Beware of Industry Experts

Our experts are failing us. In three global realms experts convinced us that things are under control. That they know better than us. They have the mathematical models, the scientific know how, the insider track, the intelligence. In all three areas they told us the outliers are not possible.  We were repeatedly told:  ”We have modeled and planned for the possible outcomes and we got it under control“.  ”Listen to us” , they told us,” we have studied and we have planned for the best outcomes“.

The first example is our global financial calamity. The experts, the financiers and bankers told us they hired all the mathematicians and physicists to model the possibilities. The formulas and the new liberal financial markets, will protect us from busts and keep us on a trajectory of booms.

Yet, my instincts, my experience was telling me the following:

• American household incomes did not rise since 1978.
• Household debt was on the rise.
• All on the idea that property values would continue an upward trajectory.

For example, in Richmond, California a friend bought a house for $550, 000, no cash down. The story was that prices would rise and she could then have equity. I turned a few shades of green and red when she told me that she put herself into this mess. My instincts, and experience in housing told me that for each $100,000 of debt, a household will make payments in the range of $800 to $1,000 per month for debt, taxes and insurance. It’s a simple calculus that I gained from twenty plus years of designing affordable housing programs. At $550,000, she would need to pay out, just for housing, something in the range of $4,400 to $5,500 per month. Remember, these were variable rates, so you calculate for the highest possible interest.

So, my dear friend would need to be able to have a minimum of $52,800 per year to make her payments. Now, this does not include food, health insurance, car payments, repairs, entertainment, savings etc. In the old days, banks would say a family was safe if they spent in the range of 25% to 35% of their income towards housing costs.  Well that went out the window with the promise of ever rising values. Let’s be conservative and say that for a time, families can have a housing payment of 50% of their income. So, she would need an income of over $100,000 per year. The median income in Richmond is somewhere below $50,000. Meaning, at that price, hardly anyone in Richmond could afford a house at $550,000. The expectation that somehow the values would rise and there would be a market in the future, was basically a scam.  For the scam to have worked, incomes in Richmond would have to take a remarkable up turn.

At that rate, the population in Richmond would have to have a rise in incomes that was no possible under any of the economic realities of our time.  The financial experts never bothered to do this one simple calculation: Can people who live in that city where we make loans, buy these over leveraged houses in the future, or even now? Of course, the mathematical calculations told them it was a slam dunk.

Our second set of failed experts were the foreign policy experts and middle east experts.  For decades they collectively droned on and on about what happened in Egypt and Tunisia was not possible. People in those nations were passive; They told us “Arabs like the tyrants because they are stuck somewhere in the crusades, they are so far behind the rest of the world. Time has passed them by and they need to be tortured and oppressed because they will just want to take back the world and impose Islam.”

The story line was convenient and convenience is lazy. No one bothered to listen to the voices of Arabs from the various nations, they made up a story and kept telling it to each other. No one bothered to read. No one bothered to follow the demonstrations in Egypt for the last five years at least, or wonder, who is in the prisons. The same batch of recycled ex officials from Europe and the US perpetuated the narrative. When Edward Said accused the west of being Orientalist, meaning they made up a racist story and stuck to it, he was accused of being a radical and anti-Semite. It was in front of them, but first you did not think it within the capability of the Arab people to desire, demand and demonstrate for the human rights they deserve. The democracy that we purport to support with all the sub clauses that are tainted with racist and colonial overtones as to why we don’t think certain people can manage such rights.  You see, the underlying racist assumptions drowned the experts in the echo chamber of foreign policy talk.

Time after time, in nations where they convinced themselves that people were stuck in the crusades, people of all walks of life proved them wrong. All that the experts had to do is get out of their echo chambers.  All you have to do, is be curious.  Talk to some people.  Read their writings.  Go beyond the bubble of our own experts who are paid to project our self interests.

Finally, we have the nuclear experts and the offshore drilling experts. Look, they told us, these systems are safe. Your doomsday scenarios are just naive and sensationalist. In less than twelve months, the worst case scenarios happened in the Gulf of Mexico and in Japan. Two major industries are proving to us that when the worst happens–that small catastrophic possibility occurs– they are not equipped to manage the disaster. They really did not plan for the worst case.  When the catastrophe happens, they tell us to not panic, that it’s not the time to panic.

