Selling Tehran's Rejectionist Stance

Having tossed out a poorly explained assertion that Tehran has little attractive ideology to offer the world in its campaign to lead a challenge to the U.S.-centric world political system, I would like to underscore the distinction between an "ideology" and a "policy position." An ideology, I would argue, is a broad construct, much more substantive than a simple policy position. Ideologies include capitalism, communism, socialism, and Khomenei's version of Shi'i clerical dictatorship. I would maintain that this ideology offers little attraction to the rest of the world, even its mistreated Shi'a. Be they Pakistani, Iraqi, Lebanese, Bahraini, or Saudi, Shi'a in general do not appear to find the idea of submitting to Khomenei's particular vision as very attractive. (Comments from those who have more expertise on this issue would be more than welcome.)

Policy is another matter, and Tehran offers the disadvantaged of the world some (potentially) very attractive policies. In a unipolar world, the big guy of course gets blamed for everything that goes wrong, and indeed when you strive to be Numero Uno, you deserve it. Tehran is the world's most open critic of the U.S.-centric global political system. Tehran may not have a very inspirational ideology, but it does offer a clear policy: replace unipolarity with...whatever. More specifically, it has a policy of rejecting Israeli military dominance over the Mideast and Israeli exceptionalism (e.g., only Israel is allowed nuclear arms, only Israel is allowed to maintain occupation forces outside its legally recognized borders).

Tehran becomes a significant player for free simply because it is essentially has a monopoly on that policy line of "resistance." This position is "free" because it does not actually have to do anything except assert the policy position and accrue the benefit of being the only actor in the world with the guts to "say no."

What Washington needs to understand is that this puts Tehran in a fundamentally passive position - its dissident stance is significant only to the degree that Washington takes such a hard-line counter-position as to make Tehran look like Robin Hood to Washington's King John. If King John had been just a bit more generous with the poor and had been a bit more willing to share power with the nobles, he could have pulled the rug out from under his opponents and been a popular king. An Obama calling for Arab democracy and insisting on the rights of Palestinians leaves Tehran rejectionists out in the cold, talking to themselves. An Obama protecting individual Arab dictators against the interests of the Arab people or kowtowing to an extremist and expansionist Israeli faction, however, hands to Tehran rejectionists a degree of global political influence they could never obtain for themselves. Tehran's future is in the hands of Washington, and so far Washington is giving Tehran exactly what it wants: an easy target.

Arab Revolt in Context

Americans can be forgiven for perplexity about the massive protests raging across the Arab world: the Boston Tea Party, the abolition movement, the women’s rights movement, and Bull Conner’s dogs threatening little black girls trying to go to school all seem to have occurred a long time ago. The Arab Revolt is all of these.

Three related questions may help to understand the big picture:

1. What does “liberty” mean?
2. What is the relationship between “liberty” and “national security?”
   
3. How will the Arab revolt influence American liberty and national security?

1. Liberty.   

Forget the Arab world; think about a family with a domineering father. Suppose Dad decided who you could date, who you could marry, what you could read, when you could express your opinion, what you could study at college, where you would work, what party you could vote for? Imagine that Dad was a free man, free to make all the above decisions for himself. Would you describe your family as free?

How would you, in such a family, gain personal liberty? Would you somehow demonstrate your ability to handle freedom and bargain with Dad? Would you protest? Would you leave home? Most Arabs of course do not have all these choices vis-à-vis oppressive dictators: expressing an opinion can land you in jail, protesting can get you beaten by brutal police, Gazans are prohibited by Israel from leaving. The bottom line is that liberty is not “natural” but an achievement of human society at its very rare best, a goal to be pursued, a growth that survives only when nourished.

2. Liberty & National Security.

Some, usually those who have more money than they can spend and no intention of sharing any of it, make the argument that a trade-off exists between liberty and national security. It goes roughly like this: “If you sacrifice some of your (not ‘our’) liberty, then ‘we’ will protect you from ‘them.’” It is never quite clear why the “we”—e.g., Egyptian generals and secret police or Iranian mullahs who assert the right to pass judgment on the government and civil society or neo-cons who want to pass “patriot” acts to gain the power to watch what kind of books you check out of the library—actually need to circumscribe civil liberties in order to provide national security. The reason is that the whole argument is a cover for protecting something altogether different – not national security but elite privilege.

