11 percent of the Army and Marine Corps personnel in Iraq are
carrying out purely offensive operations. Even counting others,
whose main job is defensive or who perform security missions to
stabilize the country for economic reconstruction and political
development, only half of the American force might be considered
combat troops.

Even
if all of the group’s proposals were carried out, it is not possible
to predict exactly how many Americans will stay, or for how long.
Decisions will hinge on military conditions on the ground and
political conditions in Washington.

But an
analysis of the current numbers and tasks of American forces suggests
that it will prove difficult to drop far below 100,000 by early
2008, and that 70,000 or more troops might have to stay for a
considerable time.

Some “withdrawal.”
Some way to “end the war.”

Since I am
being unspeakably rude in my insistence that we state the relevant
facts, let’s also talk about those “enduring bases.” In February
2006, Tom
Engelhardt wrote:
Assuming,
then, a near year to come of withdrawal buzz, speculation, and even
a media blitz of withdrawal announcements, the question is: How
can anybody tell if the Bush administration is actually withdrawing
from Iraq or not? Sometimes, when trying to cut through a veritable
fog of misinformation and disinformation, it helps to focus on something
concrete. In the case of Iraq, nothing could be more concrete –
though less generally discussed in our media – than the set
of enormous bases the Pentagon has long been building in that country.
Quite literally multi-billions of dollars have gone into them. In
a prestigious engineering magazine in late 2003, Lt. Col. David
Holt, the Army engineer “tasked with facilities development” in
Iraq, was already speaking proudly of several billion dollars being
sunk into base construction (“the numbers are staggering”). Since
then, the base-building has been massive and ongoing.

In a
country in such startling disarray, these bases, with some of
the most expensive and advanced communications systems on the
planet, are like vast spaceships that have landed from another
solar system. Representing a staggering investment of resources,
effort, and geostrategic dreaming, they are the unlikeliest places
for the Bush administration to hand over willingly to even the
friendliest of Iraqi governments.

…

There
are at least four such “super-bases” in Iraq, none of which have
anything to do with “withdrawal” from that country. Quite the
contrary, these bases are being constructed as little American
islands of eternal order in an anarchic sea. Whatever top administration
officials and military commanders say – and they always deny
that we seek “permanent” bases in Iraq — facts-on-the-ground
speak with another voice entirely. These bases practically scream
“permanency.”

Unfortunately,
there’s a problem here. American reporters adhere to a simple
rule: The words “permanent,” “bases,” and “Iraq” should never
be placed in the same sentence, not even in the same paragraph;
in fact, not even in the same news report. While a LexisNexis
search of the last 90 days of press coverage of Iraq produced
a number of examples of the use of those three words in the British
press, the only U.S. examples that could be found occurred when
80% of Iraqis (obviously somewhat unhinged by their difficult
lives) insisted in a poll that the United States might indeed
desire to establish bases and remain permanently in their country;
or when “no” or “not” was added to the mix via any American official
denial. (It’s strange, isn’t it, that such bases, imposing as
they are, generally only exist in our papers in the negative.)

As the American
press goes, so go the Democrats. For all their phony talk about “withdrawal”
and “ending the war,” the Democrats have said next to nothing about
these huge bases, their future, or their purpose.

Identical
silence surrounds the
U.S. embassy in Baghdad:
Among
the many secrets the American government cannot keep, one of its
biggest (104 acres) and most expensive ($592 million) is the American
Embassy being built in Baghdad. Surrounded by fifteen-foot-thick
walls, almost as large as the Vatican on a scale comparable to the
Mall of America, to which it seems to have a certain spiritual affinity,
this is no simple object to hide.

So you
think the Bush Administration is planning on leaving Iraq? Read
on.

The Chicago
Tribune reports, “Trucks shuttle building materials to and
fro. Cranes, at least a dozen of them, punch toward the sky. Concrete
structures are beginning to take form. At a time when most Iraqis
are enduring blackouts of up to 22 hours a day, the site is floodlighted
by night so work can continue around the clock.”

According
to Knight Ridder, “US officials here [in Baghdad] greet questions
about the site with a curtness that borders on hostility. Reporters
are referred to the State Department in Washington, which declined
to answer questions for security reasons.” Photographers attempting
to get pictures of what the locals call “George W’s Palace” are
confined to using telephoto lenses on this, the largest construction
project undertaken by Iraq’s American visitors.

Nonetheless,
we know much of what is going on in the place, where there will
soon be twenty-one buildings, 619 apartments with very fancy digs
for the big shots, restaurants, shops, gym facilities, a swimming
pool, a food court, a beauty salon, a movie theater (we can’t
say if it’s a multiplex) and, as the Times of London reports,
“a swish club for evening functions.” This should be ideal for
announcing the various new milestones marking the trudge of the
Iraqi people toward democracy and freedom.

USA
Today has learned that the “massive new embassy, being built
on the banks of the Tigris River, is designed to be entirely self-sufficient
and won’t be dependent on Iraq’s unreliable public utilities.”
Thus, there will be no reason or excuse for any of the thousands
of Americans working in this space, which is about the size of
eighty football fields, to share the daily life experience of
an Iraqi or even come in accidental contact with one.

This
gigantic complex does not square with the repeated assertions
by the people who run the American government that the United
States will not stay in the country after Iraq becomes a stand-alone,
democratic entity. An “embassy” in which 8,000 people labor, along
with the however many thousand military personnel necessary to
defend them, is not a diplomatic outpost. It is a base. A permanent
base.

Is anyone, Republican
or Democrat, talking about this embassy, its construction, or what
it signifies about our government’s plans? No.

I will make
this point very slowly. I will use simple words. The Democrats and
Republicans, the governing class, and the foreign policy establishment
all agree that our foreign policy should be directed to ensuring
global hegemony for the United States. See my series “Dominion
Over the World” for the details. They all agree that the United
States is “entitled” to direct events around the world, and that
we must have the most
powerful military the world has ever seen to make certain that
our will can never be thwarted. They all agree that we must always
have our way. There is no country and no event around the world
that is immune to our interference. With only a handful of exceptions,
no one in government or in a position of significant influence thinks
otherwise. Historically, the Democrats have been in the vanguard
of this policy, and they have been its most vociferous advocates,
beginning with Woodrow Wilson. The Democrats have initiated more
overseas interventions, both covert and by means of outright war,
than the Republicans, by far. If you have any remaining doubts on
this score, read Barack Obama’s recent foreign
policy address. A more complete compendium of the vacuous but
deadly phrases expressing belief in “American exceptionalism,” our
indisputable “right” to rule the world, and the religious belief
in U.S. “indispensability” would be close to impossible to find.
(See Max Sawicky
and IOZ
for more on Obama’s awful utterances.)

Given the
unbroken through-line of U.S. foreign policy going back to World
War I (and to the Spanish-American War even earlier), and since
this foreign policy is virtually entirely unchallenged by anyone
among our governing elites, there is only one conclusion with regard
to our presence in Iraq. No, we will not always be there in the
current numbers. But as the above facts indicate – and I said
I will keep this simple –

WE
ARE
NOT
LEAVING.

At Unqualified
Offerings, consistently refusing to vote in favor of funding for
the immoral and criminal U.S. war on and occupation of Iraq results
in condemnation
from Thoreau:
I
note that Rep. Ron Paul did not vote for the Iraq war funding bill.
Now, I know that Paul always has perfectly good and principled reasons
to vote against things, especially spending bills, but this funding
bill contains timetables for withdrawal. To let the perfect be the
enemy of the good weakens the hand of the people who have a real
chance at ending our involvement in the Iraqi Civil War. If he were
to vote with them, and perhaps provide cover for a few other Republican
mavericks to join him, it would strengthen the hand of the Congressional
leaders working to end this insanity. I have to say that I'm disappointed
in him.
This is deeply
regrettable, and in part barely coherent. According to Thoreau, “Paul
always has perfectly good and principled reasons to vote against things,”
but he’s “disappointed” in Paul precisely because Paul acts
in accordance with his convictions. If only Paul had rotten, unprincipled
reasons for agreeing to a meaningless compromise that will do
nothing to end our occupation of Iraq – SINCE WE ARE NOT LEAVING
– then he might garner Thoreau’s approval. One fears the nature
of Thoreau’s response to La Follette’s intransigent opposition to
Wilson’s vicious warmongering. Perhaps he would have joined those
calling for La Follette’s expulsion from the Senate and prosecution
as a traitor.

My warning
lights always begin to flash whenever I read or hear the phrase,
“To let the perfect be the enemy of the good…” In political contexts,
this clich is almost always used to defend the indefensible, and
to condemn those who dare to point out that it is indefensible.
What is “good” about the Democrats’ spending bill? It is utterly
toothless and non-binding. It will fund the murder and devastation
for at least another year, in a war that was a monstrous war crime
from the moment it began. Even if the “guidelines” were to be followed,
a minimum of 50,000 American troops will remain in Iraq for the
foreseeable future, probably for decades to come. The enduring bases
will remain, as will the Baghdad embassy.

I must note
that, should the Bush administration launch an attack on Iran and
the region erupts in widening war, possibly including nuclear weapons,
then all bets are off. In such a case, it is possible no Americans
will remain in the Middle East, since all of them will be fleeing
in terror or dead, as will be true of most of the inhabitants of
that region. But of course, the Democrats are doing nothing
to try to prevent that eventuality, either. Following her usual
path, Hillary Clinton has again announced a notably and criminally
irresponsible hawkish line on Iran that
concedes nothing to Bush:
Democratic
presidential candidate and New York Senator Hillary Clinton said
Tuesday that it might be necessary for America to confront Iran
militarily, addressing that possibility more directly than any of
the other presidential candidates who spoke this week to the National
Jewish Democratic Council.

Clinton
first said that the US should be engaging directly with Iran to
foil any effort to gain nuclear weapons and faulted the Bush administration
for “considerably narrowing” the options available to America
in countering Iran.

Still,
she said, all avenues should be explored, since “if we do have
to take offensive military action against Iran, it would be far
better if the rest of the world saw it as a position of last resort,
not first resort, because the effect and consequences will be
global.”

