FUKUSHIMA--A GLOBAL DISASTER--MAKES FEAR OF NUCLEAR JUSTIFIED
Recently I have seen an upsurge of an attitude about nuclear ionizing radiation which I might call “the “don't worry it’s harmless” school of thought. Such ideas, to my chagrin, are often expressed by my family dentist and the local orthopedic surgeon. I excuse their opinions, knowing they are colored by the fact that they prefer to have their patients think that their use of X rays (and a good part of how they make their comfortable incomes) incurs no danger to their patients. Their statements are in general valid...though more powerful ionizing radiation used in other protocols of medicine (i.e. MRIs) have been thoroughly criticized. But the media and practitioners of public opinion-control who have deep-rooted stakes in the viability and continued profitability of nuclear power are those with whom I have a real problem. Recently, some have argued, like my dentist, that radiation exposure should not be so frightening. For one example of such opinion pieces which look at radiation exposure through rose-colored glasses...(and may help get stories and books published by trade organizations) you may read:“Fear vs. Radiation: The Mismatch” by David Ropeik, NYT Opinion.
The blossoming of pieces such as those by Mr. Ropeik, who claims to be a risk analyst, is perhaps the natural outgrowth of the disaster that nuclear power has proved itself to be in the last two years as we all gaze on the slowly deteriorating conditions at Fukushima crippled since 11 March 2011. The Level 7 nuclear “event” (7 is the highest) in Japan is the second nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in little more than a quarter century. It is Fukushima which makes liars our of the nuclear advocates who attempt to paint nuclear as American as apple pie and as safe! After Chernobyl, and now Fukushima, world opinion now seriously questions the safety of this “most dangerous way to boil water” and to look more critically at all those sooth sayers in the nuclear industry who had profits rather than safety on their minds. Particularly devastating for the “its safe” crowd has been the disaster at Fukushima, occurring in a nation which prides itself on meticulousness, care and caution. If the methodical Japanese can't keep a lid on nuclear, how can we expect the Russians, Americans, or even French to do it any better. But the fear is not simply the result of the number of radiation deaths (a number difficult to pin down since effects take a long time to show up), which are admittedly...so far...few. The real fear is and should be of the long term contamination of wide swaths of countryside, the possibility of widely dispersed diluted amounts of biologically active nuclides being concentrated by the marine food chain, the direct contamination of water, soils, and food, the displacement of entire communities, the loss of agricultural areas to long term (virtually permanent)nuclear contamination, and finally not to mention the monstrous and debilitating costs. Risk analyst such as Mr. Ropeik make that analyis. What we do know is that Fukushima will eventually take four decades to clean up and cost unknown billions. After Chernobyl and now Fukushima the wisdom of this form of electrical generation is now more likely to be questioned. More and more thoughtful and knowledgeable leaders now consider nuclear to be too dangerous, unpredictable, and ultimately ruinously expensive. Now Germany (!), the financial and industrial powerhouse of Europe has decided to bring and end to its reliance on nuclear. Events such as this must make the powerful nuclear industry and their investors and political supporters shake in their boots and direct them to mount their campaigns of disinformation...an attempted “clean up” of their own.
So let's take a bit of review regarding the history of the earlier disaster at Chernobyl, since the Fukusihma event is difficult to evaluate since its story is still unfolding and the unpalatable and frightening facts are still “leaking out” from TEPCO like the highly contaminated water carrying dangerous Cesium 137 which is slowly leaking into the formerly pristine Pacific Ocean.
On April 26, 1986 the Chernobyl Plant at Pripyat in east Central Europe, in what is now the Ukraine,was the site of a massive nuclear accident which caused an explosion and fire that released a huge cloud of radioactive dust which dispersed and settled over a vast area of the Ukraine. Global winds carried nuclear dust west which settled over all of Europe, except for Spain and Portugal. (Even today some parts of northern Scotland still have readily detectable levels of radioactivity in their soils and in the foods produced on them. In Germany hunters can not eat the boars they kill in the forests because the meat of these beasts is too radioactive.)
The world first became aware of the Chernobyl accident two days after the explosion when workers in a Swedish nuclear power plant in Forsmark,(nearly 700 miles away from Chernobyl) were found to have radioactive dust on their clothes. Swedish nuclear regulatory investigators attempting to find the "leak" at Forsmark were finally led to conclude the nuclear materials were coming from a far off site--in the Ukraine.
In attempting to control the disaster at Chernobyl many workers heroically exposed themselves to fatal doses of radioactivity. In the end it took the efforts of some half a million workers and cost 18 billion Russian rubles (today $600 million dollars) to temporarily staunch the leak of radioactivity and stabilize the shattered Chernobyl plant. To accomplish this the plant was covered over with tons of concrete and then an outer concrete shield was built over the entire plant. But over the years, the outer shield has decayed and cracked and is now subject to collapse---and a possible repeat of the leaks and spread of nuclear contamination. As a consequence, the Ukraine is presently building on the site an even more massive (20,000 ton) arched concrete “sarcophagus” which is being built on rails next to the plant and will when completed (at a cost of some 1.5 billion Euros) be slid over the existing plant on rails to cover and protect the plant for some future date, when the process will no doubt have to be repeated to prevent further harmful leakage.
As a result of the 1986 accident a vast area of the highly productive agricultural lands of the Ukraine were so badly contaminated by radioactive dust that they had to be permanently evacuated and their farms, homes and businesses abandoned for (20,000 years) virtually forever. Russian and Ukraine officials cleared an area within a radius of about 19 miles from the plant as too contaminated with radioactive materials for human life. This zone covering nearly 1,100 square miles is known as the “zone of alienation" and is nearly the size of the US State of Rhode Island. After more than a quarter century it remains uninhabited. The untended farms, fields and meadows have have reverted to forests where wildlife such as wolves and moose now wander. Officials estimate that the land will not be safe for human habitation for 20,000 years!
Can we all afford to put at risk of permanent contamination an area the size of the State of Rhode Island around each of our many nuclear plants? Would the aftermath of a massive nuclear accident result in multiple zones “of alienation” for twenty millennia? Imagine the effects on our metropolitan areas (some of which like New York are virtually ringed with old nuclear plants similar to those at Fukushima). As humans we are supposed to be able to learn from our mistakes. Chernobyl was enough to have most of us realize nuclear power was a big mistake. One mistake was enough for some of us. But now after Fukushima, if we do not change our ways and turn to better, less expensive, systems less prone to accidents which become global disasters----in a word safer ways to generate electricity--such as solar panels, wind, renewables, geothermal, tidal, etcetera, etcetera, after this second global disaster Fukushima, if we do nothing we are just plain dumb!
Get the picture?
rjk
Friday, November 8, 2013
Monday, October 28, 2013
TIME FOR GEN. KEITH ALEXANDER TO GO!
Recent revelations regarding the excesses of the NSA and its gratuitous spying on our own allies, such as tapping German chancellor Angela Merkel's personal cell phone, proves Snowden was right! (What could we have learned about global terrorists from that phone tap? ) The NSA under Gen. Alexander ( the man who began his career hoovering up war data in US-occupied Iraq, who carried those very same procedures and polices home to the USA , and one who it has been recently revealed spent tens of millions of tax dollars creating a goldfinger-like Star Wars fantasy "spy command center" at NSA headquarters in Washington) is obviously out of control. Let's bring that young man Snowden back from Russia and award him with a whistleblower's medal.
