An Article by:
Ben Tanosborn

The Brits made an imperial mess of Iraq back in 1930, now it is America’s turn!

We followed the fate of the French in Vietnam; are trying hard to imitate the Russians in Afghanistan; and now, our emulation-in-progress is of our beloved European cousins.  Who would ever think that it was an American philosopher (by way of Spain), George Santayana, who stated just a century ago, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”  And American government leaders always seem to be the forgetful ones, although as it happens in all these cases, it is the American people who are condemned to pay the consequences in both blood and dollars.

We are not even speaking of millennia ago, or even centuries; only the recent past.  How can we be so forgetful as to how the British bamboozled a timid Iraqi Parliament, where the true nationalists lacked a voiced, into signing an agreement in 1930 that would have Iraq in turmoil with coup after coup until Saddam Hussein came to power in 1979?  And we all know what has happened since then.  Seventy-eight years later here we are, cramming down their throats an illegal “strategic alliance” that is similar in both content and tone to that Great Britain “imposed” on Iraq almost eight decades ago.

And I say illegal for both Iraq and the United States.  For Iraq, it’s a non-valid agreement since it will be contracted under duress from an occupier’s demands, whatever excuses are brought forward to obtain legitimacy.  For the US, it’s also an invalid pact unless it is subsequently ratified by the US Senate.  We are told that the wording in this strategic alliance has been crafted so as to “avoid such ratification.”  Nonsense, if the provisions in such agreement or alliance have the underlying intent of a treaty, it is a treaty; and as a treaty, constitutionally, it must be ratified.

True that the American Executive Branch has been operating for decades outside of the Constitution in taking the nation to war (undeclared war) and entering into treaties (or agreements) thanks to a spineless Senate and the de-facto consent of Americans, who really care little, or are brainwashed by the White House, unless the conflict turns sour.
It is remarkable that the two senators who will be contending for the highest office in the land next November, McCain and Obama, aren’t exercising their duty as senators, making this issue one of national concern, one to be handled with both transparency and care.  Malfeasance in office by members of the Senate made Bush’s invasion of Iraq fait accompli; once again, it will be malfeasance if the senate remains blind, deaf and mute to this travesty.

It is interesting that Barack Obama claims that “had he been a member of the Senate back in 2002, he would have voted against granting Bush permission to invade Iraq.”  Well, he is a member of the Senate now… but one hears little noise from him on this important issue, one that could keep the United States involved in the Middle East until the area runs out of oil or Israelis, whichever comes last .  Time for deeds, Sen. Obama!

Iraq does not appear to be willing to have the U.N. mandate extended beyond its current expiration date, at the end of this year; and the US really doesn’t care whether its effective control is through a mandate granted by the U.N. or an agreement with a government which may not be of unity or consensus.  The US must have a tacit control of Iraq’s oil while maintaining a solid military presence in that part of the world to counter not just Iran and its nuclear aspirations, but any “problems” that may emerge anywhere in Southwest Asia.

Although the hush-hush negotiations on the Strategic Framework Agreement and the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) had reached an impasse by the second week in June – Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki referring the deadlock on what his government felt were critical sovereignty issues – both Iraqi Foreign Minister Zebari and Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad (US) appear confident that an agreement will soon be reached since both countries are committed to a joint security pact.  Yes, we will have two caliphates out of Baghdad; one ran locally by Iraqis, the other ran by Americans as part of the Empire.

What remains to be seen, even if an agreement is reached, is whether the US Senate will once again capitulate to the White House, allowing its duties and responsibilities to be usurped by Imperator George W. Bush.  And whether the American people really give a damn now that they are paying over $4 per gallon of gasoline, soon projected to be $5, which when added to the other economic miseries the country is enduring calls for either a revolution or surrender.  My bet is on the latter.

Tags: american empire, Ben Tanosborn, colonialism, empire, Global, globalization, imperialism, military
Categories: Commentary, Global, Empire, Imperialism, military, Ben Tanosborn
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It is time for Harry Reid – the Majority Leader of the Democrats – to strip Joe Lieberman of his Chair on the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

In the past week, Lieberman has made several outrageous comments, directed at Obama, that were malicious and dishonest. Lieberman, who apparently has assumed the role of hit man for the McCain Campaign, has slurred the kind of rhetoric we should expect of a Fox peon, such as Hannity; someone who is utterly bankrupt when it comes to intellectual integrity and will say anything in order to defend any of his partisan positions.

Lieberman went so far as to accuse Obama, reverberating what was babbled by Bush when speaking in Israel, of advocating a foreign policy of appeasement when it comes to dealing with terrorists in Muslim countries.