“It would be far
better if the rest of the world saw it as a position of last resort…”
Not that it will stop a future Clinton administration if they don’t.
As a consequence of such statements, this is far from
an unlikely scenario. As I said above, and as I here repeat: historically,
the Democrats have engaged in more futile, destructive, pointless
wars than the Republicans. Woodrow Wilson first dragged the U.S. onto
the world stage to run events around the globe, and the Democrats
have never questioned that policy since. The disagreements about Iraq
are a detail in the context of the last century; keep the larger picture
in mind at all times.

Nonetheless,
I think Thoreau is providing a vitally needed service. We desperately
need more defenses of the Democrats’ ultimately meaningless political
theater, all of which is constructed solely with the 2008 elections
in mind. Never mind the chaos, death and suffering that continue
from day to day, and minute to minute. Our politics is a show, where
the warring Statist tribes fight for power. The tribes don’t dispute
that the State should be ever more powerful, and that the State
is entitled to run our lives and the world. They fight only about
who gets to wield the power. But we assuredly need defenses
of this theater of death; lord knows, we don’t have enough bloggers
on the right and the left defending it in almost every post, all
day long.

I realize
that sounds very bitter and angry. Hell, yes:

U.S.
officials who say there has been a dramatic drop in sectarian violence
in Iraq since President Bush began sending more American troops
into Baghdad aren’t counting one of the main killers of Iraqi civilians.

Car bombs
and other explosive devices have killed thousands of Iraqis in
the past three years, but the administration doesn’t include them
in the casualty counts it has been citing as evidence that the
surge of additional U.S. forces is beginning to defuse tensions
between Shiite and Sunni Muslims.

President
Bush explained why in a television interview Tuesday. “If the
standard of success is no car bombings or suicide bombings, we
have just handed those who commit suicide bombings a huge victory,”
he told TV interviewer Charlie Rose.

Others,
however, say that not counting bombing victims skews the evidence
of how well the Baghdad security plan is protecting the civilian
population – one of the surge’s main goals.

“Since
the administration keeps saying that failure is not an option,
they are redefining success in a way that suits them,” said James
Denselow, an Iraq specialist at London-based Chatham House, a
foreign policy think tank.

Yes, I’m
very angry:
Violence
in Iraq was at a moderate level on Wednesday as the UN scolded
the Iraqi government for holding back figures on civilian deaths.
Overall, the media reported that 52 Iraqis were killed or found
dead today and 80 were injured in violent attacks. The U.S. military
reported that a GI was killed in a non-hostile incident. A British
soldier was also killed.

Military
sources reported on the death of a GI in Baghdad and on a British
soldier who was killed in Basra yesterday. This death marks April
as the bloodiest month for British soldiers since March of 2003.
April has also been deadly for American troops with a daily average
nearing four soldiers per day. The toll for April is at least
86 American deaths and 11 British.

Very
angry indeed:
The
United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq criticised Baghdad on
Wednesday for concealing the casualty figures from its sectarian
war and charged that many detainees have “disappeared.”

While
placing the blame for the majority of violent civilian deaths
on the insurgents and illegal militias fighting in Iraq, UNAMI
expressed concern about the human rights record of Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki’s government.

In its
quarterly report on the human rights situation, the UN mission
said the Iraqi government had stopped providing casualty figures
and denied that its previous reports had exaggerated the death
toll in the conflict.

In a
report on January 16, UNAMI said more than 34,400 people had died
in the daily acts of violence across the country in 2006.

But these stories
only concern human beings who are ripped apart, lives being snuffed
out, people’s bodies and minds destroyed forever. No matter.

Let the show
go on.

UPDATE: I
should have noted the observations about the Iraq spending bill
offered by Dennis Kucinich, one of the extraordinarily rare members
of Congress who genuinely understands the matters of principle involved
in our criminal occupation of Iraq. Here is the beginning of Kucinich’s
interview with Truthdig:
James
Harris: This is Truthdig on the phone, Dennis Kucinich, representative
from the state of Ohio since 1996. Today we have the honor of talking
to you just after the bill that passed on the House floor, a bill
that will require President Bush to oppose benchmarks for progress
on the Iraqi government and link them to the continued presence
of American combat troops. Dennis, is this bill a victory for Democrats?

Dennis
Kucinich: It's a disaster for the American people. The Democrats
should have been voting – or come up with a plan to get out
of Iraq. Not one that's going to keep us there a year or two.
It's the same kind of thinking that led us into Iraq – that
we didn't have any alternatives. It's the same thing that caused
the Democrats to construct a plan that will keep us there at least
for a year, and saying, well, we don't have any other alternatives.
I can tell you something, we could have come up with a plan that
would have called for the troops to come home in the next few
months. But we didn't do that, so I, no one can tell me it's a
time for celebration. It's a disaster.

Harris:
What should we do instead, Dennis?

Kucinich:
We should be listening to what the American people had to say
last October, and that is taking steps to immediately end the
war. And that means to set in motion a plan to end the occupation,
close the bases, bring the troops home using money that's already
in the pipeline to do so. At the same time there's a parallel
process of bringing in international security and peacekeeping
forces to stabilize Iraq. And we can get that help once we end
the occupation. Then you have to have a number of other steps
that are taken. Most people aren't aware that this bill that Congress
passed sets the stage for the privatization of Iraq's oil, oil
industry. To have the Democratic Party involved in something like
that is outrageous. Furthermore, we should be pushing for the
stabilization of Iraq's food and energy crisis. There's no talk
about that. Basically we're blaming Iraq for the disaster that
the United States and this administration visited upon them. We're
telling them, either they're going to get their house in order
or we're going to leave. Well, you know what, this approach is
wrongheaded and the Democrats should have known better and they
should have done better.

Harris:
Nancy Pelosi, I think she's partying right now. She feels like
she's done a good job. I'm going to say, Dennis, that I think
she has done a good job if you follow the diplomatic line of things.
She couldn't go in with guns blazing and saying u201Cget those troops
out.u201D These benchmarks do mean something.

Kucinich:
Why couldn't she have said: u201CThis war must endu201D? Congress has
the power to cut off funds. Congress has the power to limit the
funds. Congress could have taken a new direction. Let's face it,
Democrats are expected to do that. … We need to go in a new
direction. And that direction is out. And the fact that we gave
the president money today to keep the war going through the end
of his term constitutes a sellout of the interests of the American
people. And a continuation of the war for another year at least,
possibly two, and this is just wrong. Just totally wrong.

Here’s the rest
of
the interview.

For more on
the control of Iraq’s oil industry by American and allied outsiders,
the plan to which the Democrats have acceded, see here
and here.

April
30, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

Imagine you
see a man on his knees, arms outstretched, with his head resting
on a wooden block. Ten feet above his head, the sharp edge of a
guillotine blade hangs suspended. The blade is held back by a rope
that is visibly frayed and weak. It appears the rope might snap
at any moment, and the blade will descend to plunge through the
man’s neck. Blood will spurt over the platform on which the guillotine
sits, and the man’s head, brutally shorn of the rest of his body,
will thud onto the darkened platform below, onto the wood stained
with the blood from earlier victims. This scene has been enacted
many times before.

One aspect
of the drama playing out before you is exceptionally strange. No
one is forcing the man to remain on his knees, with his head calmly
resting on the block. He could get up and walk off the platform
at any moment. Yet he doesn’t. He appears to be entirely unconcerned
about the fatal danger above him, the blade that hangs there with
infinite patience, silently waiting for its moment. There are others
watching this scene with you. Some of them, like you, shout out
warnings to the man. Still he does not get up. You and the others
have been unable to move the man, or to disable the blade. Only
the man with his head on the block can save himself. He won’t. He
stays on his knees, with his head on the block. With every moment
that passes, the rope holding the blade back weakens. You know,
as the man himself knows, that the rope will break eventually.

Yet he stays
there. Warnings continue to be shouted; he continues to ignore them.
The rope frays still more. Some people in the gathered crowd finally
leave. The tension had become unbearable to them. But you and a
few others remain. Surely, you think, the man will get up eventually,
before the rope breaks. Why would he remain there, when he knows
that will mean his certain death? And still he doesn’t move.

The minutes
pass, and turn into hours. Nothing changes. The man remains in position.
The blade waits. The only unknown is the precise moment when the
blood will begin to flow, the moment when another life will be brutally
destroyed, as so many have been destroyed before.

You feel compelled
to remain, and to watch. You are unable to turn away. Death hangs
in the air.

This is how
we live in America today. The final destruction of liberty, and
of life itself, could begin at any moment. Yet we act like the man
with his head resting on the block. We seem to believe there is
nothing especially unusual in our circumstances, nothing that requires
us to take action. Life goes on as it always did. Like the man under
the blade, we could choose to alter our fate. We will not. We believe,
as perhaps the man under the blade believes, that our situation
isn’t that bad; we’ll be able to get through this, just as we always
have. We forget all those who have gone before us, all those who
have died bloody and painful deaths. But, we may tell ourselves,
we are different from all those others. Their fate will not be ours,
because we are special and unique. We forget that all the earlier
victims thought the same.

Perhaps it
is the case that the man with his head resting on the block isn’t
very intelligent. It is possible he doesn’t understand that the
rope holds the blade back, and that when the rope breaks, the blade
will descend and cut through his flesh. At this moment in history,
it is indisputably the case that Americans generally, and the political
class and most of those who write about politics (including almost
all bloggers), are not very intelligent. They appear to understand
almost nothing about political principles, or how they operate.
Gathering dangers hold no reality for such people. They will understand
the guillotine’s purpose only when the blade first touches their
necks, and the blood finally gushes out. Yes, they will certainly
comprehend the danger then, when all possibilities for action have
been destroyed.

The man in
my story has only one blade suspended above him; we have at least
four blades hanging over us, any one of which could be fatal.

The first
blade, probably the most dangerous one, is the Military Commissions
Act. What is it that people fail to understand about this abomination?
I know that I and others have explained its immense dangers and
its fatal implications numerous times; perhaps we haven’t explained
it very well. But I don’t know how to say it any more plainly
than this:

There is no question that the Military Commissions Act, given the
language it now contains, grants – in principle – full
dictatorial powers to the executive. As I explained in the earlier
essay, the executive and certain entities it controls can designate
anyone, including any American citizen, as an “unlawful enemy combatant.”
That person can then be imprisoned for the rest of his life, with
no recourse whatsoever. Period.