They pat, pat us on our heads and tell us not to worry our pretty heads, they are the industry scientists, the experts. They hold the wisdom and the tools for our safety. In truth, we have abdicated our welfare to a bunch of corporate, self serving interests. Sure, we close our eyes because we get a flow of electricity and energy that courses through our veins, so we nod and wink and buy the comfort that Daddy will take care of us.

Next time someone tells you ” I am an expert, let me do the worrying, I have it under control” run. Run fast. Run and engage your instincts, your critical thinking and your advantage of being outside whatever echo chamber of experts is patronizing you.   To rift on the Reagan right wing quote, if you hear ” I am an industry expert and I have come to help”, shut the doors, take cover and hide your wallet.  ”We don’t understand the world as well as we think we do and tend to be fooled by false patterns, mistake luck for skills (the fooled by randomness effect), overestimate knowledge about rare events (Black Swans), as well as human understanding, something that has been getting worse with the increase in complexity”, Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Celebrating The Egyptian Revolution

In the past 18 days, I have followed the struggle of the Egyptian people.  My interest is beyond the casual observer.  I was born and raised in Egypt, although I am Greek/Lebanese, ethnically, my family felt  Egyptian, first.  I watched a peaceful, non-violent struggle against the old order of tyranny, patriarchy and darkness.  A struggle for a democratic and  just society.  A society that respects the human rights of every Egyptian.   I watched as Mubarak and Suleiman used every trick in the repertoire to break down the spirit of the Egyptian people: brute force,  fear, then divisiveness,  paternalism.  None worked .  The game book failed.  The Egyptian people wrote their own playbook.  It was time to remove the tyrants who replaced the old foreign colonials.

The Egyptian people through a non -violent, home-bred “balady”, no charismatic leader and non sectarian revolution, toppled the regime.  Desperate voices from the outside  kept asking Egyptians:  ”Who do you want” ” Who are the leaders of the revolution?”.  One after one the Egyptian people kept saying:  ”We will see when we start the process of Democracy.”  ”When we have parties; when we have free press.”  ”We will see when we have a legitimate electoral process, constitution and we have choices.”

The idea of Egyptians having choices has alarmed many  in the world:   “What if they make the wrong choices?”   This is where the hypocritical talk about enlightenment and democratic ideals fails.  How dare you ask such questions?  How dare you deserve an opinion?   It is the choice of the Egyptian people.  I heard an ex-American administration official giving advice on how we should influence the process for outcomes that are beneficial to American interests.  No, thank you.

Authoritarian states are not stable.

I hear rumblings from the American right, that if not for the Bush Iraq war and occupation may have incited the people of Egypt towards Democracy.  This type of thinking is on par with the Mubarak delusional thinking.   Iraq was just another part of authoritarianism.  Treating nations like children.  A policy steeped in violence, force and brutality.  Egypt was the polar opposite of what Iraq was and is in every form.

For now, the Egyptian people and the world need to celebrate the spirit and the strength of  the Egyptians and the Tunisians.

Who is next journalists  ask?  The answer is simple, the people of the various nations get to decide who is next.  Can the world really handle self- determination?

Just as the wall of fear fell in Egypt, I saw as many people around the world, and here in America particularly, realized the human face of the Islamic/Arabic enemy they have been slowly trained to fear.  18 days of seeing real Egyptian men, women and children.  Listening to Egyptian voices beyond the caricatures that we were fed for years, broke down the fear of the  demonized “Arabic Street”.  For the first time, we went beyond the simplistic binaries that separate us and Americans got a chance to feel the humanity of the other.  Now, how do we go to the next stage?   People got to hear the human aspirations of the Egyptian people and gosh darn it, they are not so foreign, or scary.  They are the same human desires and struggles.

Imagine how hard it will be for politicians to fool us if we break down the years of demonizing other human beings?   It’s not easy to choose to oppress and kill people if you see the humanity you share.

This song is by a wonderful young Egyptian singer, Hamza Namira.

( I found the videos via 3arabawy)

Global Lessons From The Egyptian Revolution

This video is disturbing.  As demonstrators walk peacefully, a police car smashes into them and drives on.  This is exactly the state sanctioned behavior that the Egyptian Revolution is trying to stop.