For clarification, Lieberman should, at the very least, identity to whom he is precisely referring when he uses the term, terrorists. Is he referring to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, whom this country has ignored for the most part over the past 5 years, in order to direct our military resources toward the invasion and pacification of Iraq; a country that had no connections to terrorism prior to our destabilization of the foundations of their society? Moreover, what ‘head of state’ – or, more plainly, what fictional leadership is Lieberman alluding to when he invokes this vacuous terminology, using references, such as ‘appeasing terrorists,’ as though American is at war with an integrated, cohesive adversary in possession of a body politic capable of conducting diplomacy?

Perhaps even worse, Lieberman said that the fact that the supposed, according to the McCain Campaign, North American spokesman for Hamas has ‘endorsed,’ Obama raises justifiable concerns over Obama’s candidacy for President. No doubt speaking to the most uninformed and intellectual impoverished segments of America’s electorate, Lieberman asserted that Hamas actually endorses American candidates for President, as though Hamas is entirely oblivious to the fact that their public support of a candidate would probably have only negative effects for that individual’s campaign.

How stupid does Lieberman think that we are? and to what depths will he sink in order to propagate his militaristic vision for the United State’s role in the Middle East? a policy of aggression that is so unmistakably a reflection of right-wing Israeli colonialist interests; certainly not the foreign policy interests of the United States.

At this point, Lieberman, in my own assessment, is more a cartoon character than a statesman who embodies the prudence and judicious temperaments that one would expect of a Chair for one of the Senate’s most influential committees.

It is time for Harry Reid to strip Lieberman of all of the privileges he has acquired through his accumulation of seniority as a Democratic, because Lieberman – judging from his performance when campaigning as Vice Presidential nominee to Gore’s Presidential bid – never was a Democrat from the beginning.

Russell Cole

Tags: american empire, congress, foreign policy, Harry Reid, homeland security, Joe Lieberman, politics, Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Terrorism
Categories: Commentary, Politics, Congress, Homeland Security, Terrorism
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An Article by:

Ben Tanosborn

America, more than anything else, more than the proverbial land of opportunity, is very definitely something else. This nation of ours appears to be, first and foremost, a land of contradictions where, while the polls indicate most people feel the nation is being led in the wrong direction, we seem inclined to follow the same pied piper foreign policy.

Like it or not, in the US you cease to be an American (or rather, a “good American”) in the mind of your family, friends and neighbors the moment you deny the sacred dogma of inerrancy in US foreign policy. It may seem irrational to some people – either the statement on its face or what it’s implied by it – but deep inside that is the attitudinal belief of a vast majority of Americans I know and, I would venture to guess, most Americans anyone might know. And yet, that “patriotic majority,” so similar to me to the “moral majority” of time past, prefer not to think of themselves in any way, shape or form as nativists, jingoists, or otherwise exclusionary… convinced they are just down-to-earth regular folks: Main Street America.

Shortly after 9/11, political America – Democrats and Republicans – decided that it was about time to set aside their minute differences in foreign policy and act as a true united front. After all, they could always maintain some semblance of independence in the domestic arena, keeping a presumed differentiation alive and well… as if the gross mislabeling of the conservative and liberal captions defined how either party stood.

To our national detriment, including America’s standing in the world, such unnecessary and unwarranted united front was adopted by our political duopoly without as much as the blink of an eye; its ideas quickly permeating, and finding acceptance, through much of the citizenry of Main Street America. That citizen’s consent to relinquish rights and freedoms, giving blind permission, authorization, license and sanction allowing Bush’s White House to do as it pleased – all too often in open acts of criminality – has made it starkly clear that even if we claim to live under democratic rule, a so-called rule of law, our republic operates under a much different rule: the rule of consentership. And we, the citizenry, are simply the consenters! Such role reversal has made Americans the doting citizens of their uncle, Sam, an embarrassingly felonious uncle at that.

Let’s stop being hypocrites! Let’s stop blaming Bush for our own cowardice and lack of civic guts. Empowering a selected – not elected – government; granting clearance for the neocons to act; giving Bush the green light to invade Iraq; tolerating the usurping of our rights and freedoms; and going along with blatant economic malfeasance that is sure to bankrupt this nation, is unmistakably defining the highest level of consentership: what some of us would call the ultimate political pass.

Could it be that we are consenting because that is exactly what we want? That deep inside we know that someone needs to do the dirty work on our behalf, and that there needs to be a price paid? Are we really accomplices as much as we are consenters? Isn’t this a form of a dictatorship by that antidemocratic triumvirate that rules our lives: predatory capitalism, wasteful consumerism, and religious fundamentalism?