The
critical point is what, in principle, the grant of power
includes. As noted, the grant is absolute: it includes
everything. As I have pointed out, the determination of
the Bush administration to achieve absolute power has been indisputably
clear since shortly after 9/11. And this is hardly the first time
that I and others have noted that the mechanisms for a complete
dictatorship
have now been put in place.

With
proper preparation, and with the requisite understanding that
freedom itself was imperiled, the Democrats could have achieved
these aims. All of us would be forever in their debt. Surely liberty
itself is worth such a battle, isn’t it? But the Democrats did
none of these things, so the bill passed. Thus, they share in
the guilt and responsibility. The guilt and responsibility that
accrues to the Democrats is not as great as that of the Republicans,
but it is surely great enough. And when your freedom, and that
of your family and friends, and that of every single one of us,
is destroyed in this manner, how do you even go about measuring
degrees of guilt? How do you say this failure is worse
than that one? The bill passed. They all failed,
Republicans and Democrats alike. In principle, torture was enshrined
and liberty was destroyed.

Some
argue that the Supreme Court will find the act, or at least certain
key provisions, unconstitutional. That, too, is a hope, but I
myself am far from certain that the Court will rule in such a
manner. In any event, we do not know what the ultimate outcome
will be as far as the judicial system is concerned.

So we
are confronted with one stark certainty, opposed by fragile and
uncertain future hopes. We know the Military Commissions Act destroys
liberty at its very foundation. We do not know if this fatal injury
will ever be ameliorated. The Act should have been stalled at
the very least. It was not.

Destroying
the very basis of liberty is not an event that occurs every day.
Mark the date. Historians may well have cause to note it.

The Democrats
have proposed the “Restoring the Constitution Act,” although its passage
hardly appears to be a matter of great urgency to them. If they do
not view the destruction of the foundation of liberty as a genuine
emergency requiring almost instantaneous action, what would
constitute an emergency to them? Beyond this, proposing new legislation
to “fix” the original bill is precisely the wrong way to fight this
battle, as I explained in “America,
Now Without the Revolution“:
If
we genuinely seek to walk the long road back to a constitutional
republic, the Act must be repealed. It must be wiped from
the books completely. Instead, the Democrats propose to enact another
bill, “correcting” the errors in the first. Inevitably, this will
lead to endless debates, in Congress, in the courts and everywhere
else, about how the two bills should be construed in relation to
each other. These debates and confrontations will go on for years
– and all the while, the Military Commissions Act will remain
the law of the land, a law that destroys the very concept of law
in terms of what it had once meant.

You do
not “fix” evils of this kind. You obliterate them as required.
It is required here. At long last, let the Democrats understand
the nature of this battle, as I discussed it in the
earlier essay. Let them educate themselves, other members
of Congress, and the American public. Let them attempt to mobilize
Americans to demand that the Act be repealed, on a scale
and in a manner that cannot be ignored. All our political leaders
endlessly praise those who give their lives in defense of liberty,
as they should when it is true. (It is not true in Iraq.) If they
are sincere in that praise to any degree at all, can’t they fight
a legislative battle to restore the basis of liberty? They
are being asked to take up only intellectual arms. For
God’s sake, they can do it sitting down the entire time.

But,
you say, Bush will veto legislation repealing the Military Commissions
Act. I initially note that Bush is equally likely to veto any
attempt to “fix” that Act. But if the Democrats waged the necessary
campaign and enlisted a significant part of the American public
on their side, then let him. He will stand alone, revealed
as the enemy of liberty and civilization that he is.

But here is where
stupidity enters the picture. Just as the man does not grasp the operation
of the guillotine or the fact that, if he does not move, the blade
will kill him, our political class (and most writers and bloggers)
appear not to understand the profound dangers of the Military Commissions
Act because of only one fact: its full powers have not yet been
implemented. In an
earlier essay, I quoted Jacob Hornberger on this point. Hornberger
deconstructs two common objections to the statement of fact that the
Executive now possesses full dictatorial powers. With regard to the
second objection, he
writes:
“Well,
then, where are the mass round-ups, and where are the concentration
camps?”

Again,
people who ask that type of question are missing the point. The
point is not whether Bush is exercising his omnipotent, dictatorial
power to the maximum extent. It’s whether he now possesses
omnipotent, dictatorial power, power that can be exercised whenever
circumstances dictate it – for example, during another major
terrorist attack on American soil, when Americans become overly
frightened again.

I went on to note:

I’ve
made this point repeatedly over the last several years, and it is
only a measure of the remarkably primitive quality of our national
conversation that so many Americans seem incapable of grasping it.

To put
the point the other way, which will hopefully penetrate the wall
of resistance erected by so many people: the only reason you aren’t
in a concentration camp right now is because Bush hasn’t decided
to send you to one – yet. But he claims he has the power
to do so – and there are almost no voices of any prominence
to dispute the contention. What is even worse than the loss of
liberty is the fact that most Americans aren’t even aware that
the loss has occurred. If there are any national leaders who understand
these issues and have the courage to fight for our freedom here
at home, they ought to realize that the battle must be waged now.
Given the hysteria that followed 9/11 – and the hysteria
that would certainly follow another terrorist attack in the U.S.
of the same or even greater magnitude – protesting against
round-ups at that point would be entirely futile, and would come
far too late.

Hornberger’s comments
and mine on this issue were written before passage of the Military
Commissions Act. Bush had asserted these dictatorial powers earlier
and utilized them, but only very selectively. The Military Commissions
Act codified those powers, and made dictatorship and torture the law
of the land.

But to watch
the actions of our political class and to read most political writers,
none of this requires urgent action. The guillotine has no reality
for us; it will become solid only when we feel the touch of the
blade. You may be certain of one fact: when powers of this kind
are granted to political leaders, men and women prepared to use
them in full will come along sooner or later, probably sooner in
our case and almost certainly after another major terrorist attack
within our own shores. The round-ups will come, as will the concentration
camps, as will comprehensive censorship. The executions without
trial will come, as well. The torture is already here, and has been
for some time.

The second
blade is related to the first one; it could be fatal on its own,
and it would certainly be fatal in conjunction with the Military
Commissions Act. I will let one of the rare writers who grasps these
dangers consistently, whether they are proposed and supported by
Republicans or Democrats, explain it. In a new article, Jim
Bovard writes:
The
Defense Authorization Act of 2006, passed on Sept. 30, empowers
President George W. Bush to impose martial law in the event of a
terrorist u201Cincident,u201D if he or other federal officials perceive
a shortfall of “public order,” or even in response to antiwar protests
that get unruly as a result of government provocations.

It only
took a few paragraphs in a $500 billion, 591-page bill to raze
one of the most important limits on federal power. Congress passed
the Insurrection Act in 1807 to severely restrict the president's
ability to deploy the military within the United States. The Posse
Comitatus Act of 1878 tightened these restrictions, imposing a
two-year prison sentence on anyone who used the military within
the U.S. without the express permission of Congress. But there
is a loophole: Posse Comitatus is waived if the president invokes
the Insurrection Act.

Section
1076 of the Defense Authorization Act of 2006 changed the name
of the key provision in the statute book from “Insurrection Act”
to “Enforcement of the Laws to Restore Public Order Act.” The
Insurrection Act of 1807 stated that the president could deploy
troops within the United States only u201Cto suppress, in a State,
any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or
conspiracy.u201D The new law expands the list to include “natural
disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency,
terrorist attack or incident, or other condition” – and such
“condition” is not defined or limited.

These
new pretexts are even more expansive than they appear. FEMA proclaims
the equivalent of a natural disaster when bad snowstorms occur,
and Congress routinely proclaims a natural disaster (and awards
more farm subsidies) when there is a shortfall of rain in states
with upcoming elections. A terrorist “incident” could be something
as stupid as the flashing toys scattered around Boston last fall.

The new
law also empowers the president to commandeer the National Guard
of one state to send to another state for up to 365 days.

The story
of how Section 1076 became law vivifies how expanding government
power is almost always the correct answer in Washington. Some
people have claimed the provision was slipped into the bill in
the middle of the night. In reality, the administration clearly
signaled its intent and almost no one in the media or Congress
tried to stop it.

Section
1076 was supported by both conservatives and liberals. Sen. Carl
Levin (D-Mich.), the ranking Democratic member on the Senate Armed
Services Committee, co-wrote the provision along with committee
chairman Sen. John Warner (R-Va.). Sen. Ted Kennedy openly endorsed
it, and Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), then-chairman of the House
Armed Services Committee, was an avid proponent.

This
expansion of presidential prerogative illustrates how every federal
failure redounds to the benefit of leviathan. FEMA was greatly
expanded during the Clinton years for crises like the New Orleans
flood. It, along with local and state agencies, floundered. Yet
the federal belly flop on the Gulf Coast somehow anointed the
president to send in troops where he sees fit.

“Martial
law” is a euphemism for military dictatorship. When foreign democracies
are overthrown and a junta establishes martial law, Americans
usually recognize that a fundamental change has occurred. Perhaps
some conservatives believe that the only change when martial law
is declared is that people are no longer read their Miranda rights
when they are locked away. “Martial law” means obey soldiers'
commands or be shot.

Some
will consider concern about Bush or future presidents exploiting
martial law to be alarmist. This is the same reflex many people
have had to each administration proposal or power grab from the
Patriot Act in October 2001 to the president's enemy-combatant
decree in November 2001 to the setting up the Guantanamo prison
in early 2002 to the doctrine of preemptive war. The administration
has perennially denied that its new powers pose any threat even
after the evidence of abuses – illegal wiretapping, torture,
a global network of secret prisons, Iraq in ruins – becomes
overwhelming. If the administration does not hesitate to trample
the First Amendment with “free speech zones,” why expect it to
be diffident about powers that could stifle protests en masse?