We are a great nation, which on one level leads the world because of our immense wealth, and military power. But on another, our world stature comes from our moral authority and the trust other nations have in our system of justice and the adherence of our leaders to legal standards. That trust is also derived from our our past behaviors in which we worked to foster a world in which all nations including the USA exists within a frame work of mutually acceptable laws. We are at our core a nation of laws...our own and those we have help foster internationally. Too often in recent decades, since 9-11 and the Bush-Cheney debacle, we have become the world's law breaker, engaging in illegal invasions, occupations, wars, torture, renditions, extrajudicial assassinations, and setting up off-shore gulags, like Guantanamo....in short a "do what we say and not what we do" nation---all to our own detriment and to the detriment of our businesses and to that of the world as a whole.
It's time for President Obama, who is down deep a decent, intelligent man and a leader who respects the law, to rise up and assert his authority. Firing General Alexander might be a good first bold step. That should be followed by retreating from the undeserved attempts at arresting and punishing Mr. Snowden, without whom all of this mess would still be festering under the national carpet.
We are a great nation, which on one level leads the world because of our immense wealth, and military power. But on another, our world stature comes from our moral authority and the trust other nations have in our system of justice and the adherence of our leaders to legal standards. That trust is also derived from our our past behaviors in which we worked to foster a world in which all nations including the USA exists within a frame work of mutually acceptable laws. We are at our core a nation of laws...our own and those we have help foster internationally. Too often in recent decades, since 9-11 and the Bush-Cheney debacle, we have become the world's law breaker, engaging in illegal invasions, occupations, wars, torture, renditions, extrajudicial assassinations, and setting up off-shore gulags, like Guantanamo....in short a "do what we say and not what we do" nation---all to our own detriment and to the detriment of our businesses and to that of the world as a whole.
It's time for President Obama, who is down deep a decent, intelligent man and a leader who respects the law, to rise up and assert his authority. Firing General Alexander might be a good first bold step. That should be followed by retreating from the undeserved attempts at arresting and punishing Mr. Snowden, without whom all of this mess would still be festering under the national carpet.
Thursday, October 24, 2013
CIA DOUBLE TAP DRONE STRIKES ARE WAR CRIMES
CIA "Double Tap" Drone Strikes Indicate President Obama Misleads American Public On His Drone Strategy.
In his May 23 2013 address at the Defense University on drone warfare the President assured the American public that his use of armed unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) was legal and that his government has taken scrupulous care to avoid civilians casualties. But past studies by Stamford and New York Universities and more recently a study by Amnesty International (See my previous blog) indicate he mislead the public. The tactics used by the CIA, and apparently supported by Mr. Obama, are designed not to simply kill insurgents "allied with Al Qaeda" as he claims, but to terrorize entire civilian populations which may harbor these extremists. That is a war crime and one reason why he can not come clean with the American public.
The earlier studies and more recent ones document that about one-third of all casualties are innocent civilians. That does not seem to square with the President's description of "precision, surgical strikes". So there is more here than meets the casual eye. What that "more" is has been touched upon by both the Stamford study and the recent Amnesty International report which document the prevalence of what are termed "double tap" strikes which intentionally target first responders and civilians. Such a tactic is a war crime....no question.
The use of "double tap" strikes suggest that the actual purpose and intent of the drone campaign is not simply "neutralizing" bad guys but to cow and terrorize the civilians who may tend to support the militant insurgency. Apparently that is OK with the President as long as it remains a secret....but if it comes out in the open ( as at present) he and all those who are complicit in this campaign are potentially subject to war crimes charges. In these attacks, a first strike by a drone hellfire missile is followed a few minutes later by a second ( or even a third missile) which kills near by residents, or relatives who had responded to help the wounded, or find elderly or children buried in the rubble. Often police, doctors and other first responders are killed in this manner. The "double tap" strike is of course a heinous war crime, designed not to surgically kill the bad guys..but to sow terror and are no different than the car or truck bomb used by the other side. (see: "Outrage at CIA's deadly double tap drone attacks", in "The Independent", by Jerome Taylor, 25 September, 2012)
The attempt to use terror by invading armies, and others to quell insurgency is as old as the hills. From Julius Caesar in Gaul , the Nazis in occupied France, to Lt Calley in Mai Lai, Vietnam, and now Obama in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Libya, and elsewhere, when fighting a native insurgency the military (and sometimes their civilian leaders) believe they are in a battle for "the minds and hearts" of the natives. To win that battle they seek to terrorize the locals and so deny the insurgents (Gauls, Free French partisans, Viet Cong, Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc. ) sustenance and safe harbor. Obama's drone strikes in Pakistan are DESIGNED to kill indiscriminately so as to elicit terror. It explains why the civilian deaths are so high...one third of the total. Drones are a form of terrorism as brutal and inhumane as the car bombs the other side uses. The President's claim that the strikes are "surgical" and designed to "neutralize" our enemies with limited civilian casualties is a perversion of the truth. The revelation about "double tap" drone strikes is a shattering revelation which exposes the drone warfare strategy as a terrorist attacks similar to those used by less sophisticated car and satchel bombers. The second series of bombs from the drone takes out women and children, and innocent bystanders who in any normal society rush to the aid of the stricken. That is what our CIA is doing on a regular basis in Pakistan---killing, maiming and terrorizing whole villages all civilians---grandmothers! parents! children! Think about it...and oppose this horror and perversion of American values-- or become one with with the jack booted perpetrators of Oradour-sur-Glane.
Get the picture?
rjk
In his May 23 2013 address at the Defense University on drone warfare the President assured the American public that his use of armed unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) was legal and that his government has taken scrupulous care to avoid civilians casualties. But past studies by Stamford and New York Universities and more recently a study by Amnesty International (See my previous blog) indicate he mislead the public. The tactics used by the CIA, and apparently supported by Mr. Obama, are designed not to simply kill insurgents "allied with Al Qaeda" as he claims, but to terrorize entire civilian populations which may harbor these extremists. That is a war crime and one reason why he can not come clean with the American public.
The earlier studies and more recent ones document that about one-third of all casualties are innocent civilians. That does not seem to square with the President's description of "precision, surgical strikes". So there is more here than meets the casual eye. What that "more" is has been touched upon by both the Stamford study and the recent Amnesty International report which document the prevalence of what are termed "double tap" strikes which intentionally target first responders and civilians. Such a tactic is a war crime....no question.
