Domestic Politics of War
On January 18, 2007, the putative Prime Minister of Iraq, Nouri al-Maliki launched rhetorical barbs at his masters in the Bush administration, appealing for more weapons even as the Americans ignored his behind-the-scenes plea not to set him up for a war with Muqtada al-Sadr. Bush, he said, was yielding to media pressure in the devlopment of his policy in Iraq and in response to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s intimation that Maliki’s “time is running out,†he said, “I might be able to say that the Iraqi government is better able to continue working than some other governments.â€
Paratroopers were pouring into Baghdad airport to set up for the Bush-Cheney “surge,†even as an American teacher was killed in an ambush likely conducted by people operating right out of Maliki’s Interior Ministry headquartered in the Green Zone. At the same time, 19 people in a Shia neighborhood were FULL
astras:
seems an extremely pessimistic analyses. correct me if i’m wrong, but are you suggesting that only these swing voters count and everybody else may just as well drop dead? how could a political system, that depends so much on the support of extremists and their freaky views change it’s course? doesen’t the latest republican defeat represent a ray of hope? i’m really waiting for the second part of your analyses.
25 January 2007, 10:07 amStan:
“Pessimism of the intellect… optimism of the will.”
The latest defeat, imho, is hopeful if there is follow-up. The purpose of the Democratic Party’s DLC is to ensure that the follow-up never happens.
The problem in American politics is threefold:
(1) The two-party system is a bastion against any truly transformative politics,
(2) People see elections as the only legitimate form of politics,
(3) Our social dependency in this highly technocratic social structure is off the charts.
Elections will never solve our basic problems. They are not electoral problems. They are problems that are far more substantial (and terrifying) than anything a wealth-driven election system can resolve.
We have to begin to see elections as a tactical, not a strategic issue… something incorporated into a larger strategy that begins with decreasing material dependency as the first step toward mounting real resistance.
The position of swing voters is an inescapable outcome of winner-take-all, two-party, bourgeois-controlled elections. I am not saying everyone else can drop dead… don’t know where that came from.
What the last election did was dis-equilibrate the forward-motion of one ruling clique. Like throwing a fighter off balance. That can accomplish two things, both of them temporary. (1) Stop the fighter from hitting us effectively, and (2) set the fighter up to be hit. So if we simply throw them off balance and fail to follow up, it becomes no more significant than an embarrassing moment. That’s why I say “follow-up” is the key.
When this fighter hits back, the target is likely to be immigrants… so this tells us something about preparing for the next blow… and if we want to hit as a follow-up, then we have to hit at the most vulnerable place. Right now, that is the Democratic Party.
The election result threw our opponent’s weight off one foot and onto the other. There are NOT two opposing parties, but two feet supporting the same national-class-gender body (the system).
Not a perfect metaphor, but you get my meaning.
What are we doing to educate the public about the roots of our so-called “immigration” issue? What do they know about Latin America? About neocolonialism? About Venezuela and Bolivia and Mexico? About how American agribusiness has played a key role in throwing Latin Americans off the land and into the northern work-migration? Bush just gave his SOU speech promoting ethanol, which is a vote-buying scheme for precisely the companies who have wrecked Latin American agriculture.
What are we doing to force the Democrats to call for de-funding the war? Let’s face it… the only weapon we have against them is to say we’ll let Republicans have it in 2008 before we’ll elect DLC Dems who refuse to stop the war.
Mass movements worthy of the name do not follow elected officials and elections, they force elected officials to follow them. But we have to quit seeing the R&D system as other than what it is… a family feud. We can use and manipulate that feud, but we cannot deceive ourselves that this is, or ever has been, OUR family.
If we want a system that is ours, we have to build it.
It’s hard, but it can be done. That’s my optimism.
25 January 2007, 10:43 amastras:
sorry, i was not implying you said ‘everyone else may drop dead’. that was my observation on how election campaign seems to happen solely in states with swing voters.
the most promising option to educate the public is the internet, i guess. and activists like you, who can spread the word. the american system seems (especially due to the swing votes) mighty difficult to change.
but what can i say? as an european i have to put up with a government who runs to brussels everytime they want to decide something the domestic parlament could not approve without angering voters. the commision in brussels then makes a eu guide line and the parlament quickly rubber stamps it without any discussion at all. thus, the european union is already a dictatorship. it’s time to rock the boat here as well. time for people power.
STAN: Text… the perilous frontier. (-: Misunderstanding was mine. Apologies if I sounded snippy.
25 January 2007, 11:23 amTimothy R. Anderson:
Democrats in Congress, and outside of Congress,too, frankly, they all miss the point, to my mind, which is that on June 28, 2004 the ” representative ” government of Iraq was handed its sovereignty.
Every proposal from the Republicans should be countered with that little tidbit of info…… for example…………..
1. We need to borrow 200 billion dollars to pay for the Iraq War. Can’t stop now, you know .
RESPONSE : But sovereignty was given to Iraq on June 28, 2004.
2. We need to send X American soldiers to the neighborhood which includes Iraq, just in case the US military commanders inside Iraq want them, you know.