Note the crucial
dynamic identified by Bovard, one I have noted on many occasions:
the government is granted massive powers “for our own good,” and to
“protect us.” An emergency arises, and the government abjectly fails
to protect us. The failure is used to argue that the problem is that
the government didn’t have enough power, so it is granted still
more expansive powers. Then the government fails again, at which point
it is given still further powers. This has been the pattern
in the United States since the late nineteenth century, as it has
been the pattern in many other countries in the past. At every step,
almost all politicians and writers cheer as the leviathan state grows,
and as individual liberty is destroyed. The number of times this pattern
can be successfully repeated depends upon how hungry for power the
political class is, and how ignorant (or stupid, if you will) the
public is. Our political class has a boundless hunger for power which
will remain unsatisfied until its power is absolute, and the American
public adamantly refuses to learn a single damned thing. Our road
to Hell is open and unobstructed.

The reaction
to the first two blades on the part of politicians and most political
writers is also the same: there is next to response at all. As Bovard
notes, the president can declare martial law because of “natural
disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency,
terrorist attack or incident, or other condition” – which
means he can declare martial law whenever he wants. Since
we have a press that primarily acts as a handmaiden to the powerful
and which, with very rare exceptions, transmits government propaganda
to a degree that effectively makes it another branch of government,
who would challenge the president’s assertion of such powers? And
we have seen the public’s ready acceptance of grievous restrictions
of freedom in the hysteria following 9/11, and that acceptance continues
today. When is the last time you heard of anyone seriously protesting
the government’s idiotic search protocols at an airport, or objecting
to any of the much more serious incursions into what had once properly
been regarded as a citizen’s zone of privacy? We have become a nation
of whining, sniveling cowards. When we are sufficiently scared,
and when the government tells us it acts only to “make us safe,”
we will do whatever we are ordered to do. If we ask any questions
at all, it will only be much later, when the liberties we have so
blithely surrendered cannot be recovered.

That the president
can declare martial law whenever he wishes, on a whim or to finally
realize his dreams of absolute power (and I know this may shock
you, but such dreams do not belong only to Republicans), causes
virtually no one to think that action to prevent such a catastrophe
must be taken – and that it must be taken now. Many
Americans don’t even know this blade is there; most of those who
do see it appear not to care at all that it exists. When the troops
appear in your city and on your street, and when some of your neighbors
and friends begin to disappear (remember the first blade), why,
then you might care, when there is nothing whatsoever to be done
about it, lest you too be spirited away in the dead of night.

The third
and fourth blades are forged in the realm of foreign affairs, but
their effects extend to the United States on the domestic front.
Stupidity puts in another appearance here. Most Americans, including
our governing class and our commentators, cannot grasp the operation
of political principles when they are confined here at home. When
connections must be made between events overseas and domestic politics,
our brains are entirely incapable of making the integrations. In
addition, our narcissism is almost perfect: when death and chaos
are visited upon peoples abroad – peoples who are almost without
exception darker than we are (or at least, darker than most of our
leaders are), poor, and largely defenseless – we barely notice.
It’s not as if Americans were being killed; even then, as
the death toll of Americans in Iraq continues to rise, we see no
reason to bring matters to a quick conclusion. As long as it’s over
there, what do we care?

Every prominent
politician, Democrat and Republican, agrees that we have the “right”
to attack Iran if Iran does not conduct itself in accordance with
our demands. The source of this “right” has never been explained,
since it cannot be explained. This is an axiomatic truth
for our governing class, and it applies to every country in the
world that cannot respond to a U.S. attack in a serious, large-scale
manner. Note Hillary
Clinton’s comments only a couple of days ago about Iran, and
our “right” to take “offensive military action.” I have explained
in some detail why an attack on Iran in the current circumstances
and in the foreseeable future would be a monstrous crime; see “Morality,
Humanity and Civilization: ‘All that remains…are memories.’”
But keep the possible consequences in mind: many thousands dead,
and millions dead if we were to use even “tactical” nuclear weapons;
spreading chaos across the Middle East and very likely beyond; possible
economic calamity, which could lead to a significant collapse of
the U.S. economy, as well as the economies of many other nations,
and on and on. The consequences would spread around the globe, and
that would be felt for decades to come.

There is still
a further result, beyond the fact that an attack on Iran would make
us the
equivalent of Nazi Germany and its attack on Poland. I discussed
it in the
second part of my “Dispatch from Germany” series, where I again
quoted
Jim Bovard:
Attacking
Iran will put American civilians in the terrorist crosshairs, with
little or no federal Kevlar to protect them. The key question is
not whether terrorists will attack but how the American people will
likely respond and how politicians could exploit the situation.

There
is no reason to expect the American people to be less docile than
they were after 9/11. The percentage of Americans who trusted
the government to do the right thing most of the time doubled
in the week after 9/11. It became fashionable to accuse critics
of Bush administration policies of being traitors or terrorist
sympathizers. …

The Bush
administration has a record of exploiting terrorist attacks to
seize nearly boundless power. After the 9/11 attacks, the Bush
administration effectively temporarily suspended habeas corpus,
railroaded the Patriot Act through Congress, authorized warrantless
domestic wiretaps, and nullified restrictions on torture by the
CIA and U.S. Military. The Bush administration now claims that
the Authorization to Use Military Force resolution passed by Congress
in September 2001 raised the president's power above the Bill
of Rights.

If there
are new terror attacks at home, how much more latent presidential
power will administration lawyers claim to discover within the
penumbra of the Constitution? How broad would the roundup of suspects
be? How many years would it be until Americans learned of how
much power the government had seized? Is there any reason to expect
that a series of attacks would not quickly result in attempts
to proclaim de facto martial law?

If Bush
does bomb Iran, the chain reaction could wreck American democracy.
The Bush administration shows no signs of developing either an
allergy to power or an addiction to truth. The American republic
cannot afford to permit a president to remain above the law and
the Constitution indefinitely. Anything that raises the odds of
a terror attack reduces the odds of reining in the government.

So you see how
the third blade, an attack on Iran, ties into the second blade, the
president’s unlimited ability to impose martial law, which ties into
the first blade, the Executive’s ability to declare anyone an enemy
of the state on any basis or no basis at all, and then to imprison
and torture them for the rest of their lives.

I have suggested
a
number of actions that might be taken in an attempt to prevent
an attack on Iran. A few people have noted that post, and some have
followed through on some of those suggestions individually. But
no one and no organization in this country is trying to motivate
a sufficient number of people to take action on the scale required.
Given the frequency with which our politicians announce that the
possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran is too great a danger
to “civilization” to be “tolerated,” most of us have to know this
blade is there. We see it, and we don’t care. The blade hangs over
our heads, and over the entire world. We will not move.

If we are
fortunate enough to make it through the remainder of Bush’s term
without a U.S. attack on Iran, it will not be because of anything
anyone has done to prevent it. No one has done anything to prevent
it. It will simply be because we were lucky. But as the remarks
from Hillary Clinton and every other leading Democrat make clear,
the danger will not pass away with Bush’s exit from the national
stage. As long as our governing class and the foreign policy establishment
remain committed to American global hegemony as our foundational
foreign policy goal (see “Dominion
Over the World“), I consider it certain that the U.S. will attack
Iran at some point, if not during this administration, then probably
during the next one.

The fourth
blade is, of course, the unending occupation of Iraq. As I explained
yesterday, it
will be unending, even if the number of American troops
is reduced to 50,000 or 70,000 in the next few years. We will be
there for decades into the future; no prominent politician, Democrat
or Republican, opposes that plan, which was the plan from the outset.
As a number of knowledgeable people predicted prior to the Iraq
invasion, Iran has been the primary victor in this imperial disaster.
The episode with the British sailors recently demonstrated, as have
any number of other incidents, that the longer we remain in Iraq,
the greater the likelihood that some incident, real or manufactured,
will lead to open conflict with Iran, and to the attack on Iran
that every leading politician seems to long for. Our ruling elites
are determined to effect “regime change” in Iran in any case, but
a border incident or one of some other kind might hasten the schedule,
and make a U.S. attack easier to “sell” to a gullible American public.

So we see
how the fourth blade connects to the third, and how all the blades
interconnect and multiply the dangers. We have already destroyed
Iraq, and we may yet destroy Iran and much of the Middle East. We
may cause an international economic collapse, or severe economic
dislocation at a minimum. We may see the final end of liberty here
at home, and the installation of a dictatorship via a declaration
of martial law.

And almost
no one speaks of the incomprehensible catastrophes that lie in wait.
Almost no one takes action to prevent even one of them. Our lives
proceed as if nothing at all unusual is transpiring in our world,
either abroad or at home. Occasionally, a few people shout warnings.
They are almost entirely ignored.

The blade
is suspended above us. With every moment that passes, the rope that
holds it back frays and weakens still more.

Death hangs
in the air.

We will not
move.

April
28, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

By the age
of eight or nine, most children realize that Santa Claus isn’t a
real person, just as they know the Easter Bunny and similar pleasantries
are only make-believe, tales of imagination offered to add a bit
of fun to the holidays. The great majority of children give up these
fantasies without experiencing emotional upheaval that remotely
approaches serious trauma. Those very rare children fortunate enough
to be raised by adults who accord them the seriousness and respect
they deserve know such stories to be ones of invention from the
beginning.

Unfortunately,
the great majority of Americans – led by a relentlessly trivial
and mendacious political class and a comparably anti-intellectual
media – never approach again the psychological achievement
of children who undergo this transition. Still more unfortunately,
most of these same children, while able to recognize fabrications
of the Santa Claus variety, become prisoners of the American
mythology that I recently discussed. Their pathetic plight is
understandable in one sense, since almost no one will disabuse them
of the lies with which they comfort themselves. Nonetheless, one
can legitimately hope and expect that upon attaining adulthood,
more individuals would be prepared to exercise even limited independent
powers of assessment. But if you have such expectations, you will
almost always be disappointed.

Thus it is
that we have repellently idiotic
episodes of the following kind:

A tempest
has been brewing today over something Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.,
said while on CBS-TV’s Late Show With David Letterman.

“Americans
are very frustrated, and they have every right to be,” about the
situation in Iraq, McCain said. “We’ve wasted a lot of our most
precious treasure, which is American lives.”

The word
“wasted” drew a sharp rebuke from the Democratic National Committee:

“Senator
McCain should apologize immediately for his comments,” Democratic
National Committee Communications Director Karen Finney said in
an e-mail to reporters. “McCain should also explain this poll-driven
change in his tune. How is it that John McCain now believes American
lives are being ‘wasted,’ yet he so stubbornly supports the President’s
plan to escalate the war in Iraq and put more American lives in
harm’s way? Clearly in looking at his sinking poll numbers, he
really will do or say just about anything to win.”

