Bush's moral stance on stem cell research surely strikes more folks than me as absurd. For all his Bible thumping, Bush has no grasp of the book. I'm fairly certain when Moses came down with the tablet that said, "You shall not kill" I'm pretty sure it didn't mean just "you shall not kill embryos," but "you shall not kill human beings," first off (probably animals too, come to think of it). Where is Bush's moral outrage at this Iraq war that has killed by some estimates 100,000 HUMAN BEINGS?
Bush launched the war by fraud. A hundred thousand human beings have been killed. Come back to me with true grief and remorse for your role in that, Bush, and I will listen to your "moral argument" over stem cells. Until then, you are bowing down to the false idol of political gain.
Friday, July 21, 2006
An attribute of strength
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
-- Mahatma Gandhi, Indian spiritual leader (1869-1948)
-- Mahatma Gandhi, Indian spiritual leader (1869-1948)
Monday, July 17, 2006
Living in Fear Together or Iraq War Redux
Israel and Lebanon are at war again. The world asks themselves haven't they had enough? The slim Israeli justification for launching real war -- the capture of an Israeli soldier -- now looks as convenient as the White House's claims of WMD in Iraq. Tanya Reinhart, leading Israeli scholar and commentator, reports the Israeli army was preparing for an attack months earlier, with the goal of destroying the Hamas infrastructure and its government.
For its part, Hezbollah is the David, benefiting from the absurdity of foisting primitive rock-ets at military Goliath Israel.
"The military arrogance of Israel, the fact that Israel is bombarding a helpless country like Lebanon, destroying its infrastructure, dismantling the state, is making people more and more angry," [said Labib Kamhawi, political scientist in Amman, the Jordanian capital].
"I feel a sense of pride because of this small group of people who are capable of fighting the state of Israel and all its military power," said Fayez Smet, a criminal defense lawyer. "Whether they win or not, they are heroes." (from LA Times A Divide Deepens in Arab World)
As tragic as all the events are, the entire conflict seems to me the last gasp of macho, without real power -- a desperate flailing about. Both groups are without answers. All that remains are habits. The habit of retaliation, the habit of expanding old wounds with fresh gashes, the habit of war.
John Keegan, one of the world's foremost military historians, says in his masterpiece A History of Warfare To refuse to recognize that politics leading to war are a poisonous intoxication, we do not need to believe, like Margaret Mead, that war is an 'invention'…. All that we need to accept is that, over the course of 4000 years of experiment and repetition, warmaking has become a habit.… Unless we unlearn the habits we have taught ourselves, we shall not survive.
The habit of war prevents both sides from seeing any common ground. Neither can acknowledge that past and present horrors suffered by both sides have given them the common experience of grief, oppression and fear. Recognition that they do have such a fundamental experience in common can lead to sympathy, compassion and eventual trust. These are the conditions that lead to the peace and safety both claim to want. Both groups will wildly flail around until the other recognizes and honors the deeply human desire they share to be safe and free.
The majority of people throughout the region seem as weary of these habits of war as the world is of reading about them. It is the leaders -- without effective answers, feeling impotent to solve the problems, and benefiting from illusions of potency -- who are now resorting to macho indiscriminate demonstrations of power. These displays merely highlight their true impotence -- they don't solve anything and cause more of the grief, oppression and fear they are purportedly trying to end.
"Why should we be the only ones who live in fear?" said Muhammad Abu Oukal, a student at the Islamic University in Gaza City. "With these rockets, the Israelis feel fear, too. We will have to live in peace together, or live in fear together." (from The New York Times Rockets Create a 'Balance of Fear' With Israel, Gaza Residents Say)
I have hope that the truth of this student's last statement is now self evident, that the choice rings clearly inside enough people of the Middle East, indeed inside enough people in the world, that the leaders benefiting from world calamity will find themselves alone, abandonded, defrocked of any illusion that they are making progress.
When enough people see the truth of the manipulation, the flaccid reality of their current leaders, the opening can come to unlearn the habits we have taught ourselves.
For its part, Hezbollah is the David, benefiting from the absurdity of foisting primitive rock-ets at military Goliath Israel.
"The military arrogance of Israel, the fact that Israel is bombarding a helpless country like Lebanon, destroying its infrastructure, dismantling the state, is making people more and more angry," [said Labib Kamhawi, political scientist in Amman, the Jordanian capital].
"I feel a sense of pride because of this small group of people who are capable of fighting the state of Israel and all its military power," said Fayez Smet, a criminal defense lawyer. "Whether they win or not, they are heroes." (from LA Times A Divide Deepens in Arab World)
As tragic as all the events are, the entire conflict seems to me the last gasp of macho, without real power -- a desperate flailing about. Both groups are without answers. All that remains are habits. The habit of retaliation, the habit of expanding old wounds with fresh gashes, the habit of war.
John Keegan, one of the world's foremost military historians, says in his masterpiece A History of Warfare To refuse to recognize that politics leading to war are a poisonous intoxication, we do not need to believe, like Margaret Mead, that war is an 'invention'…. All that we need to accept is that, over the course of 4000 years of experiment and repetition, warmaking has become a habit.… Unless we unlearn the habits we have taught ourselves, we shall not survive.
The habit of war prevents both sides from seeing any common ground. Neither can acknowledge that past and present horrors suffered by both sides have given them the common experience of grief, oppression and fear. Recognition that they do have such a fundamental experience in common can lead to sympathy, compassion and eventual trust. These are the conditions that lead to the peace and safety both claim to want. Both groups will wildly flail around until the other recognizes and honors the deeply human desire they share to be safe and free.
The majority of people throughout the region seem as weary of these habits of war as the world is of reading about them. It is the leaders -- without effective answers, feeling impotent to solve the problems, and benefiting from illusions of potency -- who are now resorting to macho indiscriminate demonstrations of power. These displays merely highlight their true impotence -- they don't solve anything and cause more of the grief, oppression and fear they are purportedly trying to end.
"Why should we be the only ones who live in fear?" said Muhammad Abu Oukal, a student at the Islamic University in Gaza City. "With these rockets, the Israelis feel fear, too. We will have to live in peace together, or live in fear together." (from The New York Times Rockets Create a 'Balance of Fear' With Israel, Gaza Residents Say)
I have hope that the truth of this student's last statement is now self evident, that the choice rings clearly inside enough people of the Middle East, indeed inside enough people in the world, that the leaders benefiting from world calamity will find themselves alone, abandonded, defrocked of any illusion that they are making progress.
When enough people see the truth of the manipulation, the flaccid reality of their current leaders, the opening can come to unlearn the habits we have taught ourselves.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
She was a GIRL
The horror of the latest revelations from the dark swarm in Iraq: our own US soldiers plotted and carried out a gang rape of a beautiful 14-year old girl and the murder of her and her family.
According to the many reports, four soldiers break into an Iraqi family's home and take aside the beautiful 14-year old GIRL. While she listens, one soldier takes the girl's mother and father and 7-year old sister into the other room and shoots them each in the head, killing them. The soldier returns to where they're holding the girl, he lifts up her dress, gathers it around her young neck, and he and at least one other soldier rape her. When they're finished, they shoot her in the head.
They then attempt to set her body on fire to cover up the evidence.
The AP and other media say the soldiers raped and killed an "Iraqi woman." But she was NOT a woman, she was a GIRL. The military has tried to say her age was 20, but her identity card shows she was only 14 years old. Her name was Abeer Qasim Hamza, born Aug 19,1991.
We must bear responsibility for this. The hatred of our leaders breads hatred down the line. The blatant disdain and dismissal of the law exhibited by the White House gets passed along to soldiers with the MREs. The macho desperation for power and control spouted at the top reaches the rank and file. Some use these poisonous teachings to hold the thought that gang raping a beautiful Iraqi girl, worthless for anything else in their eyes, is within their right.
If it is our right, according to the White House, to defraud America and the world into launching this war that has killed so many -- and We the People allow it to persist even as we know it was a fraud -- how far off are these soldiers in their conclusion? If torture and firing nuclear bombs at will are acceptable to our leaders -- and We the People allow them to stay in power -- how far off are these soldiers?
For a moment just countenance our outrage if a foreign country overthrew our evil government, occupied Los Angeles, destroyed every decent building and infrastructure, ignited huge sectarian unrest, gave power to ultra conservative religious fanatics, and then their soldiers plotted and carried out a gang rape and murder of a beautiful 15-year old girl and her family in Sherman Oaks?
We are not Darfur! We must either identify with this family or we are dead as a country. ALL are created equal.
I must believe that we are not so unconscious. I must believe that the country of integrity that we yearn to be, that we long for, is still within us. I must believe that we will find that country within us and stand together to bring to account -- through hard-won laws that we will now uphold -- those who have perpetrated all these frauds: the elections, the war, and everything in between.
Details Emerge in Alleged Army Rape, Killings
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/02/AR2006070200673.html?referrer=emailarticle
BAGHDAD, July 2 -- Fifteen-year-old Abeer Qasim Hamza was afraid, her mother confided in a neighbor.
As pretty as she was young, the girl had attracted the unwelcome attention of U.S. soldiers manning a checkpoint that the girl had to pass through almost daily in their village in the south-central city of Mahmudiyah, her mother told the neighbor.
Abeer told her mother again and again in her last days that the soldiers had made advances toward her, a neighbor, Omar Janabi, said this weekend, recounting a conversation he said he had with the girl's mother, Fakhriyah, on March 10.
Fakhriyah feared that the Americans might come for her daughter at night, at their home. She asked her neighbor if Abeer might sleep at his house, with the women there.
Janabi said he agreed.
Then, "I tried to reassure her, remove some of her fear," Janabi said. "I told her, the Americans would not do such a thing."
Abeer did not live to take up the offer of shelter.
Instead, attackers came to the girl's house the next day, apparently separating Abeer from her mother, father and young sister.
(more -- follow link above)
According to the many reports, four soldiers break into an Iraqi family's home and take aside the beautiful 14-year old GIRL. While she listens, one soldier takes the girl's mother and father and 7-year old sister into the other room and shoots them each in the head, killing them. The soldier returns to where they're holding the girl, he lifts up her dress, gathers it around her young neck, and he and at least one other soldier rape her. When they're finished, they shoot her in the head.
They then attempt to set her body on fire to cover up the evidence.
The AP and other media say the soldiers raped and killed an "Iraqi woman." But she was NOT a woman, she was a GIRL. The military has tried to say her age was 20, but her identity card shows she was only 14 years old. Her name was Abeer Qasim Hamza, born Aug 19,1991.
We must bear responsibility for this. The hatred of our leaders breads hatred down the line. The blatant disdain and dismissal of the law exhibited by the White House gets passed along to soldiers with the MREs. The macho desperation for power and control spouted at the top reaches the rank and file. Some use these poisonous teachings to hold the thought that gang raping a beautiful Iraqi girl, worthless for anything else in their eyes, is within their right.