In Egypt this may be the ability of the elite to stifle a democracy that would instantly vote them out of power.

In Israel, it is increasingly the ability of the expansionist faction to suppress traditional Israeli democracy, as formerly exemplified by the Meretz Party and as currently exemplified by a long list of Israeli historians, peace activists, and journalists who defend traditional Israeli civil rights against an increasingly authoritarian ruling faction.

In the U.S., it includes protecting the ability of the financial elite to gamble investor funds and make a profit even when the investors lose their shirts…or get paid back by taxpayers as well as the ability of the military-industrial complex to make a profit selling weapons for wars that exploit the fear of terrorism but in fact provoke terrorism.

The case of Egypt illustrates a dangerous dynamic: repression by the elite in the false name of national security generates resentment leading to protest. The more the elite suppresses the protesters and refuses to listen to their grievances, the more likely it becomes that the population will turn to extremists. When moderation fails, violence or slavery are the only two choices that remain. And thus, the self-serving argument of the elite that liberty must be sacrificed for security turns out to be a false dichotomy. In truth, while liberty is a risky venture with no certain outcome, it opens the door to a stable, enduring security.

3. Arab liberty and U.S. national security. 

Liberty as the foundation for a stable national security supported by the whole population provides the link between Arab liberty and U.S. national security. Resting the fortress of U.S. national security on the foundation of hated right-wing Arab dictators and aggressive right-wing factions in Israel provides but a short-term expedient, and the longer such a strategy is pursued, the more repressive it must become to survive, thus making a catastrophic collapse ever more likely.

Rather than, in the Egyptian case, marginalizing the moderate (judging from their behavior for many years) Muslim Brotherhood as well as the mass of Egyptians who just want minimal civil rights, a wiser course for Americans interested in long-term, stable cooperation with Egypt would be to encourage all Egyptian groups to participate in a peaceful, open, democratic system. Let any that wins an election be put to the test of performance, with the world watching. The rising moderation of both Islamic parties and the military in Turkey, today probably the most democratic state in the Mideast (including Israel), exemplifies the promise of this strategy. The Islamic Revolution in Iran, provoked by short-sighted U.S. support for an increasingly repressive right-wing dictatorship by the Shah, exemplifies the failure of the elite’s false dichotomy between liberty and national security.

Liberty is a common good, stronger the more it is shared. King George denied this and provoked the American Revolution. With globalization and the Internet and al Jazeera, the principle of liberty as a common good is all the more true today.

Turkish Opportunities

If supported by Washington, could Ankara transform Mideast political dynamics away from reliance on force to resolve all disputes?

Election 2010: Republican Party Split?

Election 2010 does not feel to me like a Republican victory so much as a fundamentalist coup that threatens to split the Republicans. Democrats should use their slap in the face as a wake-up call, stop chasing the neo-cons, and send the voters a clear message. They won't of course; too many have been on bent knees for too long, ever since 9/11.

Israeli Police Shoot Member of Knesset

Haneen Zoubi, member of the Israeli Knesset (parliament) since 2009, was shot in the back by Israeli police. She was on the June international flotilla to Gaza that the Israeli military attacked and embarrassed the Israeli government by reporting that the Israeli naval vessels had fired on the flotilla before Israeli commandos were lowered from helicopters, that two of the flotilla members killed had been shot in the head (suggesting intent to kill), and that Israeli soldiers allowed passengers to bleed to death.

Details on the highly successful Jewish extremist plot to provoke violence and the support the extremists received from the Israeli police are indeed, as Stephen Lendman pointed out, “reminiscent of Kristallnacht.” For those concerned about the struggle between the forces of democracy and fascism in Israel, the shooting by police of a member of the Knesset must surely be one of the most ominous pieces of evidence.

Of course, the incident just happened, and the evidence could go either way. Israel could launch a serious investigation of its police. Israel could clamp down on rightwing extremist Jewish demonstrations in Palestine designed to provoke violence. Israel could establish and enforce new rules to maintain the right to freedom of expression with police protection for both sides rather than police attacks on liberals. Such steps would alter the balance of evidence.

Obama: Secondrate Neo-Con or Master of Change?

Could Obama save his presidency by walking the talk, by--like Clark Kent--actually shedding his neo-con suit so we can see his Master of Change cloak?