RESPONSE : But sovereignty was given to
Iraq on June 28, 2004 .
That’s what SHOULD be happening on C-SPAN.
Sadly, it is not happening.
Timothy R. Anderson, Thursday 1 / 25 / 07
25 January 2007, 3:06 pmgrandson of a farmer ;
nephew of a farmer’s daughter . R.I.P. ,
L. J.
stacia:
stan,
25 January 2007, 8:59 pmi’m reflecting on what i see as the limits of pedagogy.
i feel pretty clear about WHAT you think should be taught, i’m interested in your thoughts about HOW.
my years in education have taught me that there is very little teaching, perhaps none, without coercion. my years in education have taught me that there is no teaching, there is only learning. many times those we have learned the most from never knew they were ‘teaching’ us anything; they were just living, and we learned. working in a school has taught me that teaching is kind of the opposite of learning.
so i’m jaded.
i’ve learned a lot from you and from your writing, but i think the best way learning happens, and certainly the most useful politically, is via relationships, which don’t happen on the ‘net the way they do in real time and space.
thanks
stacia
Stan:
Maybe pedagogy is the wrong word. When I was in college during my first break in service, I was someone who barely graduated high school. It’s a long story, but I do mean “barely.” After having had the experience of three years in the army and a tour in Vietnam, I found I was hungry for certain kinds of understanding, and that’s when I met Frank Reuter, who was teaching Medieval and Renaissance Eng lit. Because I was ready, something clicked, and his method, which was quite rigorous, was exactly what I wanted.
I think learning has to be like a good 12 step program… a program of attraction, not promotion.
Just my quick thoughts going out the door.
26 January 2007, 7:18 amhoward:
>>When this fighter hits back, the target is likely to be immigrants
I think this is right on. I have a right-wing friend whom I consider a decent person who IMO has been very hurt by patriarchy and tries to make sense of everything happening around us the best she can with the tools that are available to her.
I have often noticed in the past that she is a good barometer of the direction the “fighter” is planning to take, probably because she stays very close to mainstream right-of-center news and opinion sources (and she is on clerical staff at a conservative lobbying firm). Up until several months ago, the emails were all about links to horrible gut-wrenching pictures and stories about them damn Islamo-fascists. Now in the past week or two they seem to have shifted focus to horrible gut-wrenching pictures and stories about them damn Hispanic unwed moms (not just immigrant Hispanics, but Hispanics in general). And snarky jokes of course. And hand-wringing about where our culture is going etc. etc.
A good emblematic example of this would be the writings of Heather MacDonald (a Senior Fellow of the Manhattan Institute):
example here.
Again, we could probably all agree on the CONTENT of the educational effort that would counteract all this. As stacia says above, the question is HOW the learning happens. I think stacia gives the answer, which is “by demonstration and example,” not by “teaching” as we normally understand it — and the more natural and unconscious, the better. So it is in my mind a question of talking about more EXACTLY HOW.
I have a lot of respect for academics like Stan’s Frank Reuter, and they are needed, but they provide only a sliver of the solution and can only speak to those few who are ready for them, like Stan was when he took Frank’s classes.
26 January 2007, 11:31 amStan:
Thanks for that link, Howard. This is probably emblematic of the hateful shit we are about to hear.
Sigh.
26 January 2007, 2:13 pmLegume Sam:
I’ve been posting diaries to DailyKos…
26 January 2007, 4:26 pmLegume Sam:
actually, I’ve tried to stick to the subjects the Kosers themselves bring up, I haven’t yet gotten to any of those in Stan’s list… I’ll try to do some research and come up with a good diary on immigration…
26 January 2007, 11:51 pmxenia:
At a minimum, there should be a couple of years of Spanish obligatory for every US student (as opposed to merely year or two), starting with first grade, and perhaps a month or two of work in a Spanish speaking country as well (and I am not talking about those Cancun places where white frat boys get drunk until they faint or watch Mexican women imitating sex with a donkey for a few dollars).
Education is not everything, as liberals like to claim, yet in this case, if done systematically, it would greatly reduce racism, since it stems from ignorance and isolation. I am not thinking about upper middle class, because some of them are irredemable, and others like Spanish because it gives them the superficial feeling of being international and charitable. Lower class people from the US would have to face full Latino humanity, not just Shakira’s gyration, if they were in the position of learning to speak fluent Spanish.
It’s colossal shame that people often are afraid to speak in Spanish in public places in the US. I am especially thinking of a black (!) kid whom I saw in the subway and who kept insisting on English only and bullied two working class Latinas until they left the train. From a hegemonic asshole such as S. Huntington we may expect to wax poetically about the Anglo culture and those lovely stiff British upper lips, but what a sad farce it is when you think about that child’s ancestors who certainly did not speak a word of English when they took them away from Africa.