If it is our right, according to the White House, to defraud America and the world into launching this war that has killed so many -- and We the People allow it to persist even as we know it was a fraud -- how far off are these soldiers in their conclusion? If torture and firing nuclear bombs at will are acceptable to our leaders -- and We the People allow them to stay in power -- how far off are these soldiers?
For a moment just countenance our outrage if a foreign country overthrew our evil government, occupied Los Angeles, destroyed every decent building and infrastructure, ignited huge sectarian unrest, gave power to ultra conservative religious fanatics, and then their soldiers plotted and carried out a gang rape and murder of a beautiful 15-year old girl and her family in Sherman Oaks?
We are not Darfur! We must either identify with this family or we are dead as a country. ALL are created equal.
I must believe that we are not so unconscious. I must believe that the country of integrity that we yearn to be, that we long for, is still within us. I must believe that we will find that country within us and stand together to bring to account -- through hard-won laws that we will now uphold -- those who have perpetrated all these frauds: the elections, the war, and everything in between.
Details Emerge in Alleged Army Rape, Killings
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/02/AR2006070200673.html?referrer=emailarticle
BAGHDAD, July 2 -- Fifteen-year-old Abeer Qasim Hamza was afraid, her mother confided in a neighbor.
As pretty as she was young, the girl had attracted the unwelcome attention of U.S. soldiers manning a checkpoint that the girl had to pass through almost daily in their village in the south-central city of Mahmudiyah, her mother told the neighbor.
Abeer told her mother again and again in her last days that the soldiers had made advances toward her, a neighbor, Omar Janabi, said this weekend, recounting a conversation he said he had with the girl's mother, Fakhriyah, on March 10.
Fakhriyah feared that the Americans might come for her daughter at night, at their home. She asked her neighbor if Abeer might sleep at his house, with the women there.
Janabi said he agreed.
Then, "I tried to reassure her, remove some of her fear," Janabi said. "I told her, the Americans would not do such a thing."
Abeer did not live to take up the offer of shelter.
Instead, attackers came to the girl's house the next day, apparently separating Abeer from her mother, father and young sister.
(more -- follow link above)
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
The Flag Resurrected
Thank you, immigrant protesters, for giving us our country back.
Thank each of you for grabbing that red white and blue fabric by its balls and yanking it back to its truth.
After the current administration has so prostituted the symbol that my friend blurted, horrified when shown the latest "Liberty" flag stamp, "Do you have anything less patriotic?" to which the post office worker confided, "You have no idea how often we hear that now," -- we feel ashamed to put the flag on a humble piece of mail.
Yesterday, with tears in my eyes and lump in my throat, I watched as, resuscitated by the hands of immigrants, the flag was brought back to its proper life.
Those who are without standing stood to remind us all of the promise. The promise of America.
It takes an outsider to see what we had allowed to be trampled and shot full of holes.
The promise this country had lost thanks to this administration and their complicit lackeys in Congress and the major media: of fair treatment, opportunity for all, justice, blindness to race and class and origins. Our founding principle honors the equality of human beings. This was the noble promise we watched come close to death.
Thank God, Goddess and All There Is that it was remembered by those the country has ignored and abused.
To every person protesting yesterday, I say with all my heart on many levels, "Thank you." We've been waiting in despair, those of us who know, waiting for this.
We did not even know we were waiting. And we could not have predicted it. But now that it is here, we know -- it was what we desperately needed.
Those who are most disenfranchised had to stand up. They had to say, "Enough." They had to stand for what they deserved. They had to lose their fear.
They had to stand en masse to say they deserve honor and dignity. That they deserve it simply because they are human.
What you have done has resonated in our subconscious -- there, we've absorbed your bravery of saying each person deserves honor, that we deserve dignity. We had forgotten.
We had forgotten we were all once immigrants here looking for honor and dignity.
Each one of us now can stand for it again in our own lives with less fear, because you have shown us that it is possible.
The message will reverberate in subtle and overt ways through this country. Indeed through the Earth. I, for one, am most grateful for your gracious lesson and gift. Each step has lifted our country and returned to us its soul.
A greater gift I cannot imagine. We are deeply in your debt.
Thank each of you for grabbing that red white and blue fabric by its balls and yanking it back to its truth.
After the current administration has so prostituted the symbol that my friend blurted, horrified when shown the latest "Liberty" flag stamp, "Do you have anything less patriotic?" to which the post office worker confided, "You have no idea how often we hear that now," -- we feel ashamed to put the flag on a humble piece of mail.
Yesterday, with tears in my eyes and lump in my throat, I watched as, resuscitated by the hands of immigrants, the flag was brought back to its proper life.
Those who are without standing stood to remind us all of the promise. The promise of America.
It takes an outsider to see what we had allowed to be trampled and shot full of holes.
The promise this country had lost thanks to this administration and their complicit lackeys in Congress and the major media: of fair treatment, opportunity for all, justice, blindness to race and class and origins. Our founding principle honors the equality of human beings. This was the noble promise we watched come close to death.
Thank God, Goddess and All There Is that it was remembered by those the country has ignored and abused.
To every person protesting yesterday, I say with all my heart on many levels, "Thank you." We've been waiting in despair, those of us who know, waiting for this.
We did not even know we were waiting. And we could not have predicted it. But now that it is here, we know -- it was what we desperately needed.
Those who are most disenfranchised had to stand up. They had to say, "Enough." They had to stand for what they deserved. They had to lose their fear.
They had to stand en masse to say they deserve honor and dignity. That they deserve it simply because they are human.
What you have done has resonated in our subconscious -- there, we've absorbed your bravery of saying each person deserves honor, that we deserve dignity. We had forgotten.
We had forgotten we were all once immigrants here looking for honor and dignity.
Each one of us now can stand for it again in our own lives with less fear, because you have shown us that it is possible.
The message will reverberate in subtle and overt ways through this country. Indeed through the Earth. I, for one, am most grateful for your gracious lesson and gift. Each step has lifted our country and returned to us its soul.
A greater gift I cannot imagine. We are deeply in your debt.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Describe the World at Peace
Many people say they want peace in the world.
But what exactly are we working toward?
The word "peace," I've come to realize over the years of putting Imagine Festival together, is neither concrete nor active in many people's perceptions.
This is important because vocabulary shapes our impression of the world in which we live.
People have words for the things they need to talk about -- or are in the habit of talking about. The Inuit, for example, famously describe snow in very precise terms most likely because precise descriptions are critical to their survival.
But beyond language reflecting our world, one linguistic theory holds we may be able to perceive only what we have language for and not be aware of things we cannot name.
The words of war in our culture are pervasive and concrete: battalion, flank, troops, skirmish, battle. We use them often in our everyday business & sports metaphors: warrior spirit, battle for supremacy, the most dangerous weapon in the offense, shotgun formations, blitz, sacks, my ideas were shot down, your criticisms were on target....
These war phases are familiar and heavily color our view of and approach to our world.
The words of peace could develop as much richness, concreteness and color, if we choose to give them such attention.
I suggest that describing peace more precisely is critical to our survival.
If the word "peace" is nebulous, it will be all the more difficult to figure out how to get there.
If we describe a location as "North America," do we turn north or south from here?
So what exactly do we mean by "peace"?
For me, the form is not the place to start in creating anything. I find it more useful to describe the experience. What would that world feel like to live in?
With that in mind, in the next blog, I will list what I consider to be the top characteristics of this world at peace.
But what exactly are we working toward?
The word "peace," I've come to realize over the years of putting Imagine Festival together, is neither concrete nor active in many people's perceptions.
This is important because vocabulary shapes our impression of the world in which we live.
People have words for the things they need to talk about -- or are in the habit of talking about. The Inuit, for example, famously describe snow in very precise terms most likely because precise descriptions are critical to their survival.
But beyond language reflecting our world, one linguistic theory holds we may be able to perceive only what we have language for and not be aware of things we cannot name.
The words of war in our culture are pervasive and concrete: battalion, flank, troops, skirmish, battle. We use them often in our everyday business & sports metaphors: warrior spirit, battle for supremacy, the most dangerous weapon in the offense, shotgun formations, blitz, sacks, my ideas were shot down, your criticisms were on target....
These war phases are familiar and heavily color our view of and approach to our world.
The words of peace could develop as much richness, concreteness and color, if we choose to give them such attention.
I suggest that describing peace more precisely is critical to our survival.
If the word "peace" is nebulous, it will be all the more difficult to figure out how to get there.
If we describe a location as "North America," do we turn north or south from here?
So what exactly do we mean by "peace"?
For me, the form is not the place to start in creating anything. I find it more useful to describe the experience. What would that world feel like to live in?
With that in mind, in the next blog, I will list what I consider to be the top characteristics of this world at peace.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Yes to Department of Peace
A formal Department of Peace is not only aligned with our country’s core mission, but also would be one of the fastest routes to our own well-being.
Sixty one years ago on D-Day, my uncle, of the 13th-18th Tank Regiment QMO Hussars in the British Army, was on the first tank to land on the shore of Sword Beach, Normandy. His arrival met with a rain of gunfire to drench that sand with blood and scatter the parts of his companions' bodies.
My uncle somehow survived. He returned early last June to the commemoration on the pale cream sand of a peaceful Europe – his country’s former bitter enemy, Germany, participating in the ceremonies.
BBC News reporter Alan Little, commenting on those events, reminded me: "What subsequent generations have taken for granted – peace between the European powers – was not true of the world into which these men were born. It is the achievement of their generation."
The peace in Europe we all now do take for granted was barely conceivable then, after centuries of decimating wars. But it exists now.
How? It was created by leaders who believed it possible and who worked to create the bonds of trust, cooperation and respect that allowed it not just to exist, but to flourish.
Likewise, the global economy did not pop, fully formed, out of thin air. It was built by leaders who believed it possible and worked to make it happen.
It is remarkable to me that most European nations, not long ago hurling cannonballs with frequent ferocity, now trust each other enough to share the same currency and cross borders with little more than a wave.
No less a vision is needed now. We must work toward global peace with the same determination, the same belief in its possibility.
It can be the achievement of our generation.
A formal Department of Peace practically as well as symbolically demonstrates that this country is committed to pursue and intends to build that state we would all choose – that of peace between all.
Practically, a Department of Peace would research and facilitate nonviolent solutions to domestic and international conflict.
It would support and coordinate programs that cultivate respect, that honor the capability of people to create remarkable solutions, that instill the skills necessary to work from cooperation instead of confrontation. It would coordinate proven and effective strategies that reduce violence.
In short, the Department of Peace would guide this nation to nurture the social conditions that result in a positive peace.
Symbolically, a Department of Peace is aligned with our nation's core mission. We were founded on the truth of the unalienable rights of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Peace would open the doors to the greatest potential expansion of all of these rights.
We are at the moment predominantly a reactive nation. We wait for the heart attack before we examine our way of living. As many are now realizing, cultivating the conditions of health is a more effective strategy than hoping you can recover from a heart attack.
In the same manner, we can actively cultivate conditions of peace. They are well known. It is simply that we have yet to fully commit to them.