McCain’s
wording was similar to that of Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., another
presidential contender who got criticized for saying last month
that “we now have spent $400 billion and have seen over 3,000
lives of the bravest young Americans wasted.” He quickly apologized,
saying that “even as I said it, I realized I had misspoken.”

McCain has
moved to calm the waters. His staff just e-mailed a statement
from the Republican senator, acknowledging that he too agrees
he shouldn’t have used the word “wasted”:

“Last evening,
I referred to American casualties in Iraq as wasted,” McCain says.
“I should have used the word, sacrificed, as I have in the past.
No one appreciates and honors more than I do the selfless patriotism
of American servicemen and women in the Iraq War. We owe them
a debt we can never fully repay. And America's leaders owe them,
as well as the American people, our best judgment and honest appraisal
of the progress of the war, in which they continue to sacrifice.

“That does
not change the fact, however, that we have made many mistakes
in the past, and we have paid a grievous price for those mistakes
in the lives of the men and women who have died to protect our
interests in Iraq and defend the rest of us from the even greater
threat we would face if we are defeated there.”

“The selfless
patriotism” of those “who have died to protect our interests in Iraq…”

What “interests”
are those precisely, Senator? Iraq had not attacked us and did not
seriously threaten us. Both facts were known to our leaders before
the invasion of Iraq began, just as they were known by many “ordinary”
citizens, both here and abroad. This was a naked, criminal war of
aggression, now continued by means of an equally criminal occupation,
against a third-rate country that was virtually defenseless before
our onslaught. We have murdered more
than half a million innocent Iraqis, and destroyed an entire
nation. If by “interests,” McCain and the rest of our ruling class
mean the “right” of the United
States to uncontested world hegemony, then let them say so and
be damned. No other “right” or “interest” explains or “justifies”
our monstrous acts – but that one most certainly does.

Moreover,
our ongoing occupation of Iraq, which no one is prepared
to even try to end, has resulted in the fragmentation and significantly
increasing strength of a
global jihadist movement – which many experts (and non-experts)
predicted before this catastrophe began. We have created far more
enemies than we had before, and we therefore face greater dangers
now than we did four years ago. Those dangers continue to increase
every day that we remain.

Moreover,
the costs of this sickening war and occupation have burdened the
United States with a huge and growing debt to be paid off by our
children, by their children, and by their children unto infinity,
depending upon how much longer this continues. Our economy was already
grossly distorted by the ravages of the military-industrial, corporate
statist complex – and now the damages have cracked the foundation
wide open.

Moreover,
this catastrophe without end has severely damaged our nation’s military,
making us more vulnerable to actual threats we might face in the
future. And no, Mr. Bush, Senator Reid, and assorted “major
liberal bloggers,” the answer is not to enthusiastically
and very expensively create
a still “bigger military.” We already spend more on defense
than most of the rest of the world combined. Why in God’s
name should our military, in the words
of Chalmers Johnson, regularly “deploy well over half a million
soldiers, spies, technicians, teachers, dependents, and civilian
contractors in other nations” – and why should we have over
700 bases in 130 countries around the globe? There is only one reason
for insanity of this kind: we are absolutely convinced we are “entitled”
to rule the world, by military force on a scale never before seen
in all of world history. If that is what you believe, then say so
– and be damned.

The truth
is infinitely worse than that these lives have been “wasted”: these
deaths have served to strengthen our enemies and weaken our own
country in countless ways that our actual enemies could never have
achieved on their own. That these lives have been “wasted” is
the best one can say, not the worst. They are the greatest
boon our enemies could dream of. These lives have not been “wasted”:
they are the precious tribute laid at the feet of our enemies, by
our own leaders in the pursuit of indefensible and criminal
aims.

Of course,
the recognition of this truth requires that we act like adults,
and that we are capable of coherent thought, shorn of lies. We must
be willing to give up the myth of the “noble soldier” who “selflessly
sacrifices” his life for the glory of the Perfect and Good United
States – and see that these individuals died in a criminal
war of aggression launched to consolidate and expand America’s hegemonic
role, a goal embraced by almost every leading politician, Republican
and Democratic, over many decades of entirely avoidable conflict,
chaos and death.

I find it
easier to deal with the widespread ignorance that afflicts so many
Americans – for example, the almost total lack of knowledge
concerning the U.S. occupation of the Philippines
that I detailed last week. Since they are rarely provided with
this information, it is possible that at least some Americans might
prove capable of absorbing it, and begin to question the myths that
sustain their identities as “Americans.”

But it is
almost impossible to deal with the fact that so many Americans,
almost all our political leaders, and our media virtually without
exception are so relentlessly stupid, and so resolutely determined
to remain so. As this latest episode in national idiocy proves yet
again, and for the millionth time, this laughably pathetic state
of affairs certainly would appear to be the unalterable truth of
where we are.

And so we
debate whether these lives were “wasted.” With the blind ferocity
of religious maniacs, we enforce our new Puritan code, which demands
that certain prohibited thoughts may never be uttered. Violation
of this code means banishment from public life and from further
“serious” consideration. Every matter of importance is reduced to
the intellectual level of a remarkably backward house pet.

Meanwhile,
no one will stop this criminal war and occupation. And no
one will do a goddamned thing to
stop the next war, which could alter all our lives
forever.

How in the
world do most Americans face themselves each morning? Someone needs
to explain that to me. I truly would like to know.

March
3, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

From my essay,
“Understanding
the Significance of Guantanamo: The Symbol of Omnipotent Power,”
written almost two years ago, in May 2005:

And
that, in brief, is why Guantanamo is so crucial to the Bush’s administration’s
goals in its war, a war that will be never-ending if it has its
way: Guantanamo symbolizes the Bush administration’s desire for
omnipotent power – for the administration to be able
to do whatever it wants, with no oversight or interference
by anyone, including the federal judiciary and including those restraints
imposed by the Constitution itself.

In this
manner, especially when coupled with the great danger represented
by the Padilla case, the Bush administration seeks to place itself
beyond all restraint derived from any source, and to make itself
all-powerful. If it is successful, that will definitively and
absolutely spell the end of liberty in America – and the
rest is only a matter of time, and of details. In this sense,
it is entirely appropriate that Guantanamo is located where another
omnipotent dictator already holds sway.

Whether
Bush and his enablers will admit it or not, in fact the
policies they seek to implement would make the United States itself
into one gigantic Guantanamo: where any one of us can be detained
indefinitely merely upon the word or desire of one person, with
no charges ever filed against us, and where we can be abused or
tortured, and perhaps even murdered, at will. And no one and nothing
would be able to stop or even question them. That’s the future
they want so desperately – and I suggest that you always
keep it in mind and never, ever forget it.

In an act of profound,
historic cravenness and betrayal, the Congress acceded to the administration’s
desire for absolute power, with the passage of the Military Commissions
Act. As I detailed in “Thus
the World Was Lost,” the Democrats offered no serious opposition,
until it was far too late, and despite the fact that all of us had
been on notice for several years that this battle would soon arrive:

There
is no question that the Military Commissions Act, given the language
it now contains, grants – in principle – full dictatorial
powers to the executive. As I explained in the earlier essay, the
executive and certain entities it controls can designate anyone,
including any American citizen, as an “unlawful enemy combatant.”
That person can then be imprisoned for the rest of his life, with
no recourse whatsoever. Period.

The critical
point is what, in principle, the grant of power includes.
As noted, the grant is absolute: it includes everything.
As I have pointed out, the determination of the Bush administration
to achieve absolute power has been indisputably clear since shortly
after 9/11. And this is hardly the first time that I and others
have noted that the mechanisms for a complete dictatorship have
now been put in place.

With proper
preparation, and with the requisite understanding that freedom
itself was imperiled, the Democrats could have achieved these
aims. All of us would be forever in their debt. Surely liberty
itself is worth such a battle, isn’t it? But the Democrats did
none of these things, so the bill passed. Thus, they share in
the guilt and responsibility. The guilt and responsibility that
accrues to the Democrats is not as great as that of the Republicans,
but it is surely great enough. And when your freedom, and that
of your family and friends, and that of every single one of us,
is destroyed in this manner, how do you even go about measuring
degrees of guilt? How do you say this failure is worse
than that one? The bill passed. They all failed,
Republicans and Democrats alike. In principle, torture was enshrined
and liberty was destroyed.

Some argue
that the Supreme Court will find the act, or at least certain
key provisions, unconstitutional. That, too, is a hope, but I
myself am far from certain that the Court will rule in such a
manner. In any event, we do not know what the ultimate outcome
will be as far as the judicial system is concerned.

So we are
confronted with one stark certainty, opposed by fragile and uncertain
future hopes. We know the Military Commissions Act destroys
liberty at its very foundation. We do not know if this fatal injury
will ever be ameliorated. The Act should have been stalled at
the very least. It was not.

Destroying
the very basis of liberty is not an event that occurs every day.
Mark the date. Historians may well have cause to note it.

A brief word to
those who think the “Restoring
the Constitution Act” is an effective means of combatting the
immense evil represented by the Military Commissions Act. When I first
read about this proposed legislation, I thought it was an important
step in the right direction. After considering it further, I have
concluded this is precisely the wrong way to fight this battle.

Let me repeat:
the Military Commissions Act destroys the ultimate foundation of
liberty, and it transforms the great evil of torture into
a State-sanctioned means for treating those designated as
enemies of the State by the executive and those who do his bidding,
on any basis they choose or on no basis at all. (On the second point
and in connection with the hell on earth to which such a government
sanction can lead in time, see my series On
Torture, and especially Part
I.) The Act is an abomination in its totality, and in every
detail.

If we genuinely
seek to walk the long road back to a constitutional republic, the
Act must be repealed. It must be wiped from the books completely.
Instead, the Democrats propose to enact another bill, “correcting”
the errors in the first. Inevitably, this will lead to endless debates,
in Congress, in the courts and everywhere else, about how the two
bills should be construed in relation to each other. These debates
and confrontations will go on for years – and all the while,
the Military Commissions Act will remain the law of the land, a
law that destroys the very concept of law in terms of what it had
once meant.