Many “political pundits” speak of the Arab street.  What they don’t tell you, is that of the many who look at the street from their balconies.  When my mother was young in Alexandria, in the 1920′s, she told me she would look from her balcony as truck loads of Egyptian day laborers heading west.  From time to time one, or two would fall off the truck.  When they did, the the boss, under the eye of the English overlord,  would come out with a whip, and beat the men who fell off.  This injustice, lived with my mother.  She was not political, but she knew injustice when she saw it.  She saw it from her balcony.

We are now in the year 2011, almost 100 years later, and the Egyptian people are still treated with the same inhumanity.  And still, Egyptians, watch from their balconies, the same injustices.

The Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions  are the battle for freedom, democracy and human rights.  A battle for breaking down the authoritarian  model of oppression.  We replaced colonialism with a model of new-liberal economics and we think that tyrants will eventually democratize their societies.   We imposed our financial demands, our market rules, but we have failed miserably to have the same expectation when it comes to civil society.  Humanity is not just a set of economic rules and transactions.  De-buckling economic models from social and civic standards is a formula for catastrophe.

We can all have cell phones, computers and televisions.  But, if we are not free to say, write and see different points of view, or question our society, they are useless toys reduced to mind numbing chatter.  We can educate entire nations, but we cannot keep them submissive and numb.

Our Neo Liberal economics stands as a place holder to perpetuate the authoritarian and totalitarian regimes.  In truth, western societies did not advance because of the economic functions, they advanced because we had “Social Democracies”.  Democracies that nurtured civil society and the individual.  Social Democracies that did not just appear, social democracies that took a great deal of work to establish.

Tony Judt, in his last book, Ill Fares The Land, describes how we have placed a blind faith on the markets and we have allowed our values of Social Democracies to wither.  We have closed an eye to the most abhorrent violations of human rights in the name of economic gains.  Shame on us.  In fact, some are hell bent to regress from the core values of social democracies and just create states that are mere vehicles for commerce.

It is time, it is time that we look at the demands of the Egyptian people for self-determination, freedom, democracy and human rights.  The empty shell of exporting Neo Liberal free market economies as stand alones, corrupts everything and strengthens all the authoritarian tendencies of nations.  The Egyptian revolution is the next step to a true global culture.  A system that is not just free markets that help the few, a system entrenched in democratic values.  The young people are trying to smash this cloud of oppression.

The men from the balcony, in total frustration start screaming “sons of dogs”, ” sons of dogs”, then they go into the anti -Mubarak chants.  Do not be mistaken, that feeling of despair is starting to percolate here in America and in other parts of the west, we watch from day-to-day as our gains are taken away in the name of economic expediency.  My mother, could only tell me the story, these men could post it on You-tube using a cell phone camera.  Thank you for the tools, now, how do we keep the avenues open to use the tools for a purpose?

Time to stand up globally to all authoritarian practices that are justified in the name of economic gain and social stability.  Authoritarian thinking uses fear to keep nations and individuals passive.  Look at how fear is used to keep us from uniting and from standing up to those who brought the economic calamity?  As we feel weaker in our civil societies, yet the oligarchic interests are gaining power, we will fall into a state of entropy.  The Egyptian revolution and the young voices from Egypt are waking us up.  Telling us, there are values worth fighting for, values beyond fear and consumerism.

A Guide: How Not To Say Stupid Stuff About Egypt

The past few days I have heard so many stupid things from friends, blogs, pundits, correspondents, politicians, experts, writers that I want to pull my hair.  So, I will not beat around the bush, I will be really blunt and give you a handy list to keep you from offending Egyptians, Arabs and the world when you discuss, blog or talk about Egypt.  Honestly, I would think most Progressives would know these things, but let’s get to it.

• “I am so impressed at how articulate Egyptians are.”  Does this sound familiar?  Imagine saying this about a Latino or African American?  You don’t say it.  So don’t say it about Egyptians.   Gee, thank you oh great person who is of limited experience and human contact for recognizing that out of 80 million people some could be articulate, educated and speak many languages.  Not cool.  Don’t say it.  You may think it, but it makes you sound like a dumb ass.