If we accept the contentious viewpoint that “10 years is enough”—i.e., that 10 years of neo-con policy in Washington is enough, then what should Obama do to save his presidency?

Erdogan Broadens His Diplomacy...Still Further

Erdogan is searching in all directions for a solid foreign policy victory.

The Erdogan International Adventure continues, this time with an initiative to lead the world's Turkish-language states. Just as Erdogan's rejection of Israel's foreign policy reliance on force challenges the regional superpower and his effort to achieve a compromise between the U.S. and Iran challenges the global superpower, Erdogan's effort to carve out a Turkish heritage zone of influence challenges whatever pretensions Moscow may have of reasserting control over Central Asia. Erdogan is challenging a disunited group, of course, and it is not clear that either Washington or Moscow has concluded that his challenge need be met with a frontal rejection.

A Russian perspective, for example, recently noted the shared interest of Russia and Turkey as "Black Sea superpowers" acting as cross-national bridges:

на планете формируются новые центры силы. Один из них — как раз Турция, которая вместе с Россией сегодня принадлежит к числу "черноморских сверхдержав".

Nonetheless, he is pushing against an increasingly large set of resistance forces. His recent domestic political victory may well help, but he needs a foreign policy victory. The ratio of political meetings full of rhetoric to actual solid accomplishments is verging on the embarrassing. If the above-cited opinion represents Moscow's perspective and were Washington to adopt a similar attitude, then Erdogan would indeed be on the way to making history, but that, in both cases, remains highly questionable. Erdogan's rhetoric may be a breathe of fresh air, but somewhere he badly needs to deliver.

Theocracy vs.Democracy: The Israeli Case

Democracy is a vision of hope that has never been well implemented in any mass society. Americans should learn the lessons inherent in the missteps of other societies struggling against internal factions that attempt to use democracy in order to destroy it.

Israelis On Israel's Gaza Blunder

Attempting to reason with the current regime in Tel Aviv may be a fool's errand, but there are Israeli citizens thinking very hard about their country's circumstances, and their views are being published by the sometimes remarkably open-minded Israeli media. It is too bad that almost no one in the U.S. will ever see these analyses.

Israel Is Its Own Worst Enemy
Bradley Burston [Haaretz 5/31/10 ]:

In going to war in Gaza in late 2008, Israeli military and political leaders hoped to teach Hamas a lesson. They succeeded. Hamas learned that the best way to fight Israel is to let Israel do what it has begun to do naturally: bluster, blunder, stonewall, and fume.

Hamas, and no less, Iran and Hezbollah, learned early on that Israel's own embargo against Hamas-ruled Gaza was the most sophisticated and powerful weapon they could have deployed against the Jewish state.

Here in Israel, we have still yet to learn the lesson: We are no longer defending Israel. We are now defending the siege. The siege itself is becoming Israel's Vietnam.

The Great Leader
Gideon Levy [Haaretz 6/4/10]

Some 7 billion human beings (less about 5 million Israeli Jews ) are wrong. They haven't got a leader like Netanyahu, and that's why they go on thinking that seizing passenger ships in international waters is an act of piracy, no different from the deeds committed by the pirates of Somalia. They think (wrongly of course ) that Israel has no right to stop a fleet of boats; that the victims are the people of Gaza and the bleeding passengers, not the naval commandos who raided the ship and were beaten; and that the aggressors were the troops who were dropped onto the ship from a helicopter, killing nine civilians with live fire and wounding dozens.

Le Paradigme Modérés-Militants

The White House remains, nine years after 9/11, mired in the false paradigm that the Mideast is divided neatly into two opposing camps - "good" moderates vs. "bad" militants, which is exactly why Washington should start listening to the real moderates such as Erdogan and Lula.

Empire: The Neo-Con/Likudnik State of Mind

To learn, read what you disagree with! If you care about world peace and oppose empire, read the revealing expose of neo-con attitudes toward Iran presented by political science professor and former Bush/Cheney consultant Peter Feaver.

Listening carefully to an intelligent but committed conservative is marvelously revealing, but put the emphasis on “carefully.” The recent defense [Palestine Note 5/12/10] of U.S. policy toward Iran by Duke political scientist and former advisor to the Bush/Cheney Administration on strategic planning Peter Feaver exemplifies what can be learned by careful consideration of an intellectual’s defense of empire.