You do not
“fix” evils of this kind. You obliterate them as required. It is
required here. At long last, let the Democrats understand the nature
of this battle, as I discussed it in the
earlier essay. Let them educate themselves, other members of
Congress, and the American public. Let them attempt to mobilize
Americans to demand that the Act be repealed, on a scale
and in a manner that cannot be ignored. All our political leaders
endlessly praise those who give their lives in defense of liberty,
as they should when it is true. (It is not true in Iraq.) If they
are sincere in that praise to any degree at all, can’t they fight
a legislative battle to restore the basis of liberty? They
are being asked to take up only intellectual arms. For God’s
sake, they can do it sitting down the entire time.

But, you say,
Bush will veto legislation repealing the Military Commissions Act.
I initially note that Bush is equally likely to veto any attempt
to “fix” that Act. But if the Democrats waged the necessary campaign
and enlisted a significant part of the American public on their
side, then let him. He will stand alone, revealed as the
enemy of liberty and civilization that he is. To my knowledge, Bush
has demonstrated no courage on any issue at all in the full course
of his life. Since he and his cabal are after absolute power and
do not have much time remaining to achieve their goal, I suppose
he might surprise us all and reveal a ruthless determination, devoid
of conscience and decency, in the pursuit of a dictator’s powers.
Given the ends he seeks, “courage” is a word that grants far too
much dignity and humanity to such tenacity. It is the dogmatic obstinacy
of an authoritarian; it is the stubbornness of a rabid, homicidal
dog, that wants to make absolutely certain its prey is dead. Here,
the prey is your liberty, and mine, and that of every single one
of us.

Repeal the
Military Commissions Act. Wipe the evil out of existence. I also
note, realizing this argument very rarely applies in politics, that
it is the right thing to do – constitutionally, legally,
and morally. And the world will know that some Americans still give
a damn about what’s right. Moreover, as Chris
Floyd notes, there is an important strategic purpose as well:
“Bush will doubtless veto any move to tamper with his beloved MCA,
but at least the ‘will of the Congress’ argument in favor of gulags
and tyranny will no longer apply when the case finally reaches the
Supreme Court.”

That may be
crucial, especially in
light of this news:
Detainees
being held at the prison camp at Guantnamo Bay, Cuba, have lost
their bid for access to US courts to challenge their open-ended
detention in the war on terror.

In an important
ruling announced Tuesday, a divided federal appeals court panel
here dismissed cases filed by 63 detainees raising fundamental
legal challenges to various aspects of the Bush administration’s
approach to the war.

The ruling
applies to every pending or future case — in effect closing all
but a few doors to the courthouse for those being held at Guantanamo.

“Federal
courts have no jurisdiction in these cases,” the appeals court
declared.

The ruling
is expected to be quickly appealed — perhaps to the full US Circuit
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia — or directly to
the US Supreme Court.

At the center
of the appeals case was the assertion that the newly enacted Military
Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA) was an unconstitutional suspension
of the writ of habeas corpus. Lawyers for the detainees argued
that their clients enjoyed a constitutional right to challenge
their open-ended detention before a neutral judge. If the Bush
administration’s position prevailed, they said, it would mean
that terror suspects at Guantanamo could be tossed into a legal
black hole.

Two of the
three appeals-court judges disagreed. They ruled that Congress
did not violate constitutional protections when it passed the
MCA. The law was approved in part to overturn last summer’s decision
by the Supreme Court in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, which overturned the
military commission process proposed by the administration. Congress
later passed the MCA.

“Everyone
who has followed the interaction between Congress and the Supreme
Court knows full well that one of the primary purposes of the
MCA was to overrule Hamdan. Everyone, that is, except the detainees,”
writes Judge Raymond Randolph in an opinion joined by Judge David
Sentelle.

Judge Randolph
says the detainee arguments are “creative but not cogent.” He
adds, “To accept them would be to defy the will of Congress.”

About 400
detainees are currently held at Guantanamo. According to MSNBC.com,
110 are labeled ready for release. Among the others, only several
dozen are likely to face trial before special organized military
commissions. For those remaining, there appears to be no end in
sight to their detention.

Writing
for the panel, Judge Randolph said that Congress could not have
been clearer about its intent when it passed the Military Commission
Act. The law says the repeal of habeas jurisdiction in Guantanamo
cases applies in all cases without exception. “It is almost as
if the proponents of these words were slamming their fists on
the table shouting, “When we say ‘all,’ we mean all — without
exception!”

Note carefully
where we are: a judge defends absolute authoritarian rule, and embraces
naked evil – and he cloaks and seeks to disinfect it with allegedly
neutral, dispassionate “legal argument” and theory. History has seen
this phenomenon many times before; the twentieth century saw it repeatedly.
Those parallels should disabuse you of the pathetic notion that this
battle is anything like one over tax policy or Social Security, or
that it can be fought in the same manner.

The Democrats
(and a few Republicans) have the opportunity to fight for liberty
once again. It is a considerable miracle that they, and we, even
have another chance of this kind. Let us see what they do with it.
History will long remember the final outcome of this struggle –
and history is not forgiving. “Good intentions” count for nothing.
Let them act.

And we must
let them know, in no uncertain terms, what liberty and honor now
demand of them.

February
23, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

By means of
a surpassingly enjoyable
and informative post, I am reluctantly dragged to the latest
paean to mass
extermination from Max Boot. My reluctance was extreme: I screamed
all the way, while every single fingernail was slowly pulled out
by the roots as I vainly tried to slow my progress. If he knows
of this suffering, Boot’s satisfaction must be immense.

Near the beginning
of his post mortem (if only, sez I, at least so far as Boot’s
public pronouncements are concerned), Justin writes:
Boot
is a neoconservative who writes a regular column for the Los
Angeles Times, which is odd because you would think that after
the predictions of their violence laden theories have spectacularly
failed to hold up in their real world experiments, any self identified
neocon would be driven deep underground by the rest of us, forced
to transmit their insanity through pirate radio waves on old equipment
purchased from the now defunct Sandinista Radio Venceremos.
It only gets better.
Read the
entire entry. It’s akin to eating sinfully delicious chocolate.
I gained at least three pounds.

Justin covers
all the major points in admirable fashion. I want to amplify on
one aspect of Boot’s ravings. I suppose I could offer a Shorter
Max Boot:
Yes,
I truly am this much of a monster. And I still get published!
People continue to listen to me! Joke’s on you – and on all
those rotten little brown people! Hahahaha!!
This is what I
want to note, toward the beginning of Boot’s excretion:
In
formulating the right strategy, there is no better guide than a
slim 1964 volume, “Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice.”
Its author was a French officer named David Galula, who saw service
not only in World War II but in postwar China, Greece, Hong Kong
and Algeria. If there is a Clausewitz of counterinsurgency, Galula
is it.

Although
much has changed in recent decades, most of his admonitions still
apply, which is why so many are echoed in the new Army-Marine
counterinsurgency field manual. U.S. forces have gotten better
at this demanding type of warfare in Iraq, but even now they’re
still falling short, often through no fault of their own, in carrying
out many of Galula’s key precepts:

“Which
side gives the best protection, which one threatens the most,
which one is most likely to win, these are the criteria governing
the population’s stand. … Political, social, economic and
other reforms, however much they ought to be wanted and popular,
are inoperative when offered while the insurgent still controls
the population.”

“Which one
threatens the most…” This directly returns us to John Kerry
(“we haven’t gotten tough enough” in Iraq) and a U.S. military commander
who I doubt is at all unusual:
Let
me repeat the only fundamental point that matters here: we have
no right to be in Iraq in the first place. Since we have no
right to be there at all, by what damnable “right” are we entitled
to get “tougher” with the Iraqis? Endless violence, instantaneous
death or dismemberment, the inability to live any kind of normal
existence, and the destruction of an entire country are the “gifts”
we have brought to Iraq. And now we’re going to get “tougher”?
To call this sickening does not even begin to capture the degree
of immorality and dishonesty involved.

Kerry’s
approach [in his
NYT op-ed article] thus veers perilously and disgustingly
close to the American military commander who said toward the end
of 2003: “You have to understand the Arab mind. … The only thing
they understand is force u2014 force, pride and saving face.”

This is the unapologetic
and sickening racism that has been one of the foundational blocks
of our foreign
policy “missions of improvement” for over a century. (See another
essay for further examples: The
American Myth, Continued: Conquest and Murder for God and Civilization.)
When you strip away all the supposedly noble-sounding phrases and
all the ultimately meaningless slogans, almost every member of our
political class and the entire U.S. foreign policy establishment holds
identical beliefs. Their propaganda of “making the world safe for
democracy” and bringing “liberation” to oppressed peoples works with
an American public that is unrelievedly ignorant, stupid and self-satisfied
– but it predictably and justifiably fails to convince those
peoples upon whom we have visited destruction, chaos and death.

And please
note that Galula served in Algeria. That tells you all you need
to know. In the event you may have forgotten one key lesson from
Algeria, I refer you to Part
IV of my series, On
Torture. Here’s the relevant passage:
The
second part of [Darius] Rejali’s article deals with the Battle
of Algiers, an example often cited to support the use of torture.
However, as Rejali writes, the real lesson lies in the other direction:

The
real significance of the Battle of Algiers, however, is the startling
justification of torture by a democratic state. Algerian archives
are now open, and many French torturers wrote their autobiographies
in the 1990s. The story they tell will not comfort generals who
tell self-serving stories of torture’s success. In fact, the battle
shows the devastating consequences of torture for any democracy
foolish enough to institutionalize it.
Part II of the
article contains the details of the prohibitively high costs of
any government sanction of torture. Moreover, as Rejali also explains,
France won the Battle of Algiers “primarily through force, not by
superior intelligence gathered through torture.”
See Rejali’s article
for many more details. This is the model Boot believes the United
States should follow. If it is true that many of Galula’s “admonitions”
are incorporated into the “new Army-Marine counterinsurgency field
manual,” it appears we are doing precisely that. As if our crimes
were not already sufficiently staggering and incomprehensible in their
magnitude, I think our leaders may yet implement this monstrous advice
completely and fully, in their desperation for “victory,” and in their
determination to avoid “losing face.”