It’s beginning to look as if in early 2008, consentership will continue to dominate our Tweedledum-Tweedledee politics with Republicans and Democrats achieving renewed solidarity in foreign affairs, be it the forever-occupation (or negotiated presence) of Iraq, a non-stop continuing demonization of Iran and other “terror-villains,” or the constant denunciation of any nation that challenges our imperial hegemony and right to collect tribute in any way we see fit. Bush will soon be on his way out, but rest assured that his replacement will be a clone; or, as it is now starting to look, “a Bush in drag.” Perhaps we continue to be led astray with the promise of a lesser evil approach in domestic governance, but it will not be a lesser evil in the areas that are essential to bring trusting understanding among peoples of the world; it will not be a recipe to achieve peace on this earth, just as the organic compounds were to achieve life.

Of late, we have been looking at what is happening in Greater Russia, and are totally befuddled by the confrontational attitude of Mr. Putin. A man that not so long ago our own Duce, after looking into his eyes, tabbed as his straightforward, trustworthy friend Vladimir. My God, can someone explain how our prophetic, infallible Bush was able to get a sense of Putin’s soul and just a few years later have him turn against us?

But we shouldn’t fret over Putin’s reaction to our accustomed imperialist behavior, nor should we be surprised at his popularity in Greater Russia. Just like here in the US, there is also an apparent consensus in the neo-czarist land of Vladimir Putin, with an overwhelming majority matching their consentership against our very own. If we can be bipartisan in adopting – preserving might be a more appropriate word – an imperial foreign policy, it’s understandable that the Russians’ newly found economic success and national pride have turned their political behavior into one of consentership. The US should not expect anything better after our “screw-you” behavior during their cold turkey exit from communism, and now our insolence of trying to park missiles at their borders.

Consentership may not be dangerously consequential for small groups or nations that have no influence beyond their memberships or borders. For an imperial superpower it can turn out to be the most extreme among political extremes, perhaps the worst form of dictatorship. After all, we are consenting to the rule of a very few… and those few have been granted the power to push the nuclear button at will, to turn daylight into permanent night.

And we have the gall to criticize some nations because we tag them as dictatorships!

© 2007 Ben Tanosborn

Tags: american empire, anti imperialism, bush, citizens, democracy, economics, empire, Global, imperialism, liberty, National, political parties, politics
Categories: Commentary, National, Economics, Democracy, liberty, Politics, Empire, Imperialism
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Editor’s Notes:

I was once under the impression that the Israeli State was a proxy for United States’ interests in the Middle East. However, it is becomming abundantly clear that the US might not be the senior partner in this nefarious relationship. After all, although we might supply the Israelis with cluster bombs, I doubt that it is an extension of our own policy to drop these insidious weapons on populated areas, such as South Lebanon. And to the Israeli apologists who will no doubt scream that there is no evidence that cluster bombs where ever used, I direct you to the independent journalist, Robert Fisk, who documented casaulties who carried the scares associated with the use of these weapons of terror, following the Israeli onslought on Lebanon after two Israeli POW’s were captured when positioned in the occupied territories stolen by the Israelis from the Lebonese. The following article was originally published on Counterpunch. I did not obtain permission to republish it here. However, from my own impressions, Counterpunch appears more interested in the dessimination of truth than with the protection of its intellectual properties.

R Cole

Did Monty Python Fan Dupe Laurie Mylroie?

By CounterPunch News Service

A bizarre “interview” with imprisoned former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was circulated yesterday by MEMRI TV, a non-profit in Washington DC that specializes in translating and circulating mainly Arab-language materials, selected to display the Arab world in a poor light, to the advantage of Israel.

Releasing its translation of the purported interview, supposedly conducted over the phone to the imprisoned former dictator by Al-Fayhaa TV on on March 28, 2006, MEMRI TV trumpeted the news to its customers that “Saddam Hussein issues a Calls to Cut Off Nose and Ears of Former Iraqi VP ‘Izzat Al-Duri and Declares: It Will Make Me Happy if Iraq Turns Into Ashes, Iraq is Not Worth Two Bits Without Saddam Hussein.”

Saddam is allegedly reacting to a taped message issued by his former vice president and loyalist ‘Izzat Al-Duri, who addressed the Arab League summit in Sudan.

Saddam Hussein: “All ‘Izzat Al-Duri ever wanted was to address the Iraqis as their leader, even if just for a few short minutes. Everybody remembers that he once addressed the Iraqi Women’s Union without my knowledge. Do you know what I did to him?”

Interviewer: “We don’t know. Tell us.”

[…]

Saddam Hussein: “The first thing I did when they brought him was to spit in his face.”