• “This is so sad”:  No, sad were the thirty years of oppression, repression and torture.

• ” I loved Sadat”:  Mubarak was made of the same cloth of Sadat.  Same repression, same ill-treatment of their people, yet you were all in love with Sadat.  Hmm, where and when do you think the repression started?  The State Of Emergency?  Sadat was not loved by the Egyptian people.   Why do you love Sadat?

• “What they did to the Mummies is horrible”:  Yes, but who did it?  Think, Mubarak, for years has been playing the “I am the stabilizing force”.  The one thing you know about Egypt, the stuff that was underground and from the past, you will be distraught and find the protestors to be disgusting.  Yet it was not the protesters who did it.  In Alexandria, the young people protected the library.  Did anyone carry that story?  Statement from the Director of the Alexandria Library:

The library is safe thanks to Egypt’s youth, whether they be the staff of the Library or the representatives of the demonstrators, who are joining us in guarding the building from potential vandals and looters.  I am there daily within the bounds of the curfew hours.   However, the Library will be closed to the public for the next few days until the curfew is lifted and events unfold towards an end to the lawlessness and a move towards the resolution of the political issues that triggered the demonstrations.

• “The Muslim Brothers are Terrorists”  Maybe you should look at their English Website, or try something easy like this link Check this out:

The Muslim Brotherhood is not on the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organizations list. It renounced violence in the 1970s and has no active militia (although a provocative martial arts demonstration in December 2006 raised some alarm that they may be regrouping a militia.)

Nevertheless, the Muslim Brotherhood or Ikhwan Al Muslimun in Arabic, is frequently mentioned in relation to groups such as Hamas and Al Qaeda.

• “The Twitter Revolution”. No, this is the Revolution of the Egyptian people.  Egyptians resisted for decades.  They were tortured, jailed and repressed by the Mubarak and Sadat regimes.  Twitter and Facebook are tools.  They did not stand in front of the water canons, or go to jail for all these years to get the credit.  There were demonstrations all summer long and for a several years through out Egypt but they are rarely covered, because we are worried about what Sarah Palin said, or some moronic Imam saying something stupid.  Does it sound a bit arrogant to take credit for a people’s struggle?

• “The women are so brave”:  Egyptian women have always been brave.  If you want to know about Sadat’s Egypt, read Nawal El Saadawi’s memoir while in jail.  Memoirs from the Women’s Prison

• “Al Jazeera has come to its own”: Al Jazeera has been on it’s own, you just only noticed. .  Do you think you believed the Bush administration spin about Al Jazeera?  Just maybe you believed the bullshit?  They must be doing something right if all the factions on the ground want to shut them down.  The tyrants, the US and the Israelis.  Hmm, maybe they are speaking truth to power?

• “Mubarak kept the peace treaty”: So, what do you think, if the Egyptian people choose another government, they will go to war with Israel?  Maybe they will demand a few more things from Israel in how they negotiate with the Palestinians.  Maybe Gazans will get better treatment?  Maybe the balance of power will not be tipped over to Israel?  Egypt protests: Israel fears unrest may threaten peace treaty.   Hmm, so we should support the oppression of 80 million Egyptians for a false stabilization?

• “If they get Democracy they will elect extremists”.  Imagine if the world said that about America.  The Tea Party threatens world stability, as did the Bush administration.  How would you like if others used that as a threat to support an autocrat who made all opposing parties illegal?  In truth, US politics threaten world stability more than Egypt does.  Second, the implication is that democracy is not to be trusted in the hands of “certain” nations, people and religions is offensive, racist and ignorant.  You do not claim to value human rights, democracy and freedom and then you make exclusions based on race, nationality and religion.  Don’t say this shit.

• “The people are so nice”:  Yes they are, it’s your ignorant self that assumed they are all terrorists and fanatics.  What did you think?  Glad you went to Egypt and found the Egyptians nice.  After all, they do have a cosmopolitan civilization of over 5,000 years, yet you reduced them to “rag heads” , “jihadists”, “ali babas”, “terrorists”, the list is endless.  Imagine saying this about African Americans?  Asians?  Nope.  Just don’t fucking say it.  It’s patronizing.