The use of "double tap" strikes suggest that the actual purpose and intent of the drone campaign is not simply "neutralizing" bad guys but to cow and terrorize the civilians who may tend to support the militant insurgency. Apparently that is OK with the President as long as it remains a secret....but if it comes out in the open ( as at present) he and all those who are complicit in this campaign are potentially subject to war crimes charges. In these attacks, a first strike by a drone hellfire missile is followed a few minutes later by a second ( or even a third missile) which kills near by residents, or relatives who had responded to help the wounded, or find elderly or children buried in the rubble. Often police, doctors and other first responders are killed in this manner. The "double tap" strike is of course a heinous war crime, designed not to surgically kill the bad guys..but to sow terror and are no different than the car or truck bomb used by the other side. (see: "Outrage at CIA's deadly double tap drone attacks", in "The Independent", by Jerome Taylor, 25 September, 2012)
The attempt to use terror by invading armies, and others to quell insurgency is as old as the hills. From Julius Caesar in Gaul , the Nazis in occupied France, to Lt Calley in Mai Lai, Vietnam, and now Obama in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Libya, and elsewhere, when fighting a native insurgency the military (and sometimes their civilian leaders) believe they are in a battle for "the minds and hearts" of the natives. To win that battle they seek to terrorize the locals and so deny the insurgents (Gauls, Free French partisans, Viet Cong, Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc. ) sustenance and safe harbor. Obama's drone strikes in Pakistan are DESIGNED to kill indiscriminately so as to elicit terror. It explains why the civilian deaths are so high...one third of the total. Drones are a form of terrorism as brutal and inhumane as the car bombs the other side uses. The President's claim that the strikes are "surgical" and designed to "neutralize" our enemies with limited civilian casualties is a perversion of the truth. The revelation about "double tap" drone strikes is a shattering revelation which exposes the drone warfare strategy as a terrorist attacks similar to those used by less sophisticated car and satchel bombers. The second series of bombs from the drone takes out women and children, and innocent bystanders who in any normal society rush to the aid of the stricken. That is what our CIA is doing on a regular basis in Pakistan---killing, maiming and terrorizing whole villages all civilians---grandmothers! parents! children! Think about it...and oppose this horror and perversion of American values-- or become one with with the jack booted perpetrators of Oradour-sur-Glane.
Get the picture?
rjk
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
CIA TARGETS AFGHAN GRANDMOTHER AND 18 CIVILIAN LABORERS--INSISTS THEY ARE TERRORISTS
CIA drone kills Afghan grandmother and 18 civilian laborers in drone attacks--yet claims they target only terrorists and kill no civilians.
“In his May 23, 2013 speech on drone policy delivered at the National Defense University, in Washington the Presidentried to assure the American public about his drone warfare by stating that outside of Afghanistan, which is a legitimate theater of war, the US targets "only al Qaeda and its associated forces”. At that time he also claimed he is “bound by state sovereignty" and also must "act (only) against terrorists who pose an imminent threat to the American people”. Furthermore, he stated, before any strike there must be “near certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured." The President's press secretary recently stated (October 22), flatly that “targeted lethal action (drone strikes) are necessary, are legal, and only kill terrorists.” Though he did not elaborate how he defined a terrorist.
Some ugly facts about OBAMA's drone warfare campaign the president does not know or did not acknowledge:
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism based in London states that the US, under President Obama’s direction, has carried out 376 drone strikes in Pakistan since 2004. The estimated death toll from media reports indicate more than 3,000 fatalities, of which approximately one-third, or approximately one-thousand (1000) were innocent civilians. Thus, under Obama, approximately one-in-three victims of drone attacks are non-combatants mostly the elderly, women, young boys and small children. How can the President be so wrong?
Several times before, (see my previous blogs) I have railed against the America’s use of drones and drone warfare. This secret method of killing our so called enemies is mostly carried out in those distant parts of the world where few reporters can go, where the terrain is daunting, natives are poor, and speak incomprehensible dialects, and where custom dictates that they bury their dead within a few hours of an attack, leaving no evidence. Since these drone attacks are covert acts over which our own government has drawn a heavy veil of secrecy, the attacks are well-hidden and ignored by Congress and to a large degree our citizenry. In those previous blogs I was often reporting simply on what I read in the press, knowing full well the difficulties of sorting out the facts from these remote places. I weighed accounts from US government representatives: “We didn't do it!, or "The deceased were all heavily armed militant males ready to kill American troops.” Only to find out later that these accounts were untenable based on the known circumstances,ages of the victims, or conditions of the attack. But I persisted in comparing US accounts with those from Reuters, NY Times, Washington Post, Le Monde, Al Jazzeera or other main-line sources which often presented a different view. Frequently, the accounts conflicted wildly. (Well they did in the beginning, but all too often new evidences emerged which undermined the account of the US government.) The shroud of secrecy of our government, the remote and impenetrable nature of the terrain and lack of reporting from the actual site made it difficult to pin down facts. But a recent piece by Katherine Houreld in Reuters (Islamabad, October 22, 2013) makes clear in some cases who the culprits are.
t Katharine Houreld's piece in Reuters is not based on hear-say or second-hand reporting, but on a formal investigative study by Amnesty International using creditable researchers who visited the actual attack sites. The investigators focused on two specific drone attacks in North Waziristan, part of Pakistan's remote, native territories situated along the border with Afghanistan and one of the most frequently hit by drone-attacks in the world.
Amnesty International (AI) a London-based, non-profit, human rights organization founded in 1966, conducted more than sixty interviews of the Waziristan native population using teams of researchers, translators and others, working independently of each other. They recovered physical data, photographs and other facts-on-the ground to support their findings concerning the nature of the strikes, those killed, and the ages, sex and occupations of the victims, as well as the circumstances of the attack, such as the time of day and weather.
The teams focused on only two of many attacks which had taken place in that area. Ms. Houreld's piece states:
”London-based Amnesty said a drone strike in the village of Ghundi Kala in October 2012 killed Mamana Bibi, 68, the wife of a retired school principal, as she was gathering vegetables. Her five grandchildren were wounded, including Safdar, 3, who fell off a roof and broke bones in his chest and shoulders. It was unclear why Bibi was hit. The weather was clear, providing good visibility to drone operators, the report said. In the second incident, 18 men were killed in the village of Zowi Sidgi in July 2012. Residents described the dead as a woodcutter, vegetable seller and miners who had gathered in the shade at dusk to talk after a day's work. The youngest was 14. The first drone strike killed at least eight people in all, the report said. The second one killed more locals as they were trying to rescue the wounded. "Everyone in the hut was cut to pieces," Amnesty quoted one witness as saying. "We started to panic and each person was trying to run in a different direction." According to the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism, drones often also target rescuers coming to help those injured in an initial strike." Their findings clearly indicate that the US government spokesmen, the President, and his spokesmen and others are not telling the truth. Perhaps now, as with the NSA revelations, the President and the nation will have to face the ugly truth concerning how we conduct our secret, inhumane, costly, counter productive and wildly expensive wars.
“In his May 23, 2013 speech on drone policy delivered at the National Defense University, in Washington the Presidentried to assure the American public about his drone warfare by stating that outside of Afghanistan, which is a legitimate theater of war, the US targets "only al Qaeda and its associated forces”. At that time he also claimed he is “bound by state sovereignty" and also must "act (only) against terrorists who pose an imminent threat to the American people”. Furthermore, he stated, before any strike there must be “near certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured." The President's press secretary recently stated (October 22), flatly that “targeted lethal action (drone strikes) are necessary, are legal, and only kill terrorists.” Though he did not elaborate how he defined a terrorist.
Some ugly facts about OBAMA's drone warfare campaign the president does not know or did not acknowledge:
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism based in London states that the US, under President Obama’s direction, has carried out 376 drone strikes in Pakistan since 2004. The estimated death toll from media reports indicate more than 3,000 fatalities, of which approximately one-third, or approximately one-thousand (1000) were innocent civilians. Thus, under Obama, approximately one-in-three victims of drone attacks are non-combatants mostly the elderly, women, young boys and small children. How can the President be so wrong?