Interviewer: “Why?”

Saddam Hussein: “I said to him: ‘You despicable man, I spit on your owl’s face. How do you address these glorious women without me knowing about it?’”

[…]

“The only one who makes speeches in Iraq is the supreme leader - meaning me.

Interviewer: “You’re in prison. How can you give speeches?”

Saddam Hussein: “That’s a good question. You watch the court sessions. How many sessions have there been so far? Fifteen sessions?”

Interviewer: “Seventeen.”

Saddam Hussein: “I give a speech at every single session.”

[…]

“If I don’t give speeches, I get heartburn.

“I call to punish ‘Izzat Al-Duri, because he burned my heart.”

Interviewer: “Why, because he published a statement without your permission?”

Saddam Hussein: “He gave a speech without me knowing it. The punishment that I want for him is to cut off his tongue and ears.”

Interviewer: “Why cutting off his tongue and ears?”

Saddam Hussein: “To make him the same as all the renegades whose tongues and ears I cut off. And if ‘Izzat Al-Duri continues giving speeches in sign language, like the deaf do, I demand that his hands be cut off. And so on and so forth, until ‘Izzat Al-Duri is finished, and we get rid of this degenerate.”

MEMRI TV circulated this as “Special Dispatch No. 1127″ to its customers and it was instantly seized upon by Laurie Milroie, now somewhat fallen in status, but once riding high as an “Iraq expert” and a prominent propagandist for the US-led attack of 2003.

Milroie rushed out the “interview” at 12.57 EST, March 28,to her e-mailed Iraq News, under the breathless heading “Saddam Interview (Stunning), MEMRI TV”.

Then, just over 5 hours later came a second, crestfallen communiqué:

From: “Laurie Mylroie”
Date: March 28, 2006 6:05:06 PM PST
To: “Laurie Mylroie”
Subject: Saddam Interview was Hoax

A knowledgeable US government official has informed “Iraq News” that that remarkable interview with Saddam Hussein, published by MEMRI TV, is almost certainly a hoax.

Had the credulous Mylroie and editors at MEMRI TV been familiar with the 1975 movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail, they might have wondered about such choice lines attributed to Saddam Hussein as “You despicable man, I spit on your owl’s face.”

ARTHUR: If you will not show us the Grail, we shall take your castle by force!

FRENCH GUARD:You don’t frighten us, English pig-dogs! Go and boil your bottom, sons of a silly person. I blow my nose at you, so-called Arthur King, you and all your silly English k-nnnnniggets. Thpppppt! Thppt! Thppt!

GALAHAD: What a strange person.

ARTHUR: Now look here, my good man–

FRENCH GUARD: I don’t wanna talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper! I fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!

GALAHAD: Is there someone else up there we could talk to?

FRENCH GUARD: No. Now, go away, or I shall taunt you a second time-a!
[sniff]

ARTHUR: Now, this is your last chance. I’ve been more than reasonable.

FRENCH GUARD: (Fetchez la vache.)

OTHER FRENCH GUARD: Quoi?

FRENCH GUARD: (Fetchez la vache!)
[mooo]

ARTHUR: If you do not agree to my commands, then I shall–
[twong]
[mooooooo]
Jesus Christ!

KNIGHTS: Christ!
[thud]
Ah! Ohh!…

ARTHUR: Right! Charge!

KNIGHTS: Charge!
[mayhem]

FRENCH GUARD: Hey, this one is for your mother! There you go.
[mayhem]

FRENCH GUARD: And this one’s for your dad!

ARTHUR: Run away!

KNIGHTS: Run away!

FRENCH GUARD: Thppppt!

FRENCH GUARDS: [taunting]

LAUNCELOT: Fiends! I’ll tear them apart!

The portion of the Saddam interview where the blustering ex-despot vows to chop off Mr al-Duri’s extremities is also strongly reminiscent of a scene in the Python classic where Arthur swipes off the arms and legs of the Black Knight.

BLACK KNIGHT: None shall pass.

ARTHUR: What?

BLACK KNIGHT: None shall pass.

ARTHUR: I have no quarrel with you, good Sir Knight, but I must cross this bridge.

BLACK KNIGHT: Then you shall die.

ARTHUR: I command you, as King of the Britons, to stand aside!

BLACK KNIGHT: I move for no man.

ARTHUR: So be it!

ARTHUR and BLACK KNIGHT: Aaah!, hiyaah!, etc.
[ARTHUR chops the BLACK KNIGHT’s left arm off]

ARTHUR: Now stand aside, worthy adversary.

BLACK KNIGHT: ‘Tis but a scratch.

ARTHUR: A scratch? Your arm’s off!