Creating this Department of Peace would indicate our commitment and our choice to actively pursue a more effective strategy for our long-term security that happens to coincide with our highest ideals, our grandest dream. That, surely, is how any person, and I suggest by extension any nation, feels most fulfilled.
One thing is certain: peace will not arise without the intention to create it.
Setting this intention could be the most majestic legacy this nation could ever leave.
Sixty one years ago on D-Day, my uncle, of the 13th-18th Tank Regiment QMO Hussars in the British Army, was on the first tank to land on the shore of Sword Beach, Normandy. His arrival met with a rain of gunfire to drench that sand with blood and scatter the parts of his companions' bodies.
My uncle somehow survived. He returned early last June to the commemoration on the pale cream sand of a peaceful Europe – his country’s former bitter enemy, Germany, participating in the ceremonies.
BBC News reporter Alan Little, commenting on those events, reminded me: "What subsequent generations have taken for granted – peace between the European powers – was not true of the world into which these men were born. It is the achievement of their generation."
The peace in Europe we all now do take for granted was barely conceivable then, after centuries of decimating wars. But it exists now.
How? It was created by leaders who believed it possible and who worked to create the bonds of trust, cooperation and respect that allowed it not just to exist, but to flourish.
Likewise, the global economy did not pop, fully formed, out of thin air. It was built by leaders who believed it possible and worked to make it happen.
It is remarkable to me that most European nations, not long ago hurling cannonballs with frequent ferocity, now trust each other enough to share the same currency and cross borders with little more than a wave.
No less a vision is needed now. We must work toward global peace with the same determination, the same belief in its possibility.
It can be the achievement of our generation.
A formal Department of Peace practically as well as symbolically demonstrates that this country is committed to pursue and intends to build that state we would all choose – that of peace between all.
Practically, a Department of Peace would research and facilitate nonviolent solutions to domestic and international conflict.
It would support and coordinate programs that cultivate respect, that honor the capability of people to create remarkable solutions, that instill the skills necessary to work from cooperation instead of confrontation. It would coordinate proven and effective strategies that reduce violence.
In short, the Department of Peace would guide this nation to nurture the social conditions that result in a positive peace.
Symbolically, a Department of Peace is aligned with our nation's core mission. We were founded on the truth of the unalienable rights of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Peace would open the doors to the greatest potential expansion of all of these rights.
We are at the moment predominantly a reactive nation. We wait for the heart attack before we examine our way of living. As many are now realizing, cultivating the conditions of health is a more effective strategy than hoping you can recover from a heart attack.
In the same manner, we can actively cultivate conditions of peace. They are well known. It is simply that we have yet to fully commit to them.
Creating this Department of Peace would indicate our commitment and our choice to actively pursue a more effective strategy for our long-term security that happens to coincide with our highest ideals, our grandest dream. That, surely, is how any person, and I suggest by extension any nation, feels most fulfilled.
One thing is certain: peace will not arise without the intention to create it.
Setting this intention could be the most majestic legacy this nation could ever leave.
Friday, September 09, 2005
Worth of a Human
"We were left behind on the side of the road like yesterday's trash." -- woman in the Houston shelter on Oprah's show Wednesday.
The unfolding truth of the lack of regard for the poor, especially the poor and black, has dramatically revealed itself in New Orleans. Is it right to treat human beings like yesterday's garbage?
The ugliest aspects of our prevailing attitude are coming to light -- we are seeing the consequences of a long standing bias toward wealth, the consequences of long standing racism and self interest and it is sickening most of us. We've found an infestation of cockroaches in our own supposedly pristine cupboard. The cockroaches are the beliefs that money is the only thing that matters, that race is a determinant of the value of a human being.
We knew it was there -- we didn't realize it was that bad. Guess we don't open that cupboard often enough.
Once we see the cockroaches, finally, we get to decide what to do about the infestation. We get to examine what does truly matter and what humans deserve simply because they are human.
History has propelled us toward the conclusion that human beings deserve honor and respect as a consequence of the simple truth that they are human and alive.
If that is the conclusion we draw, then we need to turn to those most disadvantaged and say we are sorry. We have not, by any means, been widely acting on that belief. Not in the day-to-day.
We also need to turn to that part of ourselves that holds the secret belief that we are not worthy of being rescued. What do I possibly have to offer this world? That part of us resides in us still. It occurred to me yesterday that much of religions are based on the very idea of the unworthy human who must be saved or made right. No wonder we feel unworthy at some deep level.
Now this seems at odds with the conclusion that humans deserve respect and honor simply because we are human. We'll have to sort that one out.
In this grand sorting out, let us be kind to one another. Let's loudly demonstrate to those from the Gulf who have been devastated that we believe they do deserve honor and dignity and respect, without condition, because they are human on this earth.
The unfolding truth of the lack of regard for the poor, especially the poor and black, has dramatically revealed itself in New Orleans. Is it right to treat human beings like yesterday's garbage?
The ugliest aspects of our prevailing attitude are coming to light -- we are seeing the consequences of a long standing bias toward wealth, the consequences of long standing racism and self interest and it is sickening most of us. We've found an infestation of cockroaches in our own supposedly pristine cupboard. The cockroaches are the beliefs that money is the only thing that matters, that race is a determinant of the value of a human being.
We knew it was there -- we didn't realize it was that bad. Guess we don't open that cupboard often enough.
Once we see the cockroaches, finally, we get to decide what to do about the infestation. We get to examine what does truly matter and what humans deserve simply because they are human.
History has propelled us toward the conclusion that human beings deserve honor and respect as a consequence of the simple truth that they are human and alive.
If that is the conclusion we draw, then we need to turn to those most disadvantaged and say we are sorry. We have not, by any means, been widely acting on that belief. Not in the day-to-day.
We also need to turn to that part of ourselves that holds the secret belief that we are not worthy of being rescued. What do I possibly have to offer this world? That part of us resides in us still. It occurred to me yesterday that much of religions are based on the very idea of the unworthy human who must be saved or made right. No wonder we feel unworthy at some deep level.
Now this seems at odds with the conclusion that humans deserve respect and honor simply because we are human. We'll have to sort that one out.
In this grand sorting out, let us be kind to one another. Let's loudly demonstrate to those from the Gulf who have been devastated that we believe they do deserve honor and dignity and respect, without condition, because they are human on this earth.
Monday, September 05, 2005
The search for new solid ground
"The people we see suffering on television are our brothers and sisters. It's incumbent on all of us, as American citizens and fellow human beings, to do our part to help them through this terrible tragedy." Chicago Mayor Richard Daley on Sept 2.
The old solid ground is giving way, sinking like New Orleans. What we thought we stood on has crumbled -- we're coming to realize this with the inescapable evidence from New Orleans and the Gulf coast after Katrina. The institutions of government do not support us as they exist now. At every level, government has demonstrated clearly that they cannot care for the most vulnerable. When that happens, we lose faith that they can care for any of us. The rumblings of that realization are vibrating through our entire culture right now. It has woken me up with nausea at 4 AM.
As a writer, I can see the metaphor our subconscious is likely grappling with: Do any of the institutions we've relied on have anything to give us? Or do we find the places we've been ordered to go barren and quickly become hell with no escape? That we're used to relying on institutions for answers makes this question deeply disturbing.
If we needed proof of our concerns about the focus of current institutions, we've received it. If we needed proof that money is the only thing we consistently value, we've got that.
This neglect manifesting dramatically is the direct result of long-standing ways of treating each other -- ways we've grown used to -- but the underlying ugliness is being made clear to us now. One example is excruciatingly painful:
Rescue 'ticket'
Posted: 6:24 p.m. ET Sept 5, 2005
CNN's Drew Griffin in New Orleans, Louisiana
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/05/scene.blog/index.html
"I am stunned by an interview I conducted with New Orleans Detective Lawrence Dupree. He told me they were trying to rescue people with a helicopter and the people were so poor they were afraid it would cost too much to get a ride and they had no money for a "ticket." Dupree was shaken telling us the story. He just couldn't believe these people were afraid they'd be charged for a rescue."
Human beings in New Orleans hold the belief that they are too poor to matter to anyone... that no one would go out of their way... that the only reason they'd be rescued is if they had enough money. Are they far wrong based on what we've seen? The squalid Superdome evacuation was interrupted on Friday when school busses pulled up so 700 well-dressed guests of the Hyatt Hotel could move to the head of the evacuation line.
“How does this work? They (are) clean, they are dry, they get out ahead of us?” exclaimed Howard Blue, 22, who tried to get in their line. The National Guard blocked him as other guardsmen helped the well-dressed guests with their luggage. The 700 had been trapped in the hotel, near the Superdome, but conditions were considerably cleaner, even without running water, than the unsanitary crush inside the dome. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9175611/page/2/
Is this the message we want our nation regularly communicating to its citizens with every daily interaction? Is this what we secretly believe too, and it utterly frightens us? Is this how we want to be?
Now we need to own our ability to respond. We need a crash course on how to evaluate and be honest with ourselves about what's going on in our own hearts. You can be sure we are not being taught these skills in school or at work. Perhaps we can make space enough to teach each other anyway.
My deepest wish is that you can make use of this vessel of Imagine Festival to find solace, comfort, connection. New solid ground, if you will. A space within which grows the belief in the capacity of the human heart and soul, a belief that we are perfectly capable and perfectly enough to take up the ability to respond to what we see with our own eyes and know with our own hearts.
The old solid ground is giving way, sinking like New Orleans. What we thought we stood on has crumbled -- we're coming to realize this with the inescapable evidence from New Orleans and the Gulf coast after Katrina. The institutions of government do not support us as they exist now. At every level, government has demonstrated clearly that they cannot care for the most vulnerable. When that happens, we lose faith that they can care for any of us. The rumblings of that realization are vibrating through our entire culture right now. It has woken me up with nausea at 4 AM.
As a writer, I can see the metaphor our subconscious is likely grappling with: Do any of the institutions we've relied on have anything to give us? Or do we find the places we've been ordered to go barren and quickly become hell with no escape? That we're used to relying on institutions for answers makes this question deeply disturbing.
If we needed proof of our concerns about the focus of current institutions, we've received it. If we needed proof that money is the only thing we consistently value, we've got that.
This neglect manifesting dramatically is the direct result of long-standing ways of treating each other -- ways we've grown used to -- but the underlying ugliness is being made clear to us now. One example is excruciatingly painful:
Rescue 'ticket'
Posted: 6:24 p.m. ET Sept 5, 2005
CNN's Drew Griffin in New Orleans, Louisiana
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/05/scene.blog/index.html
"I am stunned by an interview I conducted with New Orleans Detective Lawrence Dupree. He told me they were trying to rescue people with a helicopter and the people were so poor they were afraid it would cost too much to get a ride and they had no money for a "ticket." Dupree was shaken telling us the story. He just couldn't believe these people were afraid they'd be charged for a rescue."