It’s time Egyptians were heard.  It’s time the pundits and “Egypt hands” (old recycled western diplomats) were retired. These people were as good at predicting the current events as our economists were in predicting the economic calamity.  I am glad you all got to see things from Egypt outside your comfort zone.  Maybe now, you can give Egyptians and Arabs some respect.  The people in Egypt are struggling for human rights, dignity and freedom.  Like the rest of us, they want the economic means to care for their families.  Break down those closed ideas that dehumanize the Arab and Egyptian people in general.  That is all I ask.

Kasr El Nil Bridge Cairo, Today

Raw video from today, January 28, 2011.  No words needed.

Diplomacy, not so diplomatic. What a shock!

If you have a basic nature that is suspicious and cynical about politics and politicians, Cablegate/Wikileaks left you rather unsatisfied. Nothing in there that I did not suspect, or consider is happening.  Yes, diplomats from the beginning of time spied for their nation.  It’s their job, they are not there just for ribbon cuttings and wreath laying ceremonies on tombs.

I looked at the cables on the Wikileaks site, the Guardian, Le Monde, the Times and following the #Cablegate and #wikileaks items on Twitter, I am still looking for the world breaking news and frankly nada.  Of course there are over 251,287 cables with more to come.  Now I think you can understand the problem, we have way too much information flying around and way no process on how decision makers can digest or use this information.   To my surprise, at first glance I agree with Timothy Gordon Ash, from the Guardian.

Yet, from what I have seen, the professional members of the US foreign service have very little to be ashamed of. Yes, there are echoes of skulduggery at the margins, especially in relation to the conduct of “the war on terror” in the Bush years. Specific questions must be asked and answered. For the most part, however, what we see here is diplomats doing their proper job: finding out what is happening in the places to which they are posted, working to advance their nation’s interests and their government’s policies.

In fact, my personal opinion of the state department has gone up several notches. In recent years, I have found the American foreign service to be somewhat underwhelming, reach-me-down, dandruffy, especially when compared with other, more confident arms of US government, such as the Pentagon and the treasury. But what we find here is often first-rate.

For my point of view, I loved the gossipy bits.  The stuff that we all think and it’s so great to have experts, diplomats, put it in diplomatic language.

How to enjoy the cables:

1.  Start at Wiki Leaks, be careful, you will not find it there, these gems have their own location:  Cablegate.  On the left side, you can choose how to browse.  Date the cable was created, origin (which embassy), tags, classification.

2.  For a more interactive, not so raw data version, go to UK Guardian, Browse the Database Interactive. Der Spiegel offers another interactive Atlas in the German fashion, there are graphs, and numbers of all types.  If you love statistics and graphs with dates and incidents, this is the place for you.

3.  Then you will find a scattering of articles about specific cables, with different points of view.  For example, each nation obsesses on it’s own stories, and it seems that the Germans, are not surprised the Americans think that Merkel is not creative, courageous and is a Teflon leader.  Just browse the various papers and the level of outrage and panic is nation specific.  It does not seem that America is the boogey man, the Chinese of course immediately shut everything down.  The Iranians, think it was a plot by the US and so do the Italians.

4.  For me, I love the chatter:  Quadaffi’s Ukranian blond nurse who goes with him everywhere, his fear of long flights ( duh, he know that airplanes can explode in mid-air).  Putin and Berlusconi finding entering into a simpatico relationship of the corrupt mafiosi variety.  Prince Andrew being a total upper class English prig, or prick, you choose.  Andrew went on, the simpleton he is, claiming that Americans don’t know cause they have bad geography teachers.  A commenter on the Guardian site, said, of course England has great teachers, how else could they sort out their shrinking empire.

5.  In what I call the: “Duh, we knew this “  the Arab dictators, Mubarek for example, advises US against Democracy in Iraq, “slap a military government and forget democracy”.  I guess I am shocked based on the long history of Democracy in Egypt.  Mubarek is not an advocate of Democracy.

6.  The right-wing, yesterday clicking through Fox, Dick the prick Morris, was accusing Hillary of betraying her personality of wanting to spy on everyone.  First, if you read the actual cable, it was a US policy/Law under all the security stuff passed by Bush.  She did not pull this out of her head, it’s an American law.  Second, everyone spies on everyone’s diplomats, are you effing kidding me?