27 January 2007, 12:04 pmstacia:
so not only do you have to learn spanish, which is another european colonial language, but you have to do it for the right reasons?
since when is spanish associated with radical purity?
i mean, my god, what a notion! spanish!?! (if i could make those little doo-hickies go upside-down, i would)
is it because che spoke it?
if historically, english-speakers have oppressed more people than spanish-speakers, it wasn’t for lack of trying on the part of the spanish. english-speakers were just better at it. they won. blame it on horatio nelson. next time you’re in london, throw an egg in trafalgar square.
jesus christ, it’s not about the fucking language.
and as an idea it’s not even remotely realistic anyway, and therefore useless. it’s prissy, sentimental, and pretentious.
racism is emotional! emotions are like epoxy, and they keep the whole system together.
i don’t usually like to be this harsh, but i think we who read FS and partake of the conversation (which is very valuable), spend too much time positioning ourselves vis a vis each other, rather than fielding ideas about WHAT TO DO and HOW TO DO IT. the answer will most likely be different for everybody, but we need support, and we need it now.
i’m tired of superior attitudes aimed huffily at ‘libruls,’ ‘pwogwessives,’ or ‘amerikka.’
terminology like that means nothing. it’s useless.
can we please get past this shit? the planet is burning.
thanks for listening.
sorry about the diatribe. it’s past 3 am.
thanks again for listening.
stacia
STAN: The reason we need to learn Spanish is that it is the second language of the US and the primary language of most of our close neighbors to the south. There is now HOW or WHAT to do if we can’t communicate with millions of our co-residents.
28 January 2007, 3:17 ampeggy:
I am with xenia and Stan on this one. EVERYBODY IN THE WORLD should be bi- or multilingual, and for Anglo Americans, Spanish should be (in fact already is) the second language of preference. Monolingual folks are cognitively and socially handicapped. That handicap can be prevented by early childhood two or three language-learning (ANY child who can talk can do this, given a bi or multilingual environment). If that doesn’t happen, the handicap can still be treated by second language learning later in life.
I am not exaggerating. Only if you learn the other’s language can you begin to understand them,
28 January 2007, 4:21 pmxenia:
Just a note on the cultural aspect:
As a historian, I am very well aware of Spanish colonialism, starting with the frigging Potosi. Just read Galeano’s wonderful and it will make your blood boil with the monstrosities of that rule. I mean, lovely Spanish accents do not make the killers from the School of the Americas any more likeable.
However, unlike English, Spanish has become a bastardized language in the best sense of the word. It is not merely hegemonic, it contains many attempts at counter-hegemonies, and very rich anticolonial literature, and the vital nueva cancion from Chile (Victor Jara, Violeta Parra,Quilapayun), with some of the most wonderful, yet simple accusations against the world order. Listen to Peruvian peasants: it will take your breath away how eloquent those people are and how pristine their pronunciation is.
English has its own share of counterhegemonies, most strongly visible in black speech. However, American English reflects the Anglo experience in remaining foreign to the cultures which it violently replaced (very little influence from indigenous cultures). In addition, today’s English is heavily, heavily marked by capitalism (just think of “invest in this relationship, you are not emotionally available to me” and similar awful expressions). There is no peasant culture in the US, meaning that some of the older conceptualizations of time and leisure which slow down intense capitalism in other countries are simply not there. Hence, people who move only in the English-speaking universe are more heavily exposed to capitalist media and to a particular colonialist understanding of history.
28 January 2007, 8:47 pmxenia:
uups, Eduardo Galeano’s wonderful trilogy: memory of fire (and for the record, he is of mostly Scottish ancestry, yet completely Latin American).
28 January 2007, 8:50 pmxenia:
terribly sorry about clogging the space…
yet i just remembered another contrast the dutch, who had their own terrible colonial adventures.
at a dutch university, you can write your dissertation in any language that your adviser and other readers know, and practically everyone is bilingual or trilingual.
in the us, on the other hand, i communicated with my adviser in english in front of others, as if it had been shameful or forbidden to speak other languages which we both spoke with more ease. i remember a few times when we were both grasping for words, and the situation was ridiculous.
another great book is phillipson: linguistic imperialism, which talks of self-conscious strategy for the construction of english as a hegemonic language, and all the ESL crap that tends to go with it.
28 January 2007, 9:14 pmstacia:
i taught spanish on the high school level a number of years ago. i never noticed a connection between verb conjugations and liberation. maybe a better teacher could have pulled it off.
28 January 2007, 11:06 pmforgive my late night bad temper. i was lashing out.
stacia
Legume Sam:
As someone who was an activist against Proposition 227 when nativists such as Ron Unz sought to dismantle bilingual education in the state of California, I can tell you that it will take America more than two years to learn Spanish.
At any rate, one important way of spreading multiculturalism in the schools is through the creation of “dual immersion” schools, in which instruction is conducted half the day in one language, half the day in another. This can be especially effective in classrooms where the students in each classroom are a mix of native speakers of both languages. A dual immersion elementary school will typically have almost all of its students graduating at a 6th grade reading level in both of its languages, as academic literacy usually takes six or seven years for children to acquire. (And, of course, you avoid the “accent” effect this way, whereas people who learn second languages late in life tend to speak their second languages with distinct accents…)
28 January 2007, 11:59 pm