Human beings in New Orleans hold the belief that they are too poor to matter to anyone... that no one would go out of their way... that the only reason they'd be rescued is if they had enough money. Are they far wrong based on what we've seen? The squalid Superdome evacuation was interrupted on Friday when school busses pulled up so 700 well-dressed guests of the Hyatt Hotel could move to the head of the evacuation line.
“How does this work? They (are) clean, they are dry, they get out ahead of us?” exclaimed Howard Blue, 22, who tried to get in their line. The National Guard blocked him as other guardsmen helped the well-dressed guests with their luggage. The 700 had been trapped in the hotel, near the Superdome, but conditions were considerably cleaner, even without running water, than the unsanitary crush inside the dome. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9175611/page/2/
Is this the message we want our nation regularly communicating to its citizens with every daily interaction? Is this what we secretly believe too, and it utterly frightens us? Is this how we want to be?
Now we need to own our ability to respond. We need a crash course on how to evaluate and be honest with ourselves about what's going on in our own hearts. You can be sure we are not being taught these skills in school or at work. Perhaps we can make space enough to teach each other anyway.
My deepest wish is that you can make use of this vessel of Imagine Festival to find solace, comfort, connection. New solid ground, if you will. A space within which grows the belief in the capacity of the human heart and soul, a belief that we are perfectly capable and perfectly enough to take up the ability to respond to what we see with our own eyes and know with our own hearts.
Friday, September 02, 2005
Shame
We are a proud lot, we Americans. We think very highly of ourselves and our abilities. It rallies us through much adversity.
But pride becomes arrogance when we ignore our flaws, don't listen, aren't sensitive.
Now we see the third world brought to one of our most beloved cities. Our city. In many ways, one of our most central hearts of culture.
I've heard it said in my travels that New Orleans is so precious it doesn't deserve to be in the United States -- we don't appreciate it.
We, in this country, hang our heads now. We feel shame that these are our citizens, in our country. It looks like a horror in Haiti.
We have failed somewhere and we dread to look at it.
The failure of government manifests broadly, at every level.
Chicago Mayor Richard Daley exclaimed, "I was shocked. We are ready to provide considerably more help than they have requested," the mayor said, barely able to contain his anger during a City Hall news conference. "We are just waiting for the call.
"The people we see suffering on television are our brothers and sisters," Daley said. "It's incumbent on all of us, as American citizens and fellow human beings, to do our part to help them through this terrible tragedy."
According to the Chicago Tribune, in the event of a disaster, the city offered to send 44 Chicago Fire Department rescue and medical personnel and their gear, more than 100 Chicago police officers, 140 Streets and Sanitation, 146 Public Health and 8 Human Services workers, and a fleet of vehicles including 29 trucks, two boats and a mobile clinic.
"So far FEMA has requested only one piece of equipment -- a tank truck to support the Illinois Emergency Response Team, which is already down there," Daley said. "The tank truck is on its way. We are awaiting further instructions from FEMA."
When government cannot care for those most vulnerable, we lose faith that it can care for any of us.
Did it not occur to planners that evacuation plans that relied on private ownership of vehicles would leave 100,000 and more behind? There are those who cannot buy a car. There are those who cannot drive.
Telling prejudices arise: From Harper's Index, August:
Number of bars visited this spring by an undercover team investigating racial discrimination: 40
Percentage of bars that charged black customers more than white customers: 40
That statistic is horrible. Something is very wrong with how we've been treating each other on a daily, basic level.
We now are forced to examine all of it. I pray we find in it a path to a better nation -- to see the brothers and sisters around us, who have always been there, on a daily, basic level.
But pride becomes arrogance when we ignore our flaws, don't listen, aren't sensitive.
Now we see the third world brought to one of our most beloved cities. Our city. In many ways, one of our most central hearts of culture.
I've heard it said in my travels that New Orleans is so precious it doesn't deserve to be in the United States -- we don't appreciate it.
We, in this country, hang our heads now. We feel shame that these are our citizens, in our country. It looks like a horror in Haiti.
We have failed somewhere and we dread to look at it.
The failure of government manifests broadly, at every level.
Chicago Mayor Richard Daley exclaimed, "I was shocked. We are ready to provide considerably more help than they have requested," the mayor said, barely able to contain his anger during a City Hall news conference. "We are just waiting for the call.
"The people we see suffering on television are our brothers and sisters," Daley said. "It's incumbent on all of us, as American citizens and fellow human beings, to do our part to help them through this terrible tragedy."
According to the Chicago Tribune, in the event of a disaster, the city offered to send 44 Chicago Fire Department rescue and medical personnel and their gear, more than 100 Chicago police officers, 140 Streets and Sanitation, 146 Public Health and 8 Human Services workers, and a fleet of vehicles including 29 trucks, two boats and a mobile clinic.
"So far FEMA has requested only one piece of equipment -- a tank truck to support the Illinois Emergency Response Team, which is already down there," Daley said. "The tank truck is on its way. We are awaiting further instructions from FEMA."
When government cannot care for those most vulnerable, we lose faith that it can care for any of us.
Did it not occur to planners that evacuation plans that relied on private ownership of vehicles would leave 100,000 and more behind? There are those who cannot buy a car. There are those who cannot drive.
Telling prejudices arise: From Harper's Index, August:
Number of bars visited this spring by an undercover team investigating racial discrimination: 40
Percentage of bars that charged black customers more than white customers: 40
That statistic is horrible. Something is very wrong with how we've been treating each other on a daily, basic level.
We now are forced to examine all of it. I pray we find in it a path to a better nation -- to see the brothers and sisters around us, who have always been there, on a daily, basic level.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Sinking beneath waters
The devastation of the Gulf is heartbreaking. Hopelessness and despair in the faces of so many. The stories are causing journalists to breakdown -- jaded journalists. My heart goes out to them, to us.
I had read about the catastrophe waiting to happen in New Orleans last year in the Global Warning issue of National Geographic. Here it is almost to the picture.
We could have fixed the levees -- apparently the problems were well known. But we went on with our usual lives instead.
Look folks, the earth isn't kidding around here. With global warming, storms are going to get more severe and more frequent. High water temperatures are a key ingredient in hurricanes, and ocean water temperature is increasing. Katrina was so severe in part because the water all over the Gulf was solidly hot.
We can't walk around in a stupor thinking that what we're in the habit of doing is gonna be just fine forever and ever.
Like the guy who's just had a heart attack, we're gonna have to make some changes to how we're living. The heart attack guy has to change his diet, his exercise routine, how he handles stress. We too need to change what we're doing.
They're just habits. We can form healthier ones. Find other more nurturing ways to interact with this planet.
Collectively, we can identify with the folks in New Orleans. We've had dreams of sinking beneath waters. What are those dreams trying to tell us?
We know what we need to do. We dare not ignore these warnings.
Let us not kick ourselves as the climate collapses, saying we could have averted this disaster, but we went on with our usual lives instead.
I had read about the catastrophe waiting to happen in New Orleans last year in the Global Warning issue of National Geographic. Here it is almost to the picture.
We could have fixed the levees -- apparently the problems were well known. But we went on with our usual lives instead.
Look folks, the earth isn't kidding around here. With global warming, storms are going to get more severe and more frequent. High water temperatures are a key ingredient in hurricanes, and ocean water temperature is increasing. Katrina was so severe in part because the water all over the Gulf was solidly hot.
We can't walk around in a stupor thinking that what we're in the habit of doing is gonna be just fine forever and ever.
Like the guy who's just had a heart attack, we're gonna have to make some changes to how we're living. The heart attack guy has to change his diet, his exercise routine, how he handles stress. We too need to change what we're doing.
They're just habits. We can form healthier ones. Find other more nurturing ways to interact with this planet.
Collectively, we can identify with the folks in New Orleans. We've had dreams of sinking beneath waters. What are those dreams trying to tell us?
We know what we need to do. We dare not ignore these warnings.
Let us not kick ourselves as the climate collapses, saying we could have averted this disaster, but we went on with our usual lives instead.
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Social permission to help each other
I woke yesterday at 5:00am California time feeling very uncomfortable. What's going on, I tried to figure out. Pre-earthquake jitters? Oh... then I realized in my groggy anxiety, Katrina is about to hit land.
I turned on the television and saw Katrina's menacing red flames swirling on the radar just off land's edge.
The thought came to me in that state between sleep and wake: Earth looks pretty angry right now.
I acknowledged the anger, since that's what it looked like. God knows, Earth sure has some pretty damn good reasons to be mad, if she is. I'd be mad if I were her.
I meditated -- sent soothing thoughts to Earth and to the people of that area. Prayers for a long while till I fell off to sleep again.
When I woke three hours later, Katrina had been downgraded from a category 4 to a category 3 storm. Earth calmed down a bit.
Another thought came to me: in these huge catastrophes, we give ourselves social permission to be kind to one another, to strangers. We go about rescuing, sharing, sheltering people we don't know. As if they were important to us.
Is that what it takes for us to get it? Disasters?
It takes disasters for us to be compassionate with each other?
Just conjecture here, but since, as I said in my last post, we're set up to expect to be loved without condition, my guess is we are also set up to draw to us what we hunger for. In the current state of the world, expressions of unconditional love are so rare. Virtually the only time we see it expressed in a large way is in the middle of disasters.
If, as quantum physics suggests, the universe responds to what we're subconsciously needing, maybe in this time of widespread shutting off from each other, disasters are the only tried and true mechanism we know of to elicit widespread unconditional love. To open our hearts.
If it is, that is a damn sad state of affairs.
I say we don't need to wait for disasters to give ourselves the social food we are all craving. Let's give ourselves social permission right now to care about each other and act on it, for no other reason than it's what we're all so hungry for.
I turned on the television and saw Katrina's menacing red flames swirling on the radar just off land's edge.
The thought came to me in that state between sleep and wake: Earth looks pretty angry right now.
I acknowledged the anger, since that's what it looked like. God knows, Earth sure has some pretty damn good reasons to be mad, if she is. I'd be mad if I were her.
I meditated -- sent soothing thoughts to Earth and to the people of that area. Prayers for a long while till I fell off to sleep again.
When I woke three hours later, Katrina had been downgraded from a category 4 to a category 3 storm. Earth calmed down a bit.
Another thought came to me: in these huge catastrophes, we give ourselves social permission to be kind to one another, to strangers. We go about rescuing, sharing, sheltering people we don't know. As if they were important to us.
Is that what it takes for us to get it? Disasters?
It takes disasters for us to be compassionate with each other?
Just conjecture here, but since, as I said in my last post, we're set up to expect to be loved without condition, my guess is we are also set up to draw to us what we hunger for. In the current state of the world, expressions of unconditional love are so rare. Virtually the only time we see it expressed in a large way is in the middle of disasters.
If, as quantum physics suggests, the universe responds to what we're subconsciously needing, maybe in this time of widespread shutting off from each other, disasters are the only tried and true mechanism we know of to elicit widespread unconditional love. To open our hearts.
If it is, that is a damn sad state of affairs.