Diplomats and nations gather gobs of information to support their national interests.  Their interests are usually economic interests that are supported via military power.  The rights of people, the value of life, the sense of justice, humanity and freedom, frankly do not matter.  It’s all about a group of world leaders filled with psychological and personality shortcomings, using their nation and its resources to stay in power.  This is the ugly history of human politics.

We of the cynical variety, always knew this and are therefore not shocked or upset. I hope the lesson that citizen’s of democracies learn, “YOUR LEADERS LIE TO YOU’.  Your press does not do it’s job, trying to figure out how and when they lie, (The NY TIMES, vetted the cables with the government, the people who brought us the Iraq war).  It’s all about power and how to keep it. I feel that there are many people who look like little children who were told that Santa does not exist.  Wow, our diplomats are human and they look at other nations through human eyes.

Preachers, Clerics, Imams and Rabbis: Oh My.

Image via Wikipedia

In the churning urn of burning funk we call news, there is always some imam, cleric, preacher,  or other holy man who is given public recognition.   Typically, they are minor players, representing some fringe element of the religion.   In the same way that fashion models are the freaks, sorry about that, the outliers of how we look.  How many women are six feet tall and weigh 115 pounds, we all know the average woman is about 145 pounds and about 5’4″.

Yet, the average woman, the average preacher, cleric, imam or rabbi, are not fun.  It’s the freak who issues a fatwa about unrelated men must be suckled by women if they are to be in mixed company; the rabbi who says that musicians should be lashed for playing in mixed groups; and now we have the southern preacher who will burn the Koran. Oh, this game is not just played by us, this is a global game.  If there is one thing that is truly global, it’s taking the freak and making him the symbol of the other.  And here I thought globalization and the world wide web would humanize us.  Pffft.

Why was he given so much attention?  Why was he given such importance?  Well, toxic populism needs to make enemies.  What better arena than the demonization of other religions, of symbolic acts like burning?  Now, somehow this act of vengeance and idiocy is being twisted into an expression of free speech. So, this nimrod will burn the Koran, what satisfaction will he gain?  Does he get power over other nimrods who strap on a vest of dynamite cause a nimrod in Florida burned the Koran.

The Generals, the Secretaries of State and Presidents now want moderation and to quell the preacher cause his act will bring doom upon America.  How naive do people think the world is?  You think the preacher is the cause?  Think Iraq, think the settlements, think Gaza, think not helping the Pakistani flood victims.

As the politicians and their cohorts, the media, churn the images of the sideline freaks, we move into a collective hysteria that ignores the real crimes against humanity.  We focus on medieval acts of symbolism, slight and insult, while the real issues get obscured by the daily freak show of imams, clerics, preachers and rabbis of the grotesque manifestation of their religions.

“Steel in Our Ship of State”

Image by Truthout.org via Flickr

Our troops are the steel in our ship of state. And though our nation may be traveling through rough waters, they give us confidence that our course is true, and that beyond the pre-dawn darkness, better days lie ahead.

President Obama’s speech, August 31st, 2010.

How many fantasies and collective national delusions did Obama perpetuate in his last paragraph?  Will the right-wing now be satisfied with such 19th century imagery?  Does this satisfy their manly desires of the warriors being the core of our national identity?

The troops give us confidence?  The young men and women we tattered for years and then we brought them back home broken and discarded.  We used them at their best, then we abandoned them to physical and mental disabilities.  An economy that cannot employ them and give their families a glimmer of a life their grandfathers enjoyed after WWII.

The difference is that the “steel” he talks of is used, spent.  Our troops are a mirror of how we use our citizenry and then discard them into a pile of used materials– like the iron scrap heaps of broken cars that we ship off to China we see on the highways.

Where are the better days?  1.2 Trillion of our treasure thrown at a mistake.  Something this President opposed and now he sits with the flag and the pictures of his children creating the imagery that his opponents want to hear.  They want the old imagery of heroism, steel and ships in rough waters supported by warriors.