BLACK KNIGHT: No, it isn’t.

ARTHUR: Well, what’s that, then?

BLACK KNIGHT: I’ve had worse.

ARTHUR: You liar!

BLACK KNIGHT: Come on, you pansy!
[clang]
Huyah!
[clang]
Hiyaah!
[clang]
Aaaaaaaah!
[ARTHUR chops the BLACK KNIGHT’s right arm off]

ARTHUR: Victory is mine!
[kneeling]
We thank Thee Lord, that in Thy mer–

BLACK KNIGHT: Hah!
[kick]
Come on, then.

ARTHUR: What?

BLACK KNIGHT: Have at you!
[kick]

ARTHUR: Eh. You are indeed brave, Sir Knight, but the fight is mine.

BLACK KNIGHT: Oh, had enough, eh?

ARTHUR: Look, you stupid bastard. You’ve got no arms left.

BLACK KNIGHT: Yes, I have.

ARTHUR: Look!

BLACK KNIGHT: Just a flesh wound.
[kick]

ARTHUR: Look, stop that.

BLACK KNIGHT: Chicken!
[kick]
Chickennn!

ARTHUR: Look, I’ll have your leg.
[kick]
Right!
[whop]
[ARTHUR chops the BLACK KNIGHT’s right leg off]

BLACK KNIGHT: Right. I’ll do you for that!

ARTHUR: You’ll what?

BLACK KNIGHT: Come here!

ARTHUR: What are you going to do, bleed on me?

BLACK KNIGHT: I’m invincible!

ARTHUR: You’re a looney.

BLACK KNIGHT: The Black Knight always triumphs! Have at you! Come on, then.
[whop]
[ARTHUR chops the BLACK KNIGHT’s last leg off]

BLACK KNIGHT: Oh? All right, we’ll call it a draw.

ARTHUR: Come, Patsy.

BLACK KNIGHT: Oh. Oh, I see. Running away, eh? You yellow bastards! Come back here and take what’s coming to you. I’ll bite your legs off!

Lately Miyroie has been eagerly promoting the supposed disclosures in documents recently released by the US government of pre-2003 ties between Saddam Hussein, Al Qaeda and Zarqawi. In flushes of battiness reminiscent of Clare Sterling (the Mylroie of the Rfeagan years) she has even accused the Bush administration of promoting a cover-up in this regard. The documents have been greeted ecstatically by the war lobby, even though there are documents which do not encourage the scenario they espouse, such as one in which Iraqi security, on hearing that Zarqawi is in Iraq, puts out an APB bulletin to establish his whereabouts.

MEMRI TV has been heavily touted by such promoters of the 2003 attack as former CIA chief R. James Wolsey who said in 2004 that “MEMRI is the single most important source for understanding what is happening in the Greater Middle East.” Another member of the War Party devouring MEMRI TV is Charles Krauthammer who has said “For anyone interested in what is really happening in the Middle East - what the Arab world is saying to itself - MEMRI is utterly indispensable.”

There are other intgriguing precursors in the Pythons’ movie, including one episode in Sir Galahad’s search for the Holy Grail:

GALAHAD: Open the door! Open the door!
[pound pound pound]
In the name of King Arthur, open the door!
[creak]
[thump]
[creak]
[boom]

GIRLS: Hello!

ZOOT: Welcome, gentle Sir Knight. Welcome to the Castle Anthrax.

Tags: american empire, israel, lebanon
Categories: Commentary
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For a glimpse of “The switch,” please scroll down to the “Preface,” which is presented on this page.

Russell Cole

(please do not confuse me with the actual author of “The Switch.”)

To Contact the author of “The Switch,” please use:

afanofWesClark@yahoo.com

If you are not convinced of this short story’s incisive insight as well as its enjoyable prose, from the “Preface,” please take my own word for it and obtain a full version of “the Switch,” via two methods described immediately below:

For “The Switch” in its entirety, please jump to a page where it is presented in html, by clicking though the following hyperlink:

http://web2sociology.com/papers/the_switch.html

Additionally, if anyone cares to obtain a PDF of “The Switch,” Please indicate so by emailing Russell Cole at:

russellcole@populistamerica

Preface

The Switch is a story built on the notion that, aside from those who are clinically insane, Bush supporters only exist due to being seriously ill-informed. But if you could wave a magic wand to make them all cognizant of the facts then his support would completely evaporate…and it doesn’t take magic to communicate information.