Several times before, (see my previous blogs) I have railed against the America’s use of drones and drone warfare. This secret method of killing our so called enemies is mostly carried out in those distant parts of the world where few reporters can go, where the terrain is daunting, natives are poor, and speak incomprehensible dialects, and where custom dictates that they bury their dead within a few hours of an attack, leaving no evidence. Since these drone attacks are covert acts over which our own government has drawn a heavy veil of secrecy, the attacks are well-hidden and ignored by Congress and to a large degree our citizenry. In those previous blogs I was often reporting simply on what I read in the press, knowing full well the difficulties of sorting out the facts from these remote places. I weighed accounts from US government representatives: “We didn't do it!, or "The deceased were all heavily armed militant males ready to kill American troops.” Only to find out later that these accounts were untenable based on the known circumstances,ages of the victims, or conditions of the attack. But I persisted in comparing US accounts with those from Reuters, NY Times, Washington Post, Le Monde, Al Jazzeera or other main-line sources which often presented a different view. Frequently, the accounts conflicted wildly. (Well they did in the beginning, but all too often new evidences emerged which undermined the account of the US government.) The shroud of secrecy of our government, the remote and impenetrable nature of the terrain and lack of reporting from the actual site made it difficult to pin down facts. But a recent piece by Katherine Houreld in Reuters (Islamabad, October 22, 2013) makes clear in some cases who the culprits are.
t Katharine Houreld's piece in Reuters is not based on hear-say or second-hand reporting, but on a formal investigative study by Amnesty International using creditable researchers who visited the actual attack sites. The investigators focused on two specific drone attacks in North Waziristan, part of Pakistan's remote, native territories situated along the border with Afghanistan and one of the most frequently hit by drone-attacks in the world.
Amnesty International (AI) a London-based, non-profit, human rights organization founded in 1966, conducted more than sixty interviews of the Waziristan native population using teams of researchers, translators and others, working independently of each other. They recovered physical data, photographs and other facts-on-the ground to support their findings concerning the nature of the strikes, those killed, and the ages, sex and occupations of the victims, as well as the circumstances of the attack, such as the time of day and weather.
The teams focused on only two of many attacks which had taken place in that area. Ms. Houreld's piece states:
”London-based Amnesty said a drone strike in the village of Ghundi Kala in October 2012 killed Mamana Bibi, 68, the wife of a retired school principal, as she was gathering vegetables. Her five grandchildren were wounded, including Safdar, 3, who fell off a roof and broke bones in his chest and shoulders. It was unclear why Bibi was hit. The weather was clear, providing good visibility to drone operators, the report said. In the second incident, 18 men were killed in the village of Zowi Sidgi in July 2012. Residents described the dead as a woodcutter, vegetable seller and miners who had gathered in the shade at dusk to talk after a day's work. The youngest was 14. The first drone strike killed at least eight people in all, the report said. The second one killed more locals as they were trying to rescue the wounded. "Everyone in the hut was cut to pieces," Amnesty quoted one witness as saying. "We started to panic and each person was trying to run in a different direction." According to the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism, drones often also target rescuers coming to help those injured in an initial strike." Their findings clearly indicate that the US government spokesmen, the President, and his spokesmen and others are not telling the truth. Perhaps now, as with the NSA revelations, the President and the nation will have to face the ugly truth concerning how we conduct our secret, inhumane, costly, counter productive and wildly expensive wars.
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
ON CRAP COFFEE, VERMONT MANURE AND UNEQUAL WEALTH IN USA
The Wealthy Rather Spend Their Money On Crap Coffee Than Pay More In Taxes
"Above all things good policy is to be used so that the treasures and monies in a state be not gathered into a few hands... Money is like fertilizer, not good except it be spread about." Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
That good advice has been ignored for four decades by the USA, the modern, western nation with the highest level of wealth and income inequality. (Turkey, Mexico and Chile, the world leaders in this unsavory category have higher levels of wealth inequality than we do.) American "exceptionalism" is often explained as a result of our freedom, economic opportunity and equality. But today we discover that those commendable national values have been compromised in the last three or four decades by the concentration of wealth into the hands of a very few. The USA has one of the lowest rates of upward mobility, stagnant middle and working class incomes, and we suffer from a situation in which the top 20% of the the population control more than 85% of the nation's wealth and income. That level of wealth disparity is found only in South America (such as in Mexico and Chile) and other tin-pot dictatorships where the "Jefe" and his family and friends control all the wealth.
Back to the USA. Do the math. Our wealth distribution leaves the lower 80% of the population with only 15% of the nation's wealth and income. Like cow manure on a Vermont dairy farm where help is scarce, the smelly stuff is sometimes piled high in the cow enclosure. It remains concentrated where it was dropped and is not being spread onto the fields where it would green the grass, nurture the cows, and bring higher income to the farmer. In Vermont, such circumstances lead to rotting piles of manure, bad smells, flies, contaminated domestic water wells, and pollution seeping into local streams. In the economic realm, it leads inequality, weak demand, long recessions, and a slow decline of national vigor.
In the US economy, where enormous wealth is concentrated in the upper one tenth of one percent, "weak demand" is almost universally blamed as the major cause of our present long and deep recession (the 2007 Great Recession). When 85 % of the nation'a wealth and income is confined to the upper 20%, the vast majority of our citizens in the bottom 80% must struggle to make do with only 15% of the nation's wealth-income pie. They do not have enough money in hand to make purchases which would boost demand. That is bad for the general economy. To make matters worse, the affluent use their wealth to lobby the government for reductions in their taxes and restrictions on government spending, policies which inhibit the government’s ability help alleviate the plight of the struggling middle class by putting money in the hands of those who would spend it and increase demand. Given our political system, the wealthy are often successful in this goal, creating the vicious cycle of lower taxes on the upper level earners, increased wealth disparity, low demand, poor business profits, high unemployment, and shrinking incomes for the lower four fifths of the wealth distribution---resulting in even less demand.
Francis Bacon put his finger on the problem way back in 16th Century. The spending habits and cash-use patterns of the super affluent do not “fertilize” the broader economy. These people do not buy automobiles, washing machines, local dairy products or local homes. Their numbers are few and their ability to spread their wealth by spending is limited, but more importantly they spend their money in ways that do not nurture wealth and job generation for the vast majority of Americans. Their money remains in one place, like a pile of Vermont cow manure, and if it is not spread on the fields it begins to stink.
One example of the disfunction caused by concentration of wealth is the explosion of weird, bizarre and exotic foods, drinks and accoutrements sold in upscale stores and on the world markets for the super affluent. These lucky folks, often the "nouveau riche", are determined to possess and display exotica to establish and proclaim their wealth status. One of the more bizarre examples of this kind of spending is the world's most expensive coffee--Terra Nero coffee, which sells in London’s Harrods for about £6500 ($10,400) and is said to come packed in 24 karat gold-foil bags.