I say we don't need to wait for disasters to give ourselves the social food we are all craving. Let's give ourselves social permission right now to care about each other and act on it, for no other reason than it's what we're all so hungry for.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
What we're doing is well worth doing
The pause in my blogging has been a regrouping, a shift in many things. Ultimately a decision on my part that what I'm doing is worth doing. What I'm pursuing is worth pursuing.
Inspired really by a Kris Kristofferson song I heard anew at a Western Beat tribute night a few months ago in a local joint, Highland Grounds -- a night conceived by Americana list goddess Bliss (www.americanarootsla.net).
"’cause I think what they've done is well worth doin'
And they'’re doin'’ it the best way that they can..."
The song's about all the great musicians in Nashville at the time (1976) that everyone was poo-pooing: Hank Williams, Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson.... You know those legends... well, folks didn't all like them back then.
"And if you don't like Hank Williams, honey, you can kiss my ass."
I realized that on another level, the song was talking about now -- in the LA music scene first of all -- LA music is the most invigorated it's been in a decade, according to veterans, and it's all because of the renewed interest in roots and alt-country music, they tell me.
The Vaquetones, James Intveld, Mike Stinson are just a few of the talents I'm blessed to hear in this town every month...
I think that what they're doing is well worth doing.
I also realized that I needed to look at what I was doing in the same light -- that what I was doing was well worth doing and at the end of my life I would be proud of myself for pushing forward with this idea so few fully believe in or act as if it is possible.
Peace among the people on earth.
I know that it is possible. Not only that it's possible, but that it's our birthright. It's what we deserve. That's right -- we human beings deserve to be treated with honor, respect, appreciation. So do animals. So does the planet. All of us, not just some of us.
This is, I'm realizing, a radical idea.
It changes everything.
But I believe it's much more our human nature than the current predominant worldview would have us believe.
I've read psychological theories that describe how, as babies, we're set up from day one to expect to receive love, so we interpret any abuse we receive in early years as "love." Once we're grown, therefore, we create in our lives the very conditions that will recreate the abuse because our early experience wired our brains to subconsciously understand the abuse as nurturing "love."
Yikes.
So it's gonna take some rewiring. We can do that work.
The key here is that we COME IN expecting to be loved without condition.
Marianne Williamson spoke yesterday here in LA and told of a cruise she'd taken recently in Alaska. Some kayakers paddled by. All the folks on the cruise boat happily waved and the kayakers happily waved back. Wait a minute, Marianne thought, how'd you know you'd even like these guys? The observation prompted her thought that it's the natural initial tendency of human beings to treat each other like brothers and sisters.
The millennium, for example, she said, was a worldwide party -- people riding on the Subway in NYC even spoke to each other -- but the day itself wasn't different from any other day, in truth. The sole difference was, on that day, we gave ourselves social permission to treat each other like brothers and sisters. Social permission. That's all that was necessary for the natural tendency to take over.
Here's another radical idea... maybe all that's needed is to drop the BS that stops us from seeing each other as brothers and sisters.
To me, as a rose is a rose is a rose, a human is a human is a human. The species is defined by DNA -- and we all share pretty much all of it.
So I press on. Doing it the best way that I can.
The best way for me is through nurturing self worth and joy in the world. Imagine Festival is one engine for that. To open the possibility that solutions are before us all the time, we simply need to discover how to apply them. To create spaces that perhaps will help people run into the magic that is out there for them and bring it into their lives. To encourage folks to own their power. To take the steps we need to get to peace.
And to imagine beyond that... for me, peace is just the beginning.
Another Kris Kristofferson song caught my ear -- To Beat the Devil
"And you still can hear me singing to the people who don't listen
To the things that I am saying, praying someone's going to hear;
And I guess I'll die explaining how the things that they complain about
Are things they could be changing, hoping someone's goin' to care.
"I was born a lonely singer and I'm bound to die the same
But I've got to feed the hunger in my soul;
And if I never have a nickel I won't ever die of shame
’cause I don't believe that no-one wants to know!"
Thank you Kris -- I've decided not to believe that no one wants to know.
Inspired really by a Kris Kristofferson song I heard anew at a Western Beat tribute night a few months ago in a local joint, Highland Grounds -- a night conceived by Americana list goddess Bliss (www.americanarootsla.net).
"’cause I think what they've done is well worth doin'
And they'’re doin'’ it the best way that they can..."
The song's about all the great musicians in Nashville at the time (1976) that everyone was poo-pooing: Hank Williams, Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson.... You know those legends... well, folks didn't all like them back then.
"And if you don't like Hank Williams, honey, you can kiss my ass."
I realized that on another level, the song was talking about now -- in the LA music scene first of all -- LA music is the most invigorated it's been in a decade, according to veterans, and it's all because of the renewed interest in roots and alt-country music, they tell me.
The Vaquetones, James Intveld, Mike Stinson are just a few of the talents I'm blessed to hear in this town every month...
I think that what they're doing is well worth doing.
I also realized that I needed to look at what I was doing in the same light -- that what I was doing was well worth doing and at the end of my life I would be proud of myself for pushing forward with this idea so few fully believe in or act as if it is possible.
Peace among the people on earth.
I know that it is possible. Not only that it's possible, but that it's our birthright. It's what we deserve. That's right -- we human beings deserve to be treated with honor, respect, appreciation. So do animals. So does the planet. All of us, not just some of us.
This is, I'm realizing, a radical idea.
It changes everything.
But I believe it's much more our human nature than the current predominant worldview would have us believe.
I've read psychological theories that describe how, as babies, we're set up from day one to expect to receive love, so we interpret any abuse we receive in early years as "love." Once we're grown, therefore, we create in our lives the very conditions that will recreate the abuse because our early experience wired our brains to subconsciously understand the abuse as nurturing "love."
Yikes.
So it's gonna take some rewiring. We can do that work.
The key here is that we COME IN expecting to be loved without condition.
Marianne Williamson spoke yesterday here in LA and told of a cruise she'd taken recently in Alaska. Some kayakers paddled by. All the folks on the cruise boat happily waved and the kayakers happily waved back. Wait a minute, Marianne thought, how'd you know you'd even like these guys? The observation prompted her thought that it's the natural initial tendency of human beings to treat each other like brothers and sisters.
The millennium, for example, she said, was a worldwide party -- people riding on the Subway in NYC even spoke to each other -- but the day itself wasn't different from any other day, in truth. The sole difference was, on that day, we gave ourselves social permission to treat each other like brothers and sisters. Social permission. That's all that was necessary for the natural tendency to take over.
Here's another radical idea... maybe all that's needed is to drop the BS that stops us from seeing each other as brothers and sisters.
To me, as a rose is a rose is a rose, a human is a human is a human. The species is defined by DNA -- and we all share pretty much all of it.
So I press on. Doing it the best way that I can.
The best way for me is through nurturing self worth and joy in the world. Imagine Festival is one engine for that. To open the possibility that solutions are before us all the time, we simply need to discover how to apply them. To create spaces that perhaps will help people run into the magic that is out there for them and bring it into their lives. To encourage folks to own their power. To take the steps we need to get to peace.
And to imagine beyond that... for me, peace is just the beginning.
Another Kris Kristofferson song caught my ear -- To Beat the Devil
"And you still can hear me singing to the people who don't listen
To the things that I am saying, praying someone's going to hear;
And I guess I'll die explaining how the things that they complain about
Are things they could be changing, hoping someone's goin' to care.
"I was born a lonely singer and I'm bound to die the same
But I've got to feed the hunger in my soul;
And if I never have a nickel I won't ever die of shame
’cause I don't believe that no-one wants to know!"
Thank you Kris -- I've decided not to believe that no one wants to know.
Friday, April 15, 2005
Productivity of Prostitution
The most wrenching moment during the Prevent Impaired Driving Event on Capitol Hill last week for me surprisingly had nothing to do with the event subject itself. It was my overhearing a conversation between two of our guests.
"What do you do?" one asked.
"I'm a lobbyist," said the other.
"What do you lobby for?" asked the first man.
"Whatever they pay me for," said the second.
Whatever they pay me for?! My stomach turned.
I didn't want to see who it was, didn't want to know the prostitute in our midst.
The worst blow came when the man he was talking to didn't even raise a challenge.
Couldn't he respond: "So you are one of those soulless drones who may be bought by the chemical companies, the pharmaceutical companies, the oil companies currently on a path to undermine our planet, our health and life on earth! How can you sleep at night? When you get up in the morning, what do you see in the mirror?"
I wanted to scream and shake the life out of him. Or into him.
But then I realized that's exactly how so many people I know regard their jobs -- they'll do whatever they get paid for.
The country is grinding its productivity out of widespread prostitution.
We accept subsuming our beliefs for money. We accept prostituting ourselves for money. We do what we hate for money. This has become not only acceptable, but the NORM. It's EXPECTED.
People AGREE to become parking-ticket givers. People AGREE to work for collection agencies to call people and pressure them for money they don't have. People AGREE to be attorneys for the tobacco industry.
Who likes parking tickets, or collection agency calls? Who thinks the tobacco industry is a positive force in the world?
Doing stuff we would hate to receive kills us, in my opinion.
Starting wars we would hate to have on our soil kills us too, in my opinion.
I persist in the belief that it cannot remain this way for much longer. It's an energy deficit. We spend much more energy doing stuff we hate than doing stuff we love.
I'd be willing to bet that people who work in the jobs they hate are sick and injured from all causes far more often than people doing jobs they love.
It goes without saying that it affects our souls. More practically, for those in practical mode, I also believe it directly affects productivity in a broad and wide way.
This country is not in a position to afford such effects anymore. We can't afford the depression in productivity. We can't afford the health costs either.
As far as I've read, we are teetering on the edge of economic meltdown.
We must change.
Important change like this can happen only by one person after another making a different decision, a different choice.
Choose to do only what you would agree to do without money. In your mind, take money out of the equation for a minute when choosing your actions today.
Then choose to bring to yourself money for making the choices that sit well in your heart. It's pretty much that simple.
When one person does this, he or she becomes an example and an influence to everyone he or she knows. That's how things shift. That's how the country can shift.
"What do you do?" one asked.
"I'm a lobbyist," said the other.
"What do you lobby for?" asked the first man.
"Whatever they pay me for," said the second.
Whatever they pay me for?! My stomach turned.
I didn't want to see who it was, didn't want to know the prostitute in our midst.
The worst blow came when the man he was talking to didn't even raise a challenge.
Couldn't he respond: "So you are one of those soulless drones who may be bought by the chemical companies, the pharmaceutical companies, the oil companies currently on a path to undermine our planet, our health and life on earth! How can you sleep at night? When you get up in the morning, what do you see in the mirror?"
I wanted to scream and shake the life out of him. Or into him.
But then I realized that's exactly how so many people I know regard their jobs -- they'll do whatever they get paid for.
The country is grinding its productivity out of widespread prostitution.
We accept subsuming our beliefs for money. We accept prostituting ourselves for money. We do what we hate for money. This has become not only acceptable, but the NORM. It's EXPECTED.
People AGREE to become parking-ticket givers. People AGREE to work for collection agencies to call people and pressure them for money they don't have. People AGREE to be attorneys for the tobacco industry.