It starts off as a metaphor on how “progress” is a misnomer, but by page 3 the spanking begins. Yes, 40 pages is long, but that’s because there’s that much to spank him for. See for yourself why the mother of a soldier in Iraq said that she was honored to have read it and why a woman who rarely reads couldn’t put it down; and admitted afterwards that she shouldn’t have voted for Bush…

“Democracy is the most difficult of all forms of government, since it requires the widest spread of intelligence…” ~ Will Durant

“Freedom is always in danger, and the majority of mankind will always acquiesce in its loss, unless a minority is willing to challenge the privileges of its few and the apathy of the masses.” ~ R.H.S. Crossman

“The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object.” ~ Thomas Jefferson

“…A battering ram doesn’t work if you hold it sideways.” ~ Jeff Poster

Tags: american empire, colonialism, democracy, imperialism, military, money
Categories: Commentary
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A patch of cognition related to the right…

The question is not if there is a Power Elite.  It is how you conceptualize power.  I just do not think that it is fruitful to understand the dynamics of power - control and discipline - in a pre-Foucauldian fashion.  I do not think there is necessarily a collaborative effort on the part of the elite in society to coordinate their actions in an ongoing effort to preserve their status in society.  The implementation of power results from a complex process that involves a system that extends beyond the individual agents involved in propagating the imposition of structure upon the populace. 

The grammar school teacher who practices discipline and punishment over the subjects of his or her pedagogical practices is surely not cognizant of the consequences of his or her actions beyond the scope of their immediate effect.  Nevertheless, the unintended consequences of the grammar school teacher are to implant the subjects with behavioral dispositions, which homogenize the population in order to render individuals docile and confirmative and skilled.  In other words, ripe for the exploitation of the processes involved in the various modes of production in society. 

However, if power in society circulates in such a fashion, and the interests of the elites extend to every crevasse our lives, through the operations of those we do not necessarily want to blame, then towards, whom do we direct our energy, in opposition?  Journalists?  CEO’s?  Lou Dobbs?  Grammar school teachers? 

Globalization, which is spurred by free-trade and other universalistic discourses, is merely proliferating the discipline and punishment, which is tantamount to the concrete manifestations of power, that effectively maintain Empire.  What I am proposing would help to diminish the supply of fuel that energizes Empire, which relies on an ever increasing number of subjects for the purposes of exploitation.

Tags: american empire, foreign policy, foucault, globalization, power
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Russell Cole's Blog, foucault, Power, Empire
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The lexicon, democracy, has an etymology, which can be traced back to the Ancient Greek word for the mob, which is translated into our own language with its Roman alphabet into the term, demos. The term, demos, with the suffix typically attached to it, forms the referring expression, democracy; which we assert to be the rule of the citizens. It is the position of the Midwest Alliance that democracy is realized when the will of the Demos becomes the policy of the state. The intermediary devices that we currently have installed in American Empire’s political system are a device to mitigate the power of the Demos; the will of the people.

Furthermore, the distillation of the people’s expression of opinions concerning matters of state, which constitutes a quasi-republic, not a democracy, have been corrupted by elitist cronyism and the influence of special interests, which invest money into the campaign coffers of career politicians. We suffer from the rule of the provincial, which imposes its selfish head at the expense of the cosmopolitan interests of the Demos, the populace.

The Demos is not represented through this system of polity. Rather, it is provided with the illusory impression that it somehow affects the posture of the state through ceremonial occasions where each member of the demos is provided the opportunity to express himself or herself through the casting of a single vote for an individual, who indirectly, in theory, represents the individual in the affairs of state.

Let us recognize this pathetic ritual, which reinforces the collective representation of a democratic nation, as a device to propagate a false ideology. We do not live in a democracy, we live in Empire, which is controlled by a plutocracy that carefully manages the representation, the veneer, of an electoral system, which provides the Demos with preselected choices, which are the products of a complex system consisting of networking and cronyist quid pro quo.

This process, conducted among the elites, preselects those who will be our choices for representation in polity. The individuals presented to us are typically those with the most elitist alliances, as well as, those with the access to the necessary capital required to enter into the ceremonial pageantries of primaries. Following the series of ritualistic dramatic performances, one of the members of the power elite eventually assumes the role of Emperor; more commonly designated as President.

Our choices are made in advance, prior to our even becoming cognizant of candidates presented as electoral options. We live under the rule of single political party, because the ideological divergences between and among the assortment of individuals belonging to the elitist class are blown into consequential oblivion by the intersection of interests among the plutocracy of Empire, which consist of preserving their elevated status.

Therefore, the Power Elite is interested and defined by the following teleology, which gives shape to their primary project: The maintenance of the status quo.