Terra Nero is a form of crap coffee. In Indonesia's coffee-growing regions, local coffee-berry pickers discovered perhaps a decade ago that the the wild Indonesian civet cat, or Asian Palm Civet, made night visits to the coffee plantations where the pickers labored. In the morning, the workers found the evidences of civit depredations in the form of ripe berries stripped from the coffee branches, and on the ground, the tell-tale scat (excrement) of the Palm Civit. The scats or civit stools were studded with the evidence of what the civit ate: the indigestible part of the coffee berry--coffee beans. (The Palm Civet is a relatively rare, small, omnivorous mammal, about the size of a house cat. They are widely distributed in Africa and throughout southeast Asia. In the wild, they inhabit the ecological niche of the raccoon or opossum of North America.)
Perhaps one of the coffee-berry pickers was desperate for some partly-dried coffee beans and collected the scats, separated out the berries and roasted them, then brewed a quick cup of coffee. He found the flavor of the brew "distinctive”. The cause of this flavor may result from the fact that the Palm Civet is known to have a powerful defense mechanism in the form of a perineal (anal) scent gland which exudes a smelly substance during defecation which may flavor the beans. Or perhaps the simple passage of the beans,through the digestive tract of this critter, where the beans come into intimate contact with other civit foods, such as over-ripe fruits, partially-chewed-up insects, and small mammal remains all typically found within the alimentary tract of a nocturnal omnivore. But for whatever reason, the coffee pickers just loved the crappy stuff, calling it "kopi luwak" and avidly collecting it to savor the “distinctive” aroma of the beans and the "wild" taste of the coffee brewed from them. As you might expect, collecting civet poo from under brambles and thick brush on a steep Indonesian hillside might be quite messy and difficult. Also Palm Civits are not that common and thus their cat poo is also quite rare. The old economic adage concerning demand versus supply makes Asian Palm Civet crap and the beans found within the stools very valuable. Since only some 500 kilograms (or about 1000 lbs) are collected each year from selected major coffee plantations, the cost of the beans may reach $400 dollars a kilogram or about $200 dollars per pound.
As with other exotica, like North American black bear gall-bladders, shark fins, rhino horns, and elephant tusks, once the product becomes established as a status symbol, a market will develop for it among the super wealthy. This jacks up the price and tends to draw in entrepreneurs who attempt to streamline production and increase output and profits. At the present time, it is virtually impossible to find “wild” kopi luwak on the market. Chinese and Indonesian businessmen have largely taken over production. They have eliminated the coffee bean pickers, and wasteful time-consuming searching on steep hillsides. Many kopi luwak crap coffee producers generate their beans by force-feeding caged Palm Civets, or other other unrelated critters, collecting the feces from below their confining cages and generating a agro-business version of kopi luwak crap coffee.
Each year the wealthy buy up the last gold-foil wrapped kilogram of crap coffee, however disgusting it sounds or weird it tastes. They much prefer to spend their money on crap coffee than on slightly higher taxes. They don't buy products that generate jobs in the real economy like those from the local corner store, or the local factory. But for the rest of us it is wise to remember Francis Bacon's warning that keeping the fertilizer in the cow corral is not good for our economy. It tends to produce useless, ecologically questionable stuff like “crap coffee” and to increase the wealth gap, and prolong our deep, dreary economic recessions.
Get the picture?
k rjk
"Above all things good policy is to be used so that the treasures and monies in a state be not gathered into a few hands... Money is like fertilizer, not good except it be spread about." Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
That good advice has been ignored for four decades by the USA, the modern, western nation with the highest level of wealth and income inequality. (Turkey, Mexico and Chile, the world leaders in this unsavory category have higher levels of wealth inequality than we do.) American "exceptionalism" is often explained as a result of our freedom, economic opportunity and equality. But today we discover that those commendable national values have been compromised in the last three or four decades by the concentration of wealth into the hands of a very few. The USA has one of the lowest rates of upward mobility, stagnant middle and working class incomes, and we suffer from a situation in which the top 20% of the the population control more than 85% of the nation's wealth and income. That level of wealth disparity is found only in South America (such as in Mexico and Chile) and other tin-pot dictatorships where the "Jefe" and his family and friends control all the wealth.
Back to the USA. Do the math. Our wealth distribution leaves the lower 80% of the population with only 15% of the nation's wealth and income. Like cow manure on a Vermont dairy farm where help is scarce, the smelly stuff is sometimes piled high in the cow enclosure. It remains concentrated where it was dropped and is not being spread onto the fields where it would green the grass, nurture the cows, and bring higher income to the farmer. In Vermont, such circumstances lead to rotting piles of manure, bad smells, flies, contaminated domestic water wells, and pollution seeping into local streams. In the economic realm, it leads inequality, weak demand, long recessions, and a slow decline of national vigor.
In the US economy, where enormous wealth is concentrated in the upper one tenth of one percent, "weak demand" is almost universally blamed as the major cause of our present long and deep recession (the 2007 Great Recession). When 85 % of the nation'a wealth and income is confined to the upper 20%, the vast majority of our citizens in the bottom 80% must struggle to make do with only 15% of the nation's wealth-income pie. They do not have enough money in hand to make purchases which would boost demand. That is bad for the general economy. To make matters worse, the affluent use their wealth to lobby the government for reductions in their taxes and restrictions on government spending, policies which inhibit the government’s ability help alleviate the plight of the struggling middle class by putting money in the hands of those who would spend it and increase demand. Given our political system, the wealthy are often successful in this goal, creating the vicious cycle of lower taxes on the upper level earners, increased wealth disparity, low demand, poor business profits, high unemployment, and shrinking incomes for the lower four fifths of the wealth distribution---resulting in even less demand.
Francis Bacon put his finger on the problem way back in 16th Century. The spending habits and cash-use patterns of the super affluent do not “fertilize” the broader economy. These people do not buy automobiles, washing machines, local dairy products or local homes. Their numbers are few and their ability to spread their wealth by spending is limited, but more importantly they spend their money in ways that do not nurture wealth and job generation for the vast majority of Americans. Their money remains in one place, like a pile of Vermont cow manure, and if it is not spread on the fields it begins to stink.
One example of the disfunction caused by concentration of wealth is the explosion of weird, bizarre and exotic foods, drinks and accoutrements sold in upscale stores and on the world markets for the super affluent. These lucky folks, often the "nouveau riche", are determined to possess and display exotica to establish and proclaim their wealth status. One of the more bizarre examples of this kind of spending is the world's most expensive coffee--Terra Nero coffee, which sells in London’s Harrods for about £6500 ($10,400) and is said to come packed in 24 karat gold-foil bags.
Terra Nero is a form of crap coffee. In Indonesia's coffee-growing regions, local coffee-berry pickers discovered perhaps a decade ago that the the wild Indonesian civet cat, or Asian Palm Civet, made night visits to the coffee plantations where the pickers labored. In the morning, the workers found the evidences of civit depredations in the form of ripe berries stripped from the coffee branches, and on the ground, the tell-tale scat (excrement) of the Palm Civit. The scats or civit stools were studded with the evidence of what the civit ate: the indigestible part of the coffee berry--coffee beans. (The Palm Civet is a relatively rare, small, omnivorous mammal, about the size of a house cat. They are widely distributed in Africa and throughout southeast Asia. In the wild, they inhabit the ecological niche of the raccoon or opossum of North America.)