Who likes parking tickets, or collection agency calls? Who thinks the tobacco industry is a positive force in the world?
Doing stuff we would hate to receive kills us, in my opinion.
Starting wars we would hate to have on our soil kills us too, in my opinion.
I persist in the belief that it cannot remain this way for much longer. It's an energy deficit. We spend much more energy doing stuff we hate than doing stuff we love.
I'd be willing to bet that people who work in the jobs they hate are sick and injured from all causes far more often than people doing jobs they love.
It goes without saying that it affects our souls. More practically, for those in practical mode, I also believe it directly affects productivity in a broad and wide way.
This country is not in a position to afford such effects anymore. We can't afford the depression in productivity. We can't afford the health costs either.
As far as I've read, we are teetering on the edge of economic meltdown.
We must change.
Important change like this can happen only by one person after another making a different decision, a different choice.
Choose to do only what you would agree to do without money. In your mind, take money out of the equation for a minute when choosing your actions today.
Then choose to bring to yourself money for making the choices that sit well in your heart. It's pretty much that simple.
When one person does this, he or she becomes an example and an influence to everyone he or she knows. That's how things shift. That's how the country can shift.
Changing Minds on Capitol Hill
Last week, April 6, I went to Capitol Hill with AWAKE Community to present to Congress an event intended to reinvigorate and bring together the groups involved in the effort to prevent impaired driving, the most prevalent violent crime in the country.
The event was a strong success -- many of the different groups involved in the effort to prevent drunk driving gathered in the same room together -- many for the first time.
I know, it may come as a shock, but the different organizations, due to conflicting opinions of the best approach to solve the issue and a mindset that each is competing for limited donor dollars, hate each other.
Okay, hate may be a strong word, but visceral dislike is pretty accurate.
I worked with AWAKE Community to create a film and music and art performance that would remove the us vs them view and thank personal, everyday heroes who have kept tragedies from happening.
By the end of the evening, minds were changed.
Not only did the various groups acknowledge each other, but also a deeper change occurred.
One man came up to my colleague and said, "You changed my mind -- I drink and drive, and I never listened because the messages were so holier than thou. But you guys are just like me... you've done it too and you're not afraid to be open about that. I can listen to you."
That to me was exactly what I wanted to accomplish with the film.
The event was a strong success -- many of the different groups involved in the effort to prevent drunk driving gathered in the same room together -- many for the first time.
I know, it may come as a shock, but the different organizations, due to conflicting opinions of the best approach to solve the issue and a mindset that each is competing for limited donor dollars, hate each other.
Okay, hate may be a strong word, but visceral dislike is pretty accurate.
I worked with AWAKE Community to create a film and music and art performance that would remove the us vs them view and thank personal, everyday heroes who have kept tragedies from happening.
By the end of the evening, minds were changed.
Not only did the various groups acknowledge each other, but also a deeper change occurred.
One man came up to my colleague and said, "You changed my mind -- I drink and drive, and I never listened because the messages were so holier than thou. But you guys are just like me... you've done it too and you're not afraid to be open about that. I can listen to you."
That to me was exactly what I wanted to accomplish with the film.
Monday, February 14, 2005
Monday, January 31, 2005
Women's rights put to test in Iraq (Boston Globe)
Another article describing the situation for women in Iraq...
Boston Globe: Women's rights put to test in Iraq
By María Cristina Caballer January 30, 2005
THE FATE of Iraqi women's rights rests on the outcome of today's election. Zainab Al-Suwaij and Ala Talabani, two prominent Iraqi women leaders, say the elections will decide whether women will really become equal citizens or lose their voices.
Women are the majority in Iraq: 55 of every 100 citizens. And for the first time, the interim constitution guarantees at least a quarter of the 275 seats in Iraq's new National Assembly to women.
But Al-Suwaij and Talabani have spoken out against the efforts of some conservatives and religious extremists to limit the role of women in the new Iraq, and to impose restrictions on the feminine majority. ''Some are using violence -- shootings and car bombs -- to try to stop women from campaigning and being elected," Al-Suwaij says.
That women's rights are an explosive issue is a bitter reality for Al-Suwaij, 33, who grew up under the harsh rule of Saddam Hussein, took up arms against the Iraqi ruler, and today is working to bring democracy to a country that is struggling both with Hussein's legacy and an age-old authoritarian tradition. With her friend and comrade Talabani, Al-Suwaij has been working to ensure that freedom extends to all the population. This, they say, is a crucial moment for women in Iraq.
Before becoming a peace-wager, Al-Suwaij was a warrior -- and has the bullet scar on her cheek to prove it. At 20, during the 1991 Gulf War, she heeded the words of the first President Bush, who broadcast messages on Voice of America urging the Iraqi people to rebel against Hussein, promising US support. As an armed fighter, she helped open the gates of a prison where there was a human meat grinder for those who didn't confess. The promised support never arrived, and the battle-scarred veteran went into exile in the United States. Lately she has focused on training Iraqi women leaders about democracy. ''I called it Democracy 101," Al-Suwaij says.
As part of the program financed by $1.5 million from USAID, Al-Suwaij recently gathered 70 Iraqi women from nine provinces. Twenty-five of them are running for office in today's elections. ''Some of them have not had the opportunity to study higher education, but they are very smart and capable. Very impressive," she says.
Al-Suwaij especially admires the courage of Bedor Alyassri, 36, from Samwah. After the American occupation, Alyassri organized meetings among women, following her heart and her instincts.
''Bedor has been targeted for her work," says Al-Suwaij. ''She doesn't know exactly who is trying to assassinate her. Could be insurgents, or members of other political parties who don't like the fact that she is mobilizing many people."
Talabani, a civil engineer who has also been struggling to empower Iraqi women, was fired from her job for refusing to join Hussein's Baath party 15 years ago. After joining the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, she was detained by the Iraqi security service. In 1996, she went into exile in England and helped organize the Women's Union of Kurdistan. She recently trained 75 women in political leadership, and hopes that some will be elected today.
Even with some women guaranteed political posts today, the women of Iraq have a long way to go before Iraqi men treat them as political or social equals.
''In this first election, the candidates will be elected based upon religious orientation," Talabani said. ''This will be a party-based election, not based upon their points of view on issues or projects."
Both women fear that if extremists are elected, they might consider it a mandate to resurrect measures such as the infamous ''Resolution 137," an attempt to restrict women's rights ''by making religious Sharia family law into civil law." Al-Suwaij said Resolution 137 would not have allowed women to leave their houses without asking for permission from their husbands, while Talabani pointed out that the resolution would have allowed men to marry several women without going to a court.
Resolution 137 was defeated this past March. But today brings a fresh vote on women's status in Iraq. Talabani pointed out that Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, the man behind Resolution 137, is campaigning to become president. She strongly hopes he doesn't win.
Despite the many battles ahead, both women are hopeful; each would like someday to be president of a democratic Iraq. Then they could get some real work done.
''We, the women, are building bridges among cultural, ethnic, and religious divides," Talabani says.
Supporting Iraqi women leaders who are risking their lives to help rebuild their country should be a higher priority for the United States and the international community. It is necessary to multiply the resources being invested in this vital front. Iraqi women leaders are key players in this nation's struggle toward democracy. When the last US troops pull out, it will the Iraqi women who will try harder to keep the peace.
María Cristina Caballero is a fellow at Harvard University's Center for Public Leadership
Saturday, January 29, 2005
The truth about men and women may be too hot to handle.
I wrote this article today in response to an opinion piece in the Sunday Times.
Andrew Sullivan may be right, the truth about men and women may be too hot to handle.
I understand by his comments that Mr. Sullivan is not a scientist. Mr Sullivan’s nodding in agreement with Harvard president and chief blunderer Larry Summers’ as he raises the possibility that male preponderance at the very top of research science might have something to do with genetics – based on research results showing men were disproportionately represented at the very bottom and the very top of the table of science tests – betrays both Mr. Hopkins and Mr. Summers’ lack of scientific understanding and glaringly reveals their poorly hidden bigotry.
First of all, all the cited research study showed was a gender difference, not a genetic difference. To a scientist, these are completely different things. Genetics is simply one factor in a grand array of cultural, social and aptitudinal differences that emerge between men and women. The cultural conditioning and belief in what and how one “should” be as a boy or girl are introduced to babies at a very early age and reinforced by countless social cues throughout life. The presupposition that women are therefore incapable of reaching the “top” of anything because of their genetics is as absurd an assertion as saying that black men are incapable of great achievements because of their genetics. You do think THAT statement absurd, don’t you Mr. Sullivan? Not to mention that the definition of “top” and the value of achieving it in the first place I would assert are generally measures devised by men, not women, in positions of power.
The reaction of Professor Nancy Hopkins – “this kind of bias makes me physically ill” – is simple to explain: by now we can smell a chauvinist at 20 miles.
Women were kept out of top orchestras for eons on the belief that they couldn’t “handle” the physical strain of high level performance. It wasn’t until the practice of blind auditions was introduced that women were able to enter the male orchestra kingdom.
As another example, the professional organization for film directors in the US, the Directors Guild, is currently only 4% women. Are women genetically unable to tell good stories on film? Surely even a non-scientist can see the absurdity of that.
The only reason I didn’t seriously consider directing as a career until recently was that I didn’t SEE any women directors around. Subconsciously, I didn’t think it was possible. So I became a scientist, and a writer. Well, of course it was possible. Now I am a director, despite lack of role models.
That’s not to say I don’t see differences between men and women. These, however, are the ones you might find too hot to handle….
Since we have been graphically reminded this week, it is men who conjured up, designed and built the facilities for, and carried out the Holocaust, as well as every other genocide we’ve experienced.
It is men who divvied up the Middle East into arbitrary regions without regard for existing tribal affinities, which is at the bottom of the current disastrous continuous conflicts there which continue to threaten our world.
It is men who have been intransigent on both sides of the Israel – Arab conflict, refusing to see how they might live together on the same inhospitable spit of sand.
It is men who organized the original Crusades, men who organized the Inquisition, men who decided slavery was alright.
It is men who designed the burka and who undertake honour killings of “impure” women in many cultures, men who decided that such honour killings are misdemeanours.
Come to think of it, it is men who brought us every war known to this planet. Women – half of the planet – according to esteemed military historian John Keegan, have always and everywhere stood apart. With the rarest of exceptions, women don’t fight.
From such evidence, one can conclude that men are bad for humanity.
It is the spirit of cooperation, not confrontation that makes the world go around. Men, whether for genetic reasons or current gender upbringing, are notoriously confrontational. Surely I don’t need to show you crime data for you to accept that, Mr. Sullivan.
But that’s not all. Men brought us the industrial revolution, and concurrent belief that we could conquer our environment. The result of this path is that we are 10 years or less away from tipping the planet toward unstoppable global warming, a temperature rise beyond which the world would be irretrievably committed to disastrous change. That means widespread agricultural failure, water shortages and major droughts, increased disease, sea-level rise and the death of forests – with the added possibility of abrupt catastrophic events such as "runaway" global warming, the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, or the switching-off of the Gulf Stream, according to a major scientific report released this week.