This paragraph establishes  the chilling  Eisenhower warning about  the military industrial complex as reality.   Maybe these words are used to give a people being tossed around in rough seas some glimmer of dignity.  But it’s a  false dignity that is used to just satisfy the machine of militarism.   The troops are just a ploy to give the monster a human face.

In truth, our steel lies in many other places and in this day in age, what holds society is not 19th century anachronism, steel.    And yes, the speech writers can produce this imagery for those who are pining for American exceptionalism.   What did we learn as a nation? Many things, but history, politics and interests will mask what we learned.  Sugar coat it in sweet language.

We come home defeated and wrong, but yet we engage in flowery language and continue the political fanfare that put us into this war.  What did we prove?  We can win wars in no time.  But, we can never win an occupation.  We destroyed all civil society of Iraq. We destabilized the region, Iran, is now more powerful.  But, we lie to ourselves.

We allowed a group of extremists , the Neo-Conservatives , to carry out their theories.  Our elected politicians stood by and let it happen.  We as a nation let it happen.  Our media did not ask questions.  And now we make ourselves better cause we will turn the page.

Who will pay for this mistake?  The young men and women who came home with broken bodies and souls.  The Iraqi people who lost their lives, homes and all their way of life.  Yet, our President uses the flowery language to paint a picture of collective national delusion based on 19th century imagery.

Religious Patriarchy: The Israeli Version

Just in case you think that public lashings and gender segregation are limited to the Saudis all you have to do is read the Israeli Newspapers and see what is going on in the original branch of the Abrahamic religions:

From the Jerusalem Post:

A singer who performed in front of a “mixed audience” of men and women was lashed 39 times to make him “repent,” after a ruling by a self-described rabbinic court on Wednesday.

Rabbi Amnon Yitzhak, founder of the Shofar organization aimed at bringing Jews “back to religion” (hazara betshuva), has made it his recent mission to fight against musical performances for both men and women.

His “judicial panel,” with Rabbi Ben Zion Mutsafi and another member, sentenced Erez Yechiel to 39 lashes in order to “rid him of his sins.”

In a video clip of the court posted on the Shofar Web site, Ben Zion said that those who make others sin (mahtiei rabim), such as artists who make men and women attend performances or dance together, have no place in the world to come.

He displayed a leather strip he said was made by his father from ass and bull skin, with which Yechiel was to have been whipped.

Yechiel, who said, “I accept upon myself the lashing for my sins,” was ordered to st

and by a wooden poll with his head facing north (“from whence the evil inclination comes”), his hands tied with a azure-colored rope (“a symbol of mercy”), and served his “sentence.”

You know, nothing drives a patriarchy crazy more than women, if you add women and music, they really go nuts.  Dancing, yes, they hate dancing as well.  But, mixing, men, women, music, singing and dancing, wow, that takes them over the top.

I add these stories as a counterpoint to every crazy “Imam” story that gets spread around the world.

Image via Wikipedia

Stoning of Iranian Woman Image

In the  Guardian UK there is an article about the women sentenced to stoning.   The article includes the image below with the caption explaining the image.  I saw this image on a number of blogs and something did not seem right.  The blogs described it as an actual stoning.  Yet, if you Google the image, you see cropped versions and full versions.  The cropped versions do not include the onlookers, which are many women without covered heads.  Obviously not an Iranian crowd scene.

An Iranian woman at a protest in Brussels highlights the barbarity of death by stoning, in which women are buried up to their necks in front of a crowd of volunteers and killed in a hail of rocks. Photograph: Thierry Roge/Reuters 2005. (the caption for the image)

What is interesting about this image, is that when you wonder around the internet, there are many bloggers who think this is an actual image of a stoning.  The Guardian article includes an image and has it captioned appropriately, that it is a re-enactment, a protest, this is journalism.  Yet, blogger, after  blogger, pass off the image as an actual stoning of a woman.   Very few notice that the picture is cropped, if they have a cropped pictures.   Or, when they have the full image, that the crowd is not Iranian.

Of course, this is not an apology in any way for the Iranian policy, this is another warning about images on the internet, truth and how we distort images to fit our message.  In truth, when you look at the image, it does look staged.  I found many bloggers who did have the correct attribution, but the ones who did not, were definitely looking for a certain point of view, or making a certain argument.