Perhaps one of the coffee-berry pickers was desperate for some partly-dried coffee beans and collected the scats, separated out the berries and roasted them, then brewed a quick cup of coffee. He found the flavor of the brew "distinctive”. The cause of this flavor may result from the fact that the Palm Civet is known to have a powerful defense mechanism in the form of a perineal (anal) scent gland which exudes a smelly substance during defecation which may flavor the beans. Or perhaps the simple passage of the beans,through the digestive tract of this critter, where the beans come into intimate contact with other civit foods, such as over-ripe fruits, partially-chewed-up insects, and small mammal remains all typically found within the alimentary tract of a nocturnal omnivore. But for whatever reason, the coffee pickers just loved the crappy stuff, calling it "kopi luwak" and avidly collecting it to savor the “distinctive” aroma of the beans and the "wild" taste of the coffee brewed from them. As you might expect, collecting civet poo from under brambles and thick brush on a steep Indonesian hillside might be quite messy and difficult. Also Palm Civits are not that common and thus their cat poo is also quite rare. The old economic adage concerning demand versus supply makes Asian Palm Civet crap and the beans found within the stools very valuable. Since only some 500 kilograms (or about 1000 lbs) are collected each year from selected major coffee plantations, the cost of the beans may reach $400 dollars a kilogram or about $200 dollars per pound.
As with other exotica, like North American black bear gall-bladders, shark fins, rhino horns, and elephant tusks, once the product becomes established as a status symbol, a market will develop for it among the super wealthy. This jacks up the price and tends to draw in entrepreneurs who attempt to streamline production and increase output and profits. At the present time, it is virtually impossible to find “wild” kopi luwak on the market. Chinese and Indonesian businessmen have largely taken over production. They have eliminated the coffee bean pickers, and wasteful time-consuming searching on steep hillsides. Many kopi luwak crap coffee producers generate their beans by force-feeding caged Palm Civets, or other other unrelated critters, collecting the feces from below their confining cages and generating a agro-business version of kopi luwak crap coffee.
Each year the wealthy buy up the last gold-foil wrapped kilogram of crap coffee, however disgusting it sounds or weird it tastes. They much prefer to spend their money on crap coffee than on slightly higher taxes. They don't buy products that generate jobs in the real economy like those from the local corner store, or the local factory. But for the rest of us it is wise to remember Francis Bacon's warning that keeping the fertilizer in the cow corral is not good for our economy. It tends to produce useless, ecologically questionable stuff like “crap coffee” and to increase the wealth gap, and prolong our deep, dreary economic recessions.
Get the picture?
k rjk
Saturday, September 14, 2013
NSA SHARES RAW DATA WITH ISRAEL, MAKES MOCKERY OF FOURTH AMENDMENT
I know our National Security Agency (NSA) is out there snooping on our emails, texts, phone calls and so forth. I don't like it. Government spying on its own citizens seems truly un-American to me. This is supposed to be the "land of the free" where our persons, houses, and papers are protected from government seizure. That includes our phone calls, emails and text messages as well. That is what makes us "exceptional".
But like most of us, I can be persuaded that with safeguards to do the right thing--the American men and women of the NSA will follow the rules and protect our rights. They come from the same culture, speak the same language and understand our laws and ways of expressing ourselves. So as Americans too, we would expect that they would diligently protect (most of the time) our Fourth Amendment Rights. (Recall that one? Amendment IV: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures...etc.) But after reading the latest Ed Snowden leak, I am not so certain, we can claim that as one of our exceptional rights as Americans.
Recent revelations of formal Israeli and US documents leaked by Edward Snowden and published in the LA Times September 13, 2013(www.latimes.com/.../la-fg-wn-nsa-intelligence-israel-edward-snow)in a piece by by Ken Dilanian, reveal that the National Security Agency---our own NSA---routinely shares “raw” intelligence data (emails, phone calls, electronic data, phone call content, names, etc., etc.) with Israel. Israel is an ally, but has a long history of going it alone, of illegal, extra-juridical assassinations, and of intensive spying efforts on the USA. I am not comfortable with some Israeli "techie"going over MY personal data, my phone calls, my emails. There is an historic, political, cultural and language divide between us and much greater chance that information can be misconstrued and misunderstood----and misused. Such raw data can certainly include sensitive information about Americans. Information which could be perverted by some foreign power. Such a policy makes a mockery of our Constitutional protections. It is very, very disturbing.
The leaked formal US documents indicate that Israel is "required to respect" the Fourth Amendment rights of any American's data "hoovered" in by the NSA and then without perusal passed on to the Israelis. But the formal document of understanding includes no actual sanctions or punishment if the foreign power fails to follow those rules. (It gives the impression that the the phrase "required to respect the American Fourth Amendment" is only a "wink wink" nudge nudge" pro forma inclusion in the boiler plate which means nothing and has no teeth.) Furthermore, the agreement permits the Israelis to hold on to the data for "a year" again with no oversight or controls, and there are no controls on what the Israelis do with the data, or who THEY can share it with. There is no way to logically explain such a breech of our own personal rights and security as this "handover" of NSA raw data to Israel. It must be addressed and changed.
What has, in effect, happened here is that the NSA, under President Obama, has handed over the protection of our Fourth American Constitutional rights to a foreign power with the NSA data. This is a astounding infringement on our rights of privacy from government intrusion...by our own government in collusion with a foreign power. That is a serious breach of the President's responsibility to protect our Constitution and our rights as Americans. How can President Obama, our Constitutional-law professor in the White House know about this and continue to permit it to occur? For this act makes a mockery of our Constitutional protections.
Get the picture?
rjk
But like most of us, I can be persuaded that with safeguards to do the right thing--the American men and women of the NSA will follow the rules and protect our rights. They come from the same culture, speak the same language and understand our laws and ways of expressing ourselves. So as Americans too, we would expect that they would diligently protect (most of the time) our Fourth Amendment Rights. (Recall that one? Amendment IV: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures...etc.) But after reading the latest Ed Snowden leak, I am not so certain, we can claim that as one of our exceptional rights as Americans.
Recent revelations of formal Israeli and US documents leaked by Edward Snowden and published in the LA Times September 13, 2013(www.latimes.com/.../la-fg-wn-nsa-intelligence-israel-edward-snow)in a piece by by Ken Dilanian, reveal that the National Security Agency---our own NSA---routinely shares “raw” intelligence data (emails, phone calls, electronic data, phone call content, names, etc., etc.) with Israel. Israel is an ally, but has a long history of going it alone, of illegal, extra-juridical assassinations, and of intensive spying efforts on the USA. I am not comfortable with some Israeli "techie"going over MY personal data, my phone calls, my emails. There is an historic, political, cultural and language divide between us and much greater chance that information can be misconstrued and misunderstood----and misused. Such raw data can certainly include sensitive information about Americans. Information which could be perverted by some foreign power. Such a policy makes a mockery of our Constitutional protections. It is very, very disturbing.
The leaked formal US documents indicate that Israel is "required to respect" the Fourth Amendment rights of any American's data "hoovered" in by the NSA and then without perusal passed on to the Israelis. But the formal document of understanding includes no actual sanctions or punishment if the foreign power fails to follow those rules. (It gives the impression that the the phrase "required to respect the American Fourth Amendment" is only a "wink wink" nudge nudge" pro forma inclusion in the boiler plate which means nothing and has no teeth.) Furthermore, the agreement permits the Israelis to hold on to the data for "a year" again with no oversight or controls, and there are no controls on what the Israelis do with the data, or who THEY can share it with. There is no way to logically explain such a breech of our own personal rights and security as this "handover" of NSA raw data to Israel. It must be addressed and changed.