This is the
moment we’ve reached: many of us, including those who seek to influence
our government’s actions and who continue to have an alarming degree
of success, are monsters. They acknowledge it openly (see
Krauthammer for another example), and they maintain becoming
monsters is “necessary” for the success of our “noble” efforts.
That such monsters continue to be regularly published in major U.S.
newspapers is a national degradation that will not be ameliorated
for decades, even if we were to reverse course tomorrow. The views
of people like Boot and Krauthammer are considered a legitimate
part of our “respectable” national discourse.

In the absence
of the kind of massive public protest and civil disobedience I mentioned
at the conclusion
of an essay yesterday, I do not expect this to change. I think
our government has traveled beyond the point of no return.

If one studies
history and the arc that is typical of great civilizations of the
past, I think it is unarguable that the high point of American influence
in the world has already passed. The new powers rise in the East
and, within several decades at the most, they will put the United
States in the shadow. Given what we now stand for, I view that prospect
as a largely positive one. Your children and grandchildren will
not experience anything close to the kinds of lives many of us enjoy
today – but, contrary to what the majority of Americans appear
to believe, the quality of our lives is not guaranteed to us in
perpetuity regardless of our actions, and in defiance of the barbarity
that we now unthinkingly accept. It’s worse than that: we commit
crimes on a huge scale, and we still maintain that we are
uniquely “exceptional” and virtuous in world history, and that nothing
we do can be fundamentally, unforgivably wrong.

If a critical
number of Americans do not protest in ways that finally cause our
government to take notice and alter its course, it’s over. This
is why I repeat once again: now, it’s up to the rest of us.

February
10, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

To provide
the necessary context for what follows, I must offer a brief excerpt
from the
first part of this series:

History
provides us with stories of individual heroism from which we draw
courage. We wonder: why did Hans and Sophie Scholl fight
against the immense evil of the Nazi regime, even when they
knew their actions would very likely lead to their deaths, as they
did in fact? In our own time, we wonder: why does Ehren
Watada refuse to participate in acts that he regards as evil,
even when he knows the penalty for his refusal may be exceptionally
severe? From what source does he derive his strength, and why is
he willing to pay such a terrible price? As I noted in an
earlier part of the series, On
Torture:
But
above all else, there is one fact that appears forever invisible
to both Krauthammer and Sullivan, and one kind of individual who
does not exist for them.

When the
order comes down to treat a prisoner with unspeakable cruelty,
to “waterboard” him, to electrocute him, to cut him, to hang
him on hooks from the ceiling for days on end, or to commit
any number of other unforgivable crimes, there is always the
man or woman who will say – without bravado, without show,
without explicitly staking any particular moral claim, but as
a simple, unadorned statement of fact:
No.
I will not do this. You can torture me, or say you will
kill me. I cannot and will not do this to another human being.
I will not do this.

No.

It is the person
who says, “No,” whom we must seek to understand. It is not melodramatic
or engaging in overstatement to say that he or she is our salvation.
Ehren Watada is
one of those rare heroes who has said, “No” – and he is prepared
to go to jail for four years for his refusal.

Norman Solomon
writes about
Lt. Watada’s court-martial, which just began:
The
people running the Iraq war are eager to make an example of Ehren
Watada. They’ve convened a kangaroo court-martial. But the man on
trial is setting a profound example of conscience – helping
to undermine the war that the Pentagon’s top officials are so eager
to protect.

“The judge
in the case against the first U.S. officer court-martialed for
refusing to ship out for Iraq barred several experts in international
and constitutional law from testifying Monday about the legality
of the war,” the Associated Press reported.

While the
judge was hopping through the military’s hoops at Fort Lewis in
Washington state, an outpouring of support for Watada at the gates
reflected just how broad and deep the opposition to this war has
become. …

Many of
the most compelling voices against the Iraq war come from the
men and women who were ordered into a conflagration that should
never have begun. …

In direct
resistance to the depravity of the Bush administration as it escalates
this war, Lieutenant Watada is taking a clear and uplifting position.
Citing international law and the U.S. Constitution, he points
out that the Iraq war is “manifestly illegal.” And he adds: “As
the order to take part in an illegal act is ultimately unlawful
as well, I must as an officer of honor and integrity refuse that
order. It is my duty not to follow unlawful orders and not to
participate in things I find morally reprehensible.”

Watada says:
“My participation would make me party to war crimes.”

Outside
the fence at Fort Lewis – while the grim farce of Watada’s
court-martial proceeded with virtually all substance ruled out
of order – the criminality of the war and the pain it has
brought were heavy in the air.

Darrell
Anderson was a U.S. soldier in Iraq. He received a Purple Heart.
Later, he refused orders to return for a second tour of duty.
Now, he gives firsthand accounts of the routine killing of Iraqi
civilians. He speaks as an eyewitness and a participant in a war
that is one long war crime. And he makes a convincing case that
“the GI resistance” is emerging and pivotal: “You can’t call yourself
antiwar if you’re not supporting the resistance.” …

Soldiers
have to choose from options forced upon them by the commander
in chief and Congress. Those who resist this war deserve our gratitude
and our support. And our willingness to resist as well.

Ehren Watada
faces four years in prison. Half of that potential sentence has
to do with the fact that he made public statements against the
war. The war-makers want such honest courage to stop. But it is
growing every day.

As I noted in
“To
Change the World,” which in part recounts the story of the very
beginnings of the anti-slavery movement in the late eighteenth century,
every significant change has begun with only a handful of individuals.
They are the ones who lead the way and who take a stand when very
few will join them, and not infrequently even when they are entirely
alone. They possess courage of a kind most of us will never know.
As Lt. Watada makes clear, they act as they do for one very simple
and profound reason: their consciences, and their refusal to make
accommodations with what they regard as immensely wrong and even evil,
will not permit them to do otherwise.

Later on,
when the changes for which they gave so much begin to be seen, many
people will be heard to say that those early pioneers were correct
from the beginning, and that all decent people acknowledged the
rightness of their cause. But the ones who are willing to put their
own lives on the line when it matters most and when opposition is
at its strongest are always very, very few in number.

As Solomon
says and as I have indicated, we owe these solitary people our profound
gratitude and our support. And, if we truly think these lonely heroes
are right, we ourselves must resist as well.

Most Americans
and, with only a few exceptions, our entire political class will
not acknowledge the primacy of the principles that move Lt. Watada.
Because Iraq had not attacked us and because Iraq was not a serious
threat to the United States, our invasion and occupation constitute
a
war crime on a huge scale. Our actions have been and continue
to be entirely immoral. For these and related reasons, the United
States deserves
to lose.

Every day
that we remain in Iraq, we continue to commit unspeakable war crimes.
Our media inform us of only a few of the worst instances, those
that cannot be covered up and denied. But because we are fighting
a war of unprovoked aggression, our crimes are much worse than this
– and they began at the
very outset of the invasion:
No
moral principle legitimizes our invasion and occupation of Iraq,
just as it will not justify an attack on Iran. Therefore, when the
first person was killed in Iraq as the result of our actions, the
immorality was complete. The crime had been committed, and no amends
could ever suffice or would even be possible. That many additional
tens or hundreds of thousands of people have subsequently been killed
or injured does not add to the original immorality with regard to
first principles. It increases its scope, which is an additional
and terrible horror – but the principle is not altered in the
smallest degree.
As Lt. Watada
recognizes, you cannot stop evil by compromising or making accommodations
with it. If you genuinely understand the issues and if you care, you
must say, “No.” You must refuse all further participation. If not
enough of us will do this, the horrors will continue for years to
come, and probably for decades.

The Democrats
now control Congress. As Russ
Feingold explains here, they could stop the ongoing criminal
catastrophe in Iraq within months. Feingold writes:
As
the hearing I chaired in the Senate Judiciary Committee made clear,
this legislation is fully consistent with the Constitution of the
United States. Since the president is adamant about pursuing his
failed policies in Iraq, Congress has the duty to stand up and use
its constitutional power to stop him. If Congress doesn't stop this
war, it's not because it doesn't have the power. It's because it
doesn't have the will.
Congress almost
certainly won’t have the will, and for the worst of reasons: most
of them are pathetic cowards. They’re terrified they will be accused
of failing “to support the troops.” They are so inept and unintelligent
that they have no confidence they can refute the charge, which is
easy enough to do (Feingold explains how). These are the people who
govern us, and who make decisions that involve the deaths of hundreds
of thousands of people. If they fail to take action to stop an attack
on Iran, they will possibly be responsible for
the deaths of millions.

When Congress
approves Bush’s request for hundreds
of billions of dollars more to pay for this ongoing crime, these
horrors will fully belong to the Democrats, as well as to the Republicans.
I have no doubt that the Democrats will tinker loudly around the
edges, and demand “oversight” of how certain of the funds are spent.
But they will not stop it. They’ve said as much: “Democratic
leaders have promised not to cut off funding for the troops.” They
should pay much closer attention to Feingold, and try to understand
his argument with their few remaining brain cells.

They can
stop it. They won’t. These are the greatest stakes in the world,
and the lives of countless innocent people lie in the balance. In
such a situation, you are either with the resistance – or you
are with the murderers.

Those in Congress
who will not even try to stop these horrors are with the murderers.
In terms of the principles and the moral responsibility involved,
they are the murderers. This is your government.

I think only
continuing, massive public protest and civil disobedience will stop
this nightmare, and the greater nightmare that may soon be upon
us. Our government will do nothing to end them.

Now, it’s
up to the rest of us.

P.S. I realize
that, in its form, my title appears to come dangerously close to
the dishonestly false choice offered in such iniquitous phrases
as Bush’s, “You’re either with us or against us.” But Bush’s approach
… represented an entirely specious choice: he meant that either
you agreed with and embraced his approach to fighting the purposely
indefinable “War on Terror” in each and every particular, or that
you were “on the other side” – that is, on the side of the
terrorists. But that, of course, is not the choice, and it
never was. One can recognize that the United States has genuine
enemies who must be fought and even eliminated as necessary, and
one can simultaneously understand that waging war against entire
nations is not the way to most effectively achieve that goal.
When one adds to this the fact that Iraq had no ties to either 9/11
or Al Qaeda, the nature of our unprovoked, non-defensive war of
aggression against Iraq becomes clearer.