It is easy to conclude from such evidence, that men are bad for the planet.
This grand, prolonged experiment now concludes. Perhaps women were curious to see what would happen to the planet if you took over for a while. The results are in.
Now there’s no time. These are our children you are threatening and their future on this planet. Time for men to get out of the way. Women have a lot of work to do.
Andrew Sullivan may be right, the truth about men and women may be too hot to handle.
I understand by his comments that Mr. Sullivan is not a scientist. Mr Sullivan’s nodding in agreement with Harvard president and chief blunderer Larry Summers’ as he raises the possibility that male preponderance at the very top of research science might have something to do with genetics – based on research results showing men were disproportionately represented at the very bottom and the very top of the table of science tests – betrays both Mr. Hopkins and Mr. Summers’ lack of scientific understanding and glaringly reveals their poorly hidden bigotry.
First of all, all the cited research study showed was a gender difference, not a genetic difference. To a scientist, these are completely different things. Genetics is simply one factor in a grand array of cultural, social and aptitudinal differences that emerge between men and women. The cultural conditioning and belief in what and how one “should” be as a boy or girl are introduced to babies at a very early age and reinforced by countless social cues throughout life. The presupposition that women are therefore incapable of reaching the “top” of anything because of their genetics is as absurd an assertion as saying that black men are incapable of great achievements because of their genetics. You do think THAT statement absurd, don’t you Mr. Sullivan? Not to mention that the definition of “top” and the value of achieving it in the first place I would assert are generally measures devised by men, not women, in positions of power.
The reaction of Professor Nancy Hopkins – “this kind of bias makes me physically ill” – is simple to explain: by now we can smell a chauvinist at 20 miles.
Women were kept out of top orchestras for eons on the belief that they couldn’t “handle” the physical strain of high level performance. It wasn’t until the practice of blind auditions was introduced that women were able to enter the male orchestra kingdom.
As another example, the professional organization for film directors in the US, the Directors Guild, is currently only 4% women. Are women genetically unable to tell good stories on film? Surely even a non-scientist can see the absurdity of that.
The only reason I didn’t seriously consider directing as a career until recently was that I didn’t SEE any women directors around. Subconsciously, I didn’t think it was possible. So I became a scientist, and a writer. Well, of course it was possible. Now I am a director, despite lack of role models.
That’s not to say I don’t see differences between men and women. These, however, are the ones you might find too hot to handle….
Since we have been graphically reminded this week, it is men who conjured up, designed and built the facilities for, and carried out the Holocaust, as well as every other genocide we’ve experienced.
It is men who divvied up the Middle East into arbitrary regions without regard for existing tribal affinities, which is at the bottom of the current disastrous continuous conflicts there which continue to threaten our world.
It is men who have been intransigent on both sides of the Israel – Arab conflict, refusing to see how they might live together on the same inhospitable spit of sand.
It is men who organized the original Crusades, men who organized the Inquisition, men who decided slavery was alright.
It is men who designed the burka and who undertake honour killings of “impure” women in many cultures, men who decided that such honour killings are misdemeanours.
Come to think of it, it is men who brought us every war known to this planet. Women – half of the planet – according to esteemed military historian John Keegan, have always and everywhere stood apart. With the rarest of exceptions, women don’t fight.
From such evidence, one can conclude that men are bad for humanity.
It is the spirit of cooperation, not confrontation that makes the world go around. Men, whether for genetic reasons or current gender upbringing, are notoriously confrontational. Surely I don’t need to show you crime data for you to accept that, Mr. Sullivan.
But that’s not all. Men brought us the industrial revolution, and concurrent belief that we could conquer our environment. The result of this path is that we are 10 years or less away from tipping the planet toward unstoppable global warming, a temperature rise beyond which the world would be irretrievably committed to disastrous change. That means widespread agricultural failure, water shortages and major droughts, increased disease, sea-level rise and the death of forests – with the added possibility of abrupt catastrophic events such as "runaway" global warming, the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, or the switching-off of the Gulf Stream, according to a major scientific report released this week.
It is easy to conclude from such evidence, that men are bad for the planet.
This grand, prolonged experiment now concludes. Perhaps women were curious to see what would happen to the planet if you took over for a while. The results are in.
Now there’s no time. These are our children you are threatening and their future on this planet. Time for men to get out of the way. Women have a lot of work to do.
Is the World Safer Now? (The Independent)
A review article of the Iraq war's consequences and outlook.
Is the world safer now?
The Independent
28 January 2005
(excerpts from article:)
As war ended, our correspondents examined key questions about Iraq's future. With the elections looming, the updated answers highlight the global impact of the conflict
Analysis by Rupert Cornwell, Andrew Grice, Patrick Cockburn, Anne Penketh, Andrew Buncombe, Ben Russell, Stephen Castle and Elizabeth Davies
WHERE ARE THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION?
As we know now, they were never in Iraq, cutting away the rationale for going to war. But next door, Iran, the state most feared by Saddam Hussein, is now accused of being less than a year from a "point of no return" in building its own nuclear bomb - a direct result of the Iraq war. It has also emerged since the war that the Americans turned a blind eye to the export of nuclear parts by the top nuclear scientist in Pakistan, a major US ally in the "war on terror". The network of A Q Khan, the architect of Pakistan's nuclear programme, was in the business of selling nuclear technology to the highest bidder, including the arch-enemies of America - Libya and North Korea. Even South Korea has been conducting clandestine nuclear experiments, fearing its northern neighbour may have built six nuclear bombs. Far from shutting down the nuclear peril, the Bush administration has actually increased the global threat.
WHO ARE THE INSURGENTS AND ARE THEY LINKED TO AL-QA'IDA?
The presence of al-Qa'ida in Iraq was cited by President George Bush as one of the main reasons for going to war, even though there was never any proof of a link to Saddam Hussein. Iraq, back then, was devoid of terrorism. How times have changed - again, as a direct consequence of the war.
There is no single resistance movement. It is made up of different groups - many of which only operate in a single district. The US has sought to portray the insurgents as consisting of either foreign fighters or bloodthirsty Islamic fanatics, though US military intelligence admits that 95 per cent of fighters are Iraqi. The common element among the different groups is opposition to the US occupation. And they are bent on disrupting the elections to speed up the Americans' departure.
The military backbone of the resistance which developed with great speed after the fall of Saddam was made up of former members of the security forces and Baath party. But they could not have gathered support and sympathy from the population so swiftly if the US administration, devoid of a post-war plan, had not so rapidly discredited itself. Most Iraqi men have some military training. They are traditionally armed and after the war Iraq was awash with weapons.
The resistance rapidly took on an Islamic colouring, the very aspect the US feared. Since August 2003, there has been a wave of suicide bombing unprecedented in history. Here, the foreign volunteers were important and they appear to have provided the bulk of the bombers. Islamic fundamentalists outside Iraq provided large sums of money.
The insurgents have become more expert. There are greater signs of co-ordination. A few days after the US Marines started their assault on Fallujah in November, the resistance attacked Mosul and captured most of the city.
How sectarian is the resistance? The Salafi or militant fundamentalist Sunni wing of the insurgency has repeatedly targeted Shia with suicide bombs in Baghdad, Najaf and Kerbala, causing horrendous casualties. These attacks ensured that the uprising remains confined to the Sunni Arabs.
Since early 2004 the US has promoted Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the man behind the uprising. This probably began as a propaganda ploy but Zarqawi revelled in the publicity and American denunciations meant local groups began to call themselves al-Qa'ida.
At any rate, the invasion - and the lack of planning - has created the very conditions the US cited as reason for going to war. Trouble was, they never existed then.
DO IRAQIS FEEL LIBERATED?
The key question, and the one answer showing the biggest change since our investigation in April 2003. Just after the war, polls showed that Iraqis were evenly divided about whether they felt liberated or occupied. We said back then that Iraqis have a strong sense of nationhood, and predicted that any sense of being subjected to American hegemony would be strongly resisted. By the time the US ended direct rule of Iraq through the Coalition Provisional Authority in the summer of 2004, only 2 per cent of Arab Iraqis supported the occupation. The overthrow of Saddam had brought none of the political and economic benefits they expected. Today, the only large group in Iraq which still overwhelmingly feels liberated is the Kurdish community, which makes up about 17 per cent of the population.
Despite the supposed handover of power to an Iraqi interim government last year, Iraqis see the US as the controller of the government. Many of them this week referred to the election as "a movie" staged for the benefit of the outside world. Significantly many of those who say they will vote also blame the US for their woes. This is the greatest mistake made by US analysts: the belief that because the Shia are increasingly hostile to the Sunni this means that they accept the occupation. The prestigious Brussels-based International Crisis Group sees the growth of hostility to the US as the most important development in Iraq since 2003. It says in a recent report: "Of all the many changes that have affected popular attitudes since the fall of the Baathist regime, perhaps the most notable has been the precipitous drop in the confidence in the US."
WHAT WAS THE WAR REALLY ABOUT?
Astonishingly, two years on there is no clear answer. The Bush White House claimed the invasion was to get rid of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction, and destroy a regime that was linked to terrorism. When the WMD failed to materialise, the war was justified (on legally shaky grounds) as a mission to remove an odious and repressive regime, the first step in a democratic transformation of the Middle East.
In truth, Iraq was at the top of the administration's hit list long before 9/11. The neo-conservatives in charge of US security policy had been calling for Saddam's overthrow for five years or more. This they argued, would give the US a new strategic base in the Gulf to replace Saudi Arabia. It would place the region's second oil producer firmly within the US orbit. It would step up the pressure on Iran, meeting a longstanding desire of Israel. Finally, there is a family factor: did Bush the son invade to finish the job started by Bush the father? Somewhere in this mixture of fear, grand strategy and blinkered ideology lies the explanation for the war.
IS THIS THE FIRST STEP TO REORDERING THE MIDDLE EAST?
That was, and remains, Mr Bush's goal, as his extraordinary second inauguration address shows. Turn Iraq into a functioning democratic regime, the theory runs, and the Islamic extremists and insurgents "who hate our freedom" would be on the retreat across the Muslim world.
Seduced by a benign version of the domino theory, Washington imagined that other authoritarian regimes would realise there was no alternative to liberalisation and democratisation. Thus would be achieved an economic and political rebirth of the Middle East, including the most elusive prize of all, a peace settlement between Israel and Palestine.
But even if the Iraqi election on Sunday goes (relatively) smoothly, those ambitions now appear to be hopelessly overblown.
The initial goals of Mr Blair's Palestinian conference in March have been watered down under Israeli pressure. Mr Bush's once-trumpeted Greater Middle East Initiative, designed to foster free thinking, free markets and free media across the region, has been drastically scaled back after complaints from allies such as Egypt that the US was trying to impose its views.
WHAT ABOUT SADDAM?