Tags: american empire, centralization, democracy, direct democracy, foreign policy, localism, midwest populist party, politics, populist movement, power
Categories: Commentary, Global, Populist Party, Democracy, liberty, government, Russell Cole's Blog, Power, Politics, Third Parties, Empire, Direct Democracy
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In this essay, I conjoin various elements previously explored by Foucault and W Churchill. I make suggestions concerning our conceptualization of the current social and political reality and the dynamics that shape it. I also wish to bring transparency to the disciplines in the Human Sciences and the role they play in the production of productive citizens for purposes of exploitation by American Empire.

Introduction to Bio-power and its Little Eichmann Engineers

There is an obvious association between the ‘Little Eichmann Mentality’ (Ward Churchill) and the practitioners of the Human Sciences that are responsible for the generation of technologies necessary to deploy ‘Bio-power’ (Foucault) in society.

Bio-power is the productive use of power in society to manufacture types of social identities that not only define the ‘normal,’ productive members of society, but also the abnormal, ‘problematic’ identities in society. Medical practitioners and social scientists seek out technologies in order to correct the ‘pathological’ behaviors of these undesirable identities in society, a process referred to, by Foucault, as ‘normalization.’

Practitioners of the Human Sciences are typically under the impression that they are performing value-neutral science, or, as I like to call it, the value of practicing science with no values. They believe that they are simply correcting ailments of individuals and aggregates in society. After all, they belong to institutions in civil society and have no conscious recognition of the political ramifications of their ’scientific’ endeavors.

Nevertheless, the Human Sciences provide the necessary regulatory mechanisms within the systemic structure of society in order to maintain the ongoing replication of elements - social identities - required for the system to persist.  These sciences ensure that the elements of society remain in their correct composition and systemic alignment—what is tantamount to the normalization of bodies—in order for the imposed structure of society to remain in tact. The bodies that revolt from the disciplinary constraints and incentives resume, through the implementation of the regulatory mechanisms, their status as ‘productive’ members working within the processes that configure the social system. In the following I will give some historical elucidation to ‘Bio- power.’

A History of the Present: The Ramifications of Bio-power

Bio-power is an umbrella term that refers to the practitioners of the human sciences whose disciplines proliferated during the Victorian era. Some examples of these disciplines are psychology, psychiatry, demography, and criminology.  They are referred to as Bio-power because they play a restrictive, yet productive, role in society. By normalizing the behaviors of individuals and aggregates of individuals within society, they generate social identities, which are expected to conform to certain behavioral patterns.

This is a productive endeavor on the part of disciplinarians because it gives meaning and purpose to the lives, or subjectivities, of these social identities, through the mechanism of implanting desires, such as living a normal, productive live: entering into a heterosexual union; and having children, whom they raise to embody the same values, such as a good work ethic and a disposition to respect and abide by the normative regulations imposed by society.  The parents are not the only agents in the socialization process.  Additionally, educators and other disciplinarians train, through pedagogy and discipline, the objects of their disciplinarian control to instantiate behavioral dispositions, which make them ‘productive members of Empire.’  In this case, ‘productive’ is intended to signify a willingness on the part of the human body to perform the repetitive tasks involved in assuming the position of a cog in the various modalities of production within American Empire, which allow it to proliferate. 

What is important to remember is that the disciplinarians, to which I originally referred, highly influence the patterns of parenting and teaching that are deployed by the lower-level disciplinarians such as parents and grammar school instructors.  The researchers at Universities, for instance, engender the development of technologies designed to modify the behavioral habits of those who are subjected to the process of socialization consisting of “Discipline and Punishment,” as well as, incentives, which serve as the desires that drive bodies to promulgate their ascribed or assumed identity within the societal matrix.  Bodies, in short, are forged, molded, and pounded into shape by disciplinarians in society, which allows for the social system to replicate the elements involved in its many processes.  

These disciplinarian practices are not disassociated from one another and lacking in any general pattern of actions and consequences.  There is a purpose behind these political practices.  Bio- power permits society to exist in a form that is in accord with the interests - although, perhaps, not the conscious interests - of particular groups in society. This is not to say that there is an reflexive collaboration among the individuals belonging to the groups that benefit from power and discipline in society, but there is most definitely a logic embedded in the unintended consequences of the agents who promote disciplinarian praxis in society.  In the case of American Empire, I would argue that Bio-power serves the purpose of the corporate elites and their henchman politicians, who need a disciplined and technically skilled work force in order to profit from their investments.  To sum, there is a relation between economic interests - a rubric which I use quite broadly to include the accumulation, transfer, and production of any commodity or source of stimulus that incites pleasure or satisfaction - and the implementation of Bio-power in American society.  The corporate elites could not amass the absurd amount of resources that they do without having at their disposal highly disciplined and trained bodies for the purposes of providing labor capacities for the exploitation of the corporate elite’s industrial niche.  With the out-sourcing of jobs, however, this dynamic is probably currently under alteration, but, for the time being, I believe that this description is an apt one. 