Having said
that, certain realities in life sometimes limit our choices very
severely. Our government now continues to conduct an illegal and
immoral war every day. Each new day brings new murders committed
by U.S. forces. And make no mistake: they are murders, in
very large part of innocent people who never threatened us and who
would not threaten us now were we not in Iraq in the first place,
and in Iraq illegally and immorally. In this circumstance,
there are only two alternatives: you can either support a continuing
criminal war and ongoing murder, or you can oppose and work to stop
them in every way possible. In that sense, as discussed above, you
are either with the resistance or with the murderers. To
be precise, there is one other possibility: you can remain on the
sidelines and refuse to take a stand at all. I would hope no one
reading this considers that to be a legitimate alternative, although
it appears to be the alternative chosen by Congress. With rare exceptions
like Feingold and Kucinich, they speak against the war –
but they will not take action to stop it, even though such
action clearly is possible. At a minimum, they are obliged to at
least try to stop this ongoing criminal enterprise –
if, that is, they care at all about innocent life.

In certain
ways, not taking a stand is the worst and most contemptible choice
of all. It is precisely how evil triumphs in the world. For another
example of how these dynamics work, see my essay, “Thus
the World Was Lost,” and in particular, the excerpts from Milton
Mayer’s, They
Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933–45, that
I offer there.

February
9, 2007

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.

DIGG THIS

I find it almost
impossible to write another post about our nauseatingly immoral
invasion and occupation of Iraq. I’ve made my views clear, and offered
numerous reasons for my conclusions. See, for example, “No
Way Out – But Out,” “A
Genuine Mission Impossible,” and “Get
Out Now: Just Do It.” And “The
Missing Moral Center: Murdering the Innocent” concerns the moral
dimension that almost every pundit, and the vast majority of Americans,
adamantly refuse to acknowledge to this day.

I offer the
following comments about the Symposium
of Wise People offered by The New Republic only as an
exercise in what perhaps should be called the sociology of the banality
of evil. These are the Wise People who make murderous catastrophes
of this kind possible. Even at this late date, they are incapable
of acknowledging and admitting what they have done. For some additional
commentary on this TNR collection of abominables, see Spencer
Ackerman here
and here,
and IOZ.

I want to
make a few observations about Peter Beinart’s piece, since Beinart
is one of the so-called “opinion leaders” endlessly encouraging
the Democrats to adopt a more “muscular” foreign policy. One might
be pardoned for having thought that the Democrats hardly needed
encouragement on this point: from World War I (from which sprang
the
endless train of horrors that still consumes us today), through
Korea, Vietnam,
and Clinton’s beloved, “humanitarian” bombing campaigns and
their attendant lies, the Democrats have never been shy about
murdering people who don’t threaten us. Today, we have a number
of prominent Democrats who are more hawkish about Iran than even
Bush can credibly be at the moment (including Hillary
“Bomb ‘Em Yesterday, aka Torture” Clinton). I still think it
almost certain that Bush will find his warmongering groove in the
next year, and Bombs Over Iran will shortly follow. No national
Democrat will oppose him, not in any way that matters or deters
him. Ah, but Beinart isn’t concerned with the facts or the reality
of the matter, you see. Oh, no: he is concerned, as are all such
Establishment types, with how Democrats are perceived. Too
many people think of the Democrats as “weak,” and that needs fixing.
For a discussion of some of Beinart’s deeper analytic inadequacies
and dishonesties, see this
earlier piece.

Beinart was,
of course, a major booster of the invasion of Iraq. Let us be precise:
Beinart strongly urged the invasion of a country that had not attacked
us, and that did not threaten us. This is the advocacy of illegitimate,
immoral, and illegal aggressive war. Let us always remember the
exact nature of the crime involved.

But now Beinart’s
heart breaks:
I
can’t even imagine Iraq anymore. It exceeds my capacity to visualize
horror. In a recent interview with The Washington Post’s
Anthony Shadid, a woman named Fatima put it this way: “One-third
of us are dying, one-third of us are fleeing, and one-third of us
will be widows.” At the Baghdad morgue, they distinguish Shia from
Sunnis because the former are beheaded and the latter are killed
with power drills. Moqtada Al Sadr has actually grown afraid of
his own men. I came of age believing the United States had a
mission to stop such evil. And now, not only isn’t the United States
stopping it – in some important sense, we are its cause.
No, Beinart: not
“in some important sense.” The United States government and
its military are the cause – in every “important
sense.” And the U.S. government was aided and abetted by Beinart and
his fellow warmongers. But the collective “we” is critical to Beinart’s
purposes, since he is determined to avoid accountability at every
turn. That “we” carries profound meaning. As Hannah
Arendt observes: “[W]here all are guilty, no one is.” The
“we” washes Beinart clean of sin, or so he hopes.

See if you
can follow the ludicrous desperation of Beinart’s argument. He moves
from this statement: “In a particularly cruel twist, the events
of recent months have demolished the best arguments both for staying
and for leaving” – to this one: “Today, the honest arguments
for staying or leaving are simply that we can’t do the opposite.”
This irrefutable chain of logic leads to his recommendation:
At
this late date, the United States has only one card left to play
in Iraq: the threat to leave immediately. Except for Sadr, virtually
no one in Iraq’s political class wants that to happen. We must wield
that threat as dramatically as possible, and, if Iraq’s leaders
don’t respond, leave as fast as we humanly can.
This is surpassingly,
stupendously stupid. I discussed the ridiculousness of this idea just
last week: if we threaten to leave – and if we convince the Iraqis
that we really, really, really mean it – a miracle will
occur. No,
it won’t – and neither Beinart nor anyone else can
provide even the smallest piece of evidence to make the possibility
of the required miracle believable to any degree at all.

Beinart appears
to have become confused about where and when his hero FDR employed
the various tactics that Beinart so admires. Beinart is still wedded
to his “carrot” that will enable the miracle: “a temporary troop
increase and a dramatically larger, World Bank-overseen
development effort.” If you should think he doesn’t mean this,
Beinart spells out these details should the Iraqis bow to our demands:

If
the Iraqis really strike a constitutional deal that the prominent
leaders in all three major communities publicly support, the United
States must try to make it stick. That would mean temporarily sending
more troops to secure key Baghdad neighborhoods and then flooding
those neighborhoods with public-works programs that put young Sunni
and Shia men to work.
Now, I could be
wrong about this, and I’m sure someone will tell me if I am. But I
don’t think FDR used TVA-like projects in Germany and Japan while
World War II was still raging across the world. No, I’m certain
he didn’t. If
Beinart’s views weren’t so repugnant and literally insane, I might
give him a point or two for creativity. A New Deal for Iraq! Well,
I suppose “creative” is one word for it.

Beinart and
all hawks of similar inclination refuse to give up the idea that
“we meant well,” just as he refuses to surrender the myth that American
willpower can still make this work, even at this late date.
As I’ve discussed in detail, one of Beinart’s fundamental problems
is not that “[he] can’t even imagine Iraq anymore.” His problem
is that the reality of Iraq never was clear to him. Iraq,
its own history, peoples, cultures and aspirations never
assumed solid shape before his eyes, so Beinart, just like those
driving the Bush administration’s foreign policy, deluded himself
that we could shape Iraq in our own image. The presumptuousness,
arrogance and colonialist condescension of this view cannot be allowed
into Beinart’s consciousness.

Given his
still unshakable basic beliefs, to say that Beinart’s concluding
paragraph is inadequate and unsatisfactory hardly captures the nature
of the errors involved:
“Were
not those right who held that it was self-contradictory to try to
further the permanent ideals of peace by recourse to war?” wrote
John Dewey in The New Republic in 1919, confessing his despondency
at the outcome of World War I. Yes, they were right then, and they
are right now. War can be necessary, but, in the decade between
the liberation of Kuwait and the liberation of Kabul, it became
the repository for too many of our hopes for a better world. Now
that we have seen the liberation and destruction of Baghdad, it
won’t be again for a long, long time.
Beinart still
insists that his advocacy of non-defensive war was a “repository”
for “our hopes for a better world.” He still refuses to admit that
he “hoped” to bring about “a better world” by “travel[ing] long
distances in order to kill foreigners,” in Jim
Henley’s entirely accurate phrase. [I should add that Beinart's
mention of Dewey's "despondency at the outcome of World War I" carries
especially heavy irony – since The New Republic was a
particularly influential force in dragging the United States into
World War I, especially through the writings of Herbert Croly. I discussed
that history in the
second half of this essay.]

People with
views like Beinart’s will never acknowledge the
true nature of their mistake. Given even less than half a chance,
they will do it all again. So take this warning: whenever any of
these unreconstructed hawks again announce their abiding love of
war, and be assured they will, condemn them, ridicule them and,
most of all, ignore them. They will lie, as they always do,
and tell you, for example, that a nuclear Iran is “unacceptable”
and “intolerable” – even though any threat an Iran with nuclear
weapons might represent still lies years in the future, and
even then, it would be capable of being contained and deterred.

Beinart and
his fellow warlovers are filled with regret now, only because the
devastation and horror are so immense they cannot be denied. But
most Americans have an attention span measured in months and, in
the very best case, perhaps a year. Moreover, the horrors of Iraq
still have no reality for most Americans, least of all with regard
to how those horrors affect Iraqis. To the extent they are
aware of them at all, that awareness will fade quickly enough.

And then the
stage will be set for the next war, and Beinart and his crowd will
propagandize for it once more. For pity’s sake, don’t let them get
away with it again. Remember, and I mean this literally: they will
be getting away with murder.

Just as they
did this time, and as they do every time.

November
29, 2006

Arthur
Silber’s [send him mail]
blog is Once Upon
a Time, where he writes about political and cultural issues.
He has also written a number of essays based on the work of psychologist
and author Alice Miller, concerning the implications of her work
with regard to world events today. Descriptions of those articles
will be found at a companion blog, The
Sacred Moment. Silber worked as an actor in the New York theater
many years ago. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in the late 1970s,
he worked in the film industry for several years. After pursuing
what ultimately proved to be an unsatisfying business career, he
decided to turn to writing full-time, a profession which he happily
pursues today.