Saddam Hussein is in custody awaiting trial in the US military base at Baghdad airport. But his appearances in court have not benefited the interim government as much as they had hoped. His capture has, surprisingly, highlighted difficulties, and his is the spectre overhanging the elections.
His strong, defiant demeanour before his accusers last year quickly replaced in the public psyche the earlier images of a bedraggled and beaten former Iraqi leader dragged from his hole in December 2003. His trial will be difficult to arrange if it is to appear in any way fair. Nor will it be easy to find evidence of Saddam directly ordering massacres. And controversy has already engulfed the trial. Salem Chalabi, initially in charge, was accused of murder and dismissed.
Saddam's prosecution will cause division. The Kurds want to execute the man who oppressed and slaughtered them. The Shia, too, want him convicted for the killings after their uprising in 1991 and the murder of their leaders. But the Sunni are more ambivalent, not because of loyalty to Saddam, but because they see a trial as a veiled attack on their community. Many Iraqis also feel that however bad conditions were under Saddam they were better than today. The destruction of Fallujah by the US Marines and the torture of Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers in Abu Ghraib have made them less willing to condemn Saddam, a feat most would have found incredible two years ago.
IS NORTH KOREA NEXT ON THE AMERICAN HITLIST?
No, for the simple reason that the Americans are more concerned about stopping countries from obtaining a nuclear weapon rather than going after those that have one. Experts agree North Korea probably has half a dozen nuclear bombs, or enough to deter an American attack. So Iran - which is suspected of developing a nuclear bomb - is now "top of the list of potential troublespots", according to the American Vice-President, Dick Cheney.
It is also the reason Iraq was a target in the first place, rather than North Korea, which from a nuclear perspective was a far more dangerous threat. Iran must have realised it would be safer from attack the sooner it developed nuclear capability. In that sense, the invasion of Iraq has made the world much less safe.
The countries that the Americans want quaking in their boots have been branded "outposts of tyranny" by the new US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice. The list is Cuba, Burma, North Korea, Iran, Belarus, and Zimbabwe. She did not indicate an order of priority, and left off her list other states which happen to be US allies.
Taking strong-arm action against a geo-strategically important state like Iran will be tricky: Iranian officials say Tehran would respond vigorously to any military attack by the United States or Israel. "Iran is not Iraq, Iran is not North Korea," said an Iranian diplomat.
Is the world safer now?
The Independent
28 January 2005
(excerpts from article:)
As war ended, our correspondents examined key questions about Iraq's future. With the elections looming, the updated answers highlight the global impact of the conflict
Analysis by Rupert Cornwell, Andrew Grice, Patrick Cockburn, Anne Penketh, Andrew Buncombe, Ben Russell, Stephen Castle and Elizabeth Davies
WHERE ARE THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION?
As we know now, they were never in Iraq, cutting away the rationale for going to war. But next door, Iran, the state most feared by Saddam Hussein, is now accused of being less than a year from a "point of no return" in building its own nuclear bomb - a direct result of the Iraq war. It has also emerged since the war that the Americans turned a blind eye to the export of nuclear parts by the top nuclear scientist in Pakistan, a major US ally in the "war on terror". The network of A Q Khan, the architect of Pakistan's nuclear programme, was in the business of selling nuclear technology to the highest bidder, including the arch-enemies of America - Libya and North Korea. Even South Korea has been conducting clandestine nuclear experiments, fearing its northern neighbour may have built six nuclear bombs. Far from shutting down the nuclear peril, the Bush administration has actually increased the global threat.
WHO ARE THE INSURGENTS AND ARE THEY LINKED TO AL-QA'IDA?
The presence of al-Qa'ida in Iraq was cited by President George Bush as one of the main reasons for going to war, even though there was never any proof of a link to Saddam Hussein. Iraq, back then, was devoid of terrorism. How times have changed - again, as a direct consequence of the war.
There is no single resistance movement. It is made up of different groups - many of which only operate in a single district. The US has sought to portray the insurgents as consisting of either foreign fighters or bloodthirsty Islamic fanatics, though US military intelligence admits that 95 per cent of fighters are Iraqi. The common element among the different groups is opposition to the US occupation. And they are bent on disrupting the elections to speed up the Americans' departure.
The military backbone of the resistance which developed with great speed after the fall of Saddam was made up of former members of the security forces and Baath party. But they could not have gathered support and sympathy from the population so swiftly if the US administration, devoid of a post-war plan, had not so rapidly discredited itself. Most Iraqi men have some military training. They are traditionally armed and after the war Iraq was awash with weapons.
The resistance rapidly took on an Islamic colouring, the very aspect the US feared. Since August 2003, there has been a wave of suicide bombing unprecedented in history. Here, the foreign volunteers were important and they appear to have provided the bulk of the bombers. Islamic fundamentalists outside Iraq provided large sums of money.
The insurgents have become more expert. There are greater signs of co-ordination. A few days after the US Marines started their assault on Fallujah in November, the resistance attacked Mosul and captured most of the city.
How sectarian is the resistance? The Salafi or militant fundamentalist Sunni wing of the insurgency has repeatedly targeted Shia with suicide bombs in Baghdad, Najaf and Kerbala, causing horrendous casualties. These attacks ensured that the uprising remains confined to the Sunni Arabs.
Since early 2004 the US has promoted Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the man behind the uprising. This probably began as a propaganda ploy but Zarqawi revelled in the publicity and American denunciations meant local groups began to call themselves al-Qa'ida.
At any rate, the invasion - and the lack of planning - has created the very conditions the US cited as reason for going to war. Trouble was, they never existed then.
DO IRAQIS FEEL LIBERATED?
The key question, and the one answer showing the biggest change since our investigation in April 2003. Just after the war, polls showed that Iraqis were evenly divided about whether they felt liberated or occupied. We said back then that Iraqis have a strong sense of nationhood, and predicted that any sense of being subjected to American hegemony would be strongly resisted. By the time the US ended direct rule of Iraq through the Coalition Provisional Authority in the summer of 2004, only 2 per cent of Arab Iraqis supported the occupation. The overthrow of Saddam had brought none of the political and economic benefits they expected. Today, the only large group in Iraq which still overwhelmingly feels liberated is the Kurdish community, which makes up about 17 per cent of the population.
Despite the supposed handover of power to an Iraqi interim government last year, Iraqis see the US as the controller of the government. Many of them this week referred to the election as "a movie" staged for the benefit of the outside world. Significantly many of those who say they will vote also blame the US for their woes. This is the greatest mistake made by US analysts: the belief that because the Shia are increasingly hostile to the Sunni this means that they accept the occupation. The prestigious Brussels-based International Crisis Group sees the growth of hostility to the US as the most important development in Iraq since 2003. It says in a recent report: "Of all the many changes that have affected popular attitudes since the fall of the Baathist regime, perhaps the most notable has been the precipitous drop in the confidence in the US."
WHAT WAS THE WAR REALLY ABOUT?
Astonishingly, two years on there is no clear answer. The Bush White House claimed the invasion was to get rid of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction, and destroy a regime that was linked to terrorism. When the WMD failed to materialise, the war was justified (on legally shaky grounds) as a mission to remove an odious and repressive regime, the first step in a democratic transformation of the Middle East.
In truth, Iraq was at the top of the administration's hit list long before 9/11. The neo-conservatives in charge of US security policy had been calling for Saddam's overthrow for five years or more. This they argued, would give the US a new strategic base in the Gulf to replace Saudi Arabia. It would place the region's second oil producer firmly within the US orbit. It would step up the pressure on Iran, meeting a longstanding desire of Israel. Finally, there is a family factor: did Bush the son invade to finish the job started by Bush the father? Somewhere in this mixture of fear, grand strategy and blinkered ideology lies the explanation for the war.
IS THIS THE FIRST STEP TO REORDERING THE MIDDLE EAST?
That was, and remains, Mr Bush's goal, as his extraordinary second inauguration address shows. Turn Iraq into a functioning democratic regime, the theory runs, and the Islamic extremists and insurgents "who hate our freedom" would be on the retreat across the Muslim world.
Seduced by a benign version of the domino theory, Washington imagined that other authoritarian regimes would realise there was no alternative to liberalisation and democratisation. Thus would be achieved an economic and political rebirth of the Middle East, including the most elusive prize of all, a peace settlement between Israel and Palestine.
But even if the Iraqi election on Sunday goes (relatively) smoothly, those ambitions now appear to be hopelessly overblown.
The initial goals of Mr Blair's Palestinian conference in March have been watered down under Israeli pressure. Mr Bush's once-trumpeted Greater Middle East Initiative, designed to foster free thinking, free markets and free media across the region, has been drastically scaled back after complaints from allies such as Egypt that the US was trying to impose its views.
WHAT ABOUT SADDAM?
Saddam Hussein is in custody awaiting trial in the US military base at Baghdad airport. But his appearances in court have not benefited the interim government as much as they had hoped. His capture has, surprisingly, highlighted difficulties, and his is the spectre overhanging the elections.
His strong, defiant demeanour before his accusers last year quickly replaced in the public psyche the earlier images of a bedraggled and beaten former Iraqi leader dragged from his hole in December 2003. His trial will be difficult to arrange if it is to appear in any way fair. Nor will it be easy to find evidence of Saddam directly ordering massacres. And controversy has already engulfed the trial. Salem Chalabi, initially in charge, was accused of murder and dismissed.
Saddam's prosecution will cause division. The Kurds want to execute the man who oppressed and slaughtered them. The Shia, too, want him convicted for the killings after their uprising in 1991 and the murder of their leaders. But the Sunni are more ambivalent, not because of loyalty to Saddam, but because they see a trial as a veiled attack on their community. Many Iraqis also feel that however bad conditions were under Saddam they were better than today. The destruction of Fallujah by the US Marines and the torture of Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers in Abu Ghraib have made them less willing to condemn Saddam, a feat most would have found incredible two years ago.
IS NORTH KOREA NEXT ON THE AMERICAN HITLIST?
No, for the simple reason that the Americans are more concerned about stopping countries from obtaining a nuclear weapon rather than going after those that have one. Experts agree North Korea probably has half a dozen nuclear bombs, or enough to deter an American attack. So Iran - which is suspected of developing a nuclear bomb - is now "top of the list of potential troublespots", according to the American Vice-President, Dick Cheney.
It is also the reason Iraq was a target in the first place, rather than North Korea, which from a nuclear perspective was a far more dangerous threat. Iran must have realised it would be safer from attack the sooner it developed nuclear capability. In that sense, the invasion of Iraq has made the world much less safe.
The countries that the Americans want quaking in their boots have been branded "outposts of tyranny" by the new US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice. The list is Cuba, Burma, North Korea, Iran, Belarus, and Zimbabwe. She did not indicate an order of priority, and left off her list other states which happen to be US allies.
Taking strong-arm action against a geo-strategically important state like Iran will be tricky: Iranian officials say Tehran would respond vigorously to any military attack by the United States or Israel. "Iran is not Iraq, Iran is not North Korea," said an Iranian diplomat.
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