What has, in effect, happened here is that the NSA, under President Obama, has handed over the protection of our Fourth American Constitutional rights to a foreign power with the NSA data. This is a astounding infringement on our rights of privacy from government intrusion...by our own government in collusion with a foreign power. That is a serious breach of the President's responsibility to protect our Constitution and our rights as Americans. How can President Obama, our Constitutional-law professor in the White House know about this and continue to permit it to occur? For this act makes a mockery of our Constitutional protections.
Get the picture?
rjk
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
OBAMA OUTFOXED BY RUSSIA
I can't complain about the recent developments in Syria. Fewer people will die in bomb blasts. But one must wonder at the serendipity of foreign affairs. One slip of the Obama lip got us caught up in war fever and another by John Kerry may have extricated us out of it. Secretary Kerry's off-the-cuff remark, "Let them get rid of their chemical weapons", in answer to a reporter's question on what would dissuade Obama from his determination to attack Syria did it. Kerry did not realize it then, but that statement was to make history.
The following is my analysis of why I think that Obama lost and the Russians won. (Well so far. We will have to see how this plays out.)
The long term Obama Middle East strategy was to somehow get rid of Assad, and in that way protect Israel, and importantly weaken and break up the "Shia Crescent", a zone comprised of Iran, Syria, Lebanon (Hezbollah) and Iraq. The Syria civil war was the best hope of the proponents of this strategy. As the war progressed the US secretly and with denials supported the anti-Assad rebels, through sending small arms, intelligence, cash flow by way of Saudi Arabia, Quatar, Turkey, and by "shoes" on the ground in the form of CIA and other agents provocateurs. For the pro-Israeli right and the AIPAC left this was a dream come true. Eliminate Assad and then deal with a weakened Hezbollah and the "evil" Iran.
But as the civil war deepened and intensified, the Syrian insurgency turned increasingly radical and fractured. There were no "reasonable centrists" fighting Assad. It seemed all the radical Sunni forces in the Moslem world had joined in to oppose the Syrian dictator. The logical answer was for the west to keep hands off Syria, but the political situation in the US made that option untenable. It soon became difficult for US operatives to distribute aid for fear it would wind up in the hands of dangerous al Qaeda elements and others. But the US persisted in its policies to weaken Assad in the hopes of a long war "al la Iraq-Iran" in which a third party can, by supporting the weaker element in a fight prolong the conflict and weaken both unpalatable combatants. A stalemate was what Obama was looking for that would weaken both Assad and the insurgency. This was not a politically strong position for our President for it opened him to criticism from both left and right. He was not satisfying the blood lust of the neo-con right or the passivity of the anti-war left.
On the home front, at this time, Obama's second term descended abruptly into political limbo. His political "mojo" appeared to be slipping through his long slim fingers. Several embarrassing scandals marred the early part of his first year. His popularity dropped to the lowest level of his presidency. About this time in August 2012 he made the off-the-cuff remark---the "red line"--statement which boxed him in to a response if Syria used chemical weapons. He also faced several severe domestic issues, immigration, implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the debt ceiling, etc.,etc. In effect Obama confronted both domestic and foreign stalemates. He feared if nothing changed, he was going to go down as a hog-tied president...with very little accomplished.
In Syria, Hezbollah and Iran had joined the Syrian forces in attempting to quell the insurgency. The war began to look like a proxy fight between the Sunni and Shia elements of the Moslem world. With the help of Russia, Hezbollah and Iran, Assad's prospects began to turn around and looked brighter. It seemed that Assad was going to be able to maintain his position. The idea of a fight to the death, was less likely and Assad, with Russian help looked to be gaining power and control. Obama and his allies were about to loose strategically, so they played down and ignored all efforts by the Russians and others for a diplomatic settlement.
Then someone fired off several canisters of Sarin gas into the suburbs of Damascus.
The tragedy, Obama's weak position at home, and his careless "red line"remark forced him to act belligerently or to appear weak and inconsequential. No president would want the latter so he was forced into the former action. The gas attack provided an opportunity--a causus belli--though for the US without a UN sanction it was an illegal one--to change both Obama's domestic and foreign policy stalemates. But how to do it? He decided to follow the Bush play book. Use the sarin gas incident to initiate a war with Syria. That might break up the Middle East log jam, get rid of Assad and have some positive out-come in the foreign policy area. It would also act to distract the public from the embarrassing in effectiveness of the administration's second term.
Obama announced his plan to bomb Syria, just the way Bush, Cheney and Don Rumsfeld would have. It was disappointing and disheartening to see Obama and his team morph into Neo cons. Their behavior overturned the will of the people in two elections in the blink of an eye. They should be roundly condemned for that.
The President's decision rightly faced a firestorm of criticism from all sides. Major allies chose not to participate. The UN labeled Obama's intentions "illegal", NATO, EU, the Arab League, and famously the UK, our obedient "shadow" in all of our, even foolhardy ventures, failed to join the march to war. The President stood all alone, in his illegal belligerency.
With few allies to follow him over the cliff (except the unfortunate Msr. Hollande of France) Mr. Obama finally paused to reconsider. After thinking long and hard, but not too deeply, he decided to throw the Syria bombing question to the Congress. He followed this stunning move with a pro-war propaganda barrage of lies, half-truths and innuendo that matched that of George Bush and Dick Cheney during the run up to the Iraq War. The people were unimpressed, his approval numbers did not rise, and polling in the House indicated an insuperable majority of "nays". It was apparent Mr. Obama's war proposal might pass the Senate, with arm twisting but not the House. Congress was not going to go with Mr. Obama's foolhardy war. This President would have to bomb Syria without Congressional approval.
But another slip of the lip by his new, war-zealot Secretary John Kerry blew all Obama's foolhardy plans away. A day after that, on September 10, the Russians and Syrians agreed to go ahead with a proposal for Syria to put its chemical weapons under international supervision. The President was boxed in again. Out foxed by Putin, he was not going to be able to bomb Syria. A new thrust for a diplomatic settlement would surely follow that Mr. Obama would have to acknowledge and support.
The Russians would still keep their economic ties and port facilities in Syria. Assad would probably not be unseated. The US would not have the opportunity to "degrade" Syria's military. It would not be able to shatter the Shia crescent. Iran would keeps it Syria ally (a bit weakened). Hezbollah would mainain its arms channel open to the east via Syria. The basic status quo would be reinstated. All negatives the way Obama saw it.
Mr Obama goes back to a hostile Congress, no longer distracted by foreign affairs and the Syrian war drum beat, with lower poll ratings and a weaker political position. He must still face the scandals of Benghazi, IRA, NRA, and the drip drip of embarrassing secrets from Mr. Snowden, etc. He must deal with the problems such as efforts to defund the ACA, lack of action on immigration, and the looming debt limit. His plan to further undermine and weaken a part of the world he (mistakenly in my view) sees as a threat to US interests has been avoided.