I hope one can already see the political implications of these Human Scientific disciplines in civil society. The fact that they are in civil society makes them appear innocuous and politically inert. However, this is an illusory impression, because these Bio-power disciplines serve as the regulatory mechanism for the current configuration of society, which is dominated by political and corporate elites.

The Little Eichmann Component to Bio-power

The Little Eichmann mentality defines the subjectivities of the engineers social reality; the disciplinarians, described in the preceding paragraphs.  Human Science is not a mere recording of ‘objective’ reality. It is more an attempt to manipulate and control the ontological domain that has been delimited by a discipline’s observational activities. The objects that appear present-at- hand were originally given an ontological status by scientists carving out entities from the monist world to use as instruments in the actualization of the objectives that define the teleology of their projects.

Consequently, science should be understood less as a form of an objective rendering of reality than a manifestation of Nietzsche’s Will to Power—the drive or impetus to control and manipulate one’s surroundings. According to Nietzsche, the external environment is far too complex to for humans to ever conceive of a complete, ‘objective’ description of its elements and properties as well as knowledge of its relationships and its processes.  Humans, through the device of language, simplify the world and reduce its complexity, and invent operations, devised by the mechanism of if-then-statements - allowing for causal analysis - and render the world exploitable for their interests.

The language, or the vocabulary, of the disciplines—the jargon—is the repository for the ontological creations of the discipline. To increase its power, its ability to manipulate and control, those who are indoctrinated into the discipline are taught, by exposure to exemplars, the language of the discipline and its habits for problematizing the discipline’s phenomenal domain. Heidegger, through one of his aphorisms, which goes something like this, “Being resides in the House of Language, ” communicated that language, and its lexicon, along with all of the culturally distinct varieties of language and lexicon, shape our perceptions and understandings of the objects and properties that exist within the domain that is defined by our activities in particular modes of Being-in-the-World; or, in other words, the types of projects in which we are engaged.

Indeed, the little worlds that are projected by human sciences are defined by the language that is peculiar to their tribal activities.  The unfortunate thing, however, is that these forms of vocabulary enter into the sphere of bureaucratic and popular culture; thus, creating social identities that become objectified and quite real with respect to social-ontology of social reality.  Identities, such as homosexual and other marginalized identities are the products of the Human Sciences, and have created subspecies of humanity, which are often mistreated or subjected to the corrective medical practices referred to by Foucault as ‘normalization;’ the regulatory technologies produced by disciplinarians. 

Although the deleterious effects of the practices of the preponderance of social-scientists are quite evident to anyone who considers historical research a valid form of knowledge production, the subjectivities of practitioners of the Human Sciences are such that they only tune in to their narrowly defined projection of professional possibilities. It is as if they are race horses wearing blinders, so not to be distracted by any unintended social consequences they might glimpse in their periphery vision. They are driven forward as they jockey for the lead position among their academic competitors in the specialized field that they find themselves….publish…publish… publish…because their only measure of success is in criteria created within the discipline itself, leading to an obsession with performitivity and productivity. They possess the “Little Eichmann” mentality.

They epitomize the administrative role of the compliant yet the partially ignorant. Are they to blame in a personal respect, perhaps.  However, they are most definitely professionally culpable for every technological insight they create to help make the processes and systems of the social structure function more efficiently under the American Empire.  Therefore, the individuals who comprise these disciplines belonging to the social sciences are not really scientists, at all; at least not in a traditional sense.  Rather they are extensions of polity’s bureaucratic apparatus, and they serve as effective agents of those who possess a disproportionate control upon American Polity, such as the corporate elites, by disciplining the population to possess the necessary dispositions rendering them docile, conformitive, and skilled.

Conclusion

The disciplines in society are a necessary component to the continuation of American Empire and its expansion, because they regulate the processes needed to produce the type of person who can contribute to Empire. I have often heard the slogan, ‘think globally but act locally.’ This is all fine and good, but to understand the effects of your efforts when you situate yourself in the larger picture of things, acting nationally as well locally seems quite tempting.

It is time to bring recognition to the functional properties of the disciplinarian Human Sciences and to take a stance on their impact upon the society that we are trying to reform. Populists, they are not necessarily our allies; they are often part of the problem.

Tags: american empire, bio power, democracy, education, empire, Energy, foucault, human sciences, power, russell cole, society, ward churchill
Categories: Commentary, Society, Democracy, Education, foucault, Energy, Empire
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