So this was not an Obama win. Though that is not how he and his minions will spin it. Expect them to claim the opposite. The truth is Mr. Obama brought us to the brink of war by his own bumbling and off the cuff remarks. For our deliverance we must thank the wise men of our own Congress and Senate (particularly Sen. Rand Paul), the British Parliament, the Russians(!) the cooler heads in the UN and the EU and others around the world for resisting the call to a senseless war. So Obama loses and perhaps those of us who see the world from a less parochial perspective have won. Let us hope we have learned a new lesson. The Bush style "cowboy days" are gone. In the future, a call to arms by the USA for no good reason may again result in the embarrassing silence and put down that Obama received.
Get the picture?
Rjk
The following is my analysis of why I think that Obama lost and the Russians won. (Well so far. We will have to see how this plays out.)
The long term Obama Middle East strategy was to somehow get rid of Assad, and in that way protect Israel, and importantly weaken and break up the "Shia Crescent", a zone comprised of Iran, Syria, Lebanon (Hezbollah) and Iraq. The Syria civil war was the best hope of the proponents of this strategy. As the war progressed the US secretly and with denials supported the anti-Assad rebels, through sending small arms, intelligence, cash flow by way of Saudi Arabia, Quatar, Turkey, and by "shoes" on the ground in the form of CIA and other agents provocateurs. For the pro-Israeli right and the AIPAC left this was a dream come true. Eliminate Assad and then deal with a weakened Hezbollah and the "evil" Iran.
But as the civil war deepened and intensified, the Syrian insurgency turned increasingly radical and fractured. There were no "reasonable centrists" fighting Assad. It seemed all the radical Sunni forces in the Moslem world had joined in to oppose the Syrian dictator. The logical answer was for the west to keep hands off Syria, but the political situation in the US made that option untenable. It soon became difficult for US operatives to distribute aid for fear it would wind up in the hands of dangerous al Qaeda elements and others. But the US persisted in its policies to weaken Assad in the hopes of a long war "al la Iraq-Iran" in which a third party can, by supporting the weaker element in a fight prolong the conflict and weaken both unpalatable combatants. A stalemate was what Obama was looking for that would weaken both Assad and the insurgency. This was not a politically strong position for our President for it opened him to criticism from both left and right. He was not satisfying the blood lust of the neo-con right or the passivity of the anti-war left.
On the home front, at this time, Obama's second term descended abruptly into political limbo. His political "mojo" appeared to be slipping through his long slim fingers. Several embarrassing scandals marred the early part of his first year. His popularity dropped to the lowest level of his presidency. About this time in August 2012 he made the off-the-cuff remark---the "red line"--statement which boxed him in to a response if Syria used chemical weapons. He also faced several severe domestic issues, immigration, implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the debt ceiling, etc.,etc. In effect Obama confronted both domestic and foreign stalemates. He feared if nothing changed, he was going to go down as a hog-tied president...with very little accomplished.
In Syria, Hezbollah and Iran had joined the Syrian forces in attempting to quell the insurgency. The war began to look like a proxy fight between the Sunni and Shia elements of the Moslem world. With the help of Russia, Hezbollah and Iran, Assad's prospects began to turn around and looked brighter. It seemed that Assad was going to be able to maintain his position. The idea of a fight to the death, was less likely and Assad, with Russian help looked to be gaining power and control. Obama and his allies were about to loose strategically, so they played down and ignored all efforts by the Russians and others for a diplomatic settlement.
Then someone fired off several canisters of Sarin gas into the suburbs of Damascus.
The tragedy, Obama's weak position at home, and his careless "red line"remark forced him to act belligerently or to appear weak and inconsequential. No president would want the latter so he was forced into the former action. The gas attack provided an opportunity--a causus belli--though for the US without a UN sanction it was an illegal one--to change both Obama's domestic and foreign policy stalemates. But how to do it? He decided to follow the Bush play book. Use the sarin gas incident to initiate a war with Syria. That might break up the Middle East log jam, get rid of Assad and have some positive out-come in the foreign policy area. It would also act to distract the public from the embarrassing in effectiveness of the administration's second term.
Obama announced his plan to bomb Syria, just the way Bush, Cheney and Don Rumsfeld would have. It was disappointing and disheartening to see Obama and his team morph into Neo cons. Their behavior overturned the will of the people in two elections in the blink of an eye. They should be roundly condemned for that.
The President's decision rightly faced a firestorm of criticism from all sides. Major allies chose not to participate. The UN labeled Obama's intentions "illegal", NATO, EU, the Arab League, and famously the UK, our obedient "shadow" in all of our, even foolhardy ventures, failed to join the march to war. The President stood all alone, in his illegal belligerency.
With few allies to follow him over the cliff (except the unfortunate Msr. Hollande of France) Mr. Obama finally paused to reconsider. After thinking long and hard, but not too deeply, he decided to throw the Syria bombing question to the Congress. He followed this stunning move with a pro-war propaganda barrage of lies, half-truths and innuendo that matched that of George Bush and Dick Cheney during the run up to the Iraq War. The people were unimpressed, his approval numbers did not rise, and polling in the House indicated an insuperable majority of "nays". It was apparent Mr. Obama's war proposal might pass the Senate, with arm twisting but not the House. Congress was not going to go with Mr. Obama's foolhardy war. This President would have to bomb Syria without Congressional approval.
But another slip of the lip by his new, war-zealot Secretary John Kerry blew all Obama's foolhardy plans away. A day after that, on September 10, the Russians and Syrians agreed to go ahead with a proposal for Syria to put its chemical weapons under international supervision. The President was boxed in again. Out foxed by Putin, he was not going to be able to bomb Syria. A new thrust for a diplomatic settlement would surely follow that Mr. Obama would have to acknowledge and support.
The Russians would still keep their economic ties and port facilities in Syria. Assad would probably not be unseated. The US would not have the opportunity to "degrade" Syria's military. It would not be able to shatter the Shia crescent. Iran would keeps it Syria ally (a bit weakened). Hezbollah would mainain its arms channel open to the east via Syria. The basic status quo would be reinstated. All negatives the way Obama saw it.
Mr Obama goes back to a hostile Congress, no longer distracted by foreign affairs and the Syrian war drum beat, with lower poll ratings and a weaker political position. He must still face the scandals of Benghazi, IRA, NRA, and the drip drip of embarrassing secrets from Mr. Snowden, etc. He must deal with the problems such as efforts to defund the ACA, lack of action on immigration, and the looming debt limit. His plan to further undermine and weaken a part of the world he (mistakenly in my view) sees as a threat to US interests has been avoided.
So this was not an Obama win. Though that is not how he and his minions will spin it. Expect them to claim the opposite. The truth is Mr. Obama brought us to the brink of war by his own bumbling and off the cuff remarks. For our deliverance we must thank the wise men of our own Congress and Senate (particularly Sen. Rand Paul), the British Parliament, the Russians(!) the cooler heads in the UN and the EU and others around the world for resisting the call to a senseless war. So Obama loses and perhaps those of us who see the world from a less parochial perspective have won. Let us hope we have learned a new lesson. The Bush style "cowboy days" are gone. In the future, a call to arms by the USA for no good reason may again result in the embarrassing silence and put down that Obama received.
Get the picture?
Rjk
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