Feaver characterizes the U.S.-Iranian dispute “for over thirty years” as “primarily about behavior,” a dispute that would end “if the regime were to change its behavior.” Read every word with care. This is a refreshingly honest admission from an imperial defender that the U.S. would happily deal with an Iran that would submit. Feaver’s summary effectively dispels any inclination to take seriously his earlier remark in the same paragraph that the dispute concerns “its support for international terrorism, its pursuit of WMD, and its hostility towards Israel.” Only the last—hostility toward Israel—comes close to revealing the truth. Just for the most obvious example, the U.S. works closely every day with Israel, India, and Pakistan, all of which vigorously and successfully pursue WMD.

Feaver also reveals in this passage, if only by implication, the clear order of events that Washington requires: first, Iranian change in behavior; second, U.S. acceptance of “more fruitful and cordial relations.” Again, note this carefully: Feaver is clearly not suggesting negotiations. A positive-sum outcome of mutual benefit is not at all what he is referring to; rather, Feaver is indicating about as honestly as any defender of empire is likely to do that the process of obtaining “cordial” U.S. treatment is submission to the rules of the international political system written in Washington.

These rules are significant. It is worth being clear about what the rules require and what they do not.

Rule 1 is acceptance of American international leadership. No campaigns for new leadership, no elections, no competing or reformist visions will be tolerated.

Rule 2 is acceptance of Israeli military dominance over the Mideast. Only Israel, among Mideast states, is to be allowed nuclear weapons; other countries can have arms to the degree permitted by Israel. Israel is to be allowed overflight rights across international borders to enforce the limitations on arms that it sets. Military support for Palestinian liberation or the defense of Lebanon is not only forbidden but will be terms “terrorism.” Only Israel is to be allowed to establish colonies or expand its territory (to be fair, there is now some evidence that this rule is under review in Washington).

Rule 3 is broad acceptance of the legitimacy of the current international political system. Reformers must step very, very lightly, and dissidents—even those only presenting theoretical visions, much less those who take action—are treated with exactly the same contempt with which Moscow treated its own dissidents under the bad old Soviet Union. Where the Soviet Union threw dissident individuals into insane asylums, Washington pillories dissident regimes as “crazy.” Perhaps it was “crazy” for a Solzhenitzen or a Sakharov to demand that the USSR reform; perhaps it is also “crazy” for an Iran, a Hamas, a Turkey, a Brazil, or a Cairo (!) to demand that the international political system be reformed.

Note that no rule about possession of WMD exists. That is decided on a case-by-case basis, not on the basis of defense needs but on the basis of…well, Feaver already said it: “behavior.”

The behavioral change Washington demands of Tehran is very simply its acceptance of these rules. There is a word for this, and that word is “surrender.”

Feaver’s revelations continue. Concerning the U.S. double-standard on Mideast nuclear arms, he states frankly: “The United States views the Iranian pursuit of a nuclear weapon to be substantially more destabilizing than the Israeli nuclear posture:” destabilizing to the current power structure in the Mideast, that is. One could of course take issue with the assumption that Israel can be trusted not to knock down the American house of cards by provoking regional war, but Feaver is undoubtedly correct that this is in fact the U.S. elite assumption. Few are the decision makers in Washington with the foresight and independence of mind to consider the danger to American security in an era of long-term recession and a worsening war against global activist Islam that is posed by the threat of an Israeli nuclear strike.

Unfortunately, Feaver’s efforts to put Likudnik propaganda to the side and present an intellectual defense of U.S. policy collapses once he starts trying to justify Israeli nuclear arms. He notes correctly the anti-Israeli challenge posed by “well-armed groups” without making any attempt to explain how nuclear arms will prevent rockets from Gaza or Palestinian efforts to protect their homes and olive groves from Israeli colonization. Does he anticipate small Israeli nuclear strikes on Hamas headquarters in Gaza or to clear Palestinian homes from East Jerusalem? Sliding over the indefensible implications of his reference to nuclear arms as protection from “well-armed groups,” he jumps to the standard neo-con propaganda charge that Ahmadinejad has pledged “to wipe Israel from the face of the map.” As often as Persian readers demonstrate that this charge was created by mistranslation, neo-con & Likudnik propagandists repeat the charge.

Returning the focus of his remarks to Iran, Feaver again becomes interesting. “The United States believes it needs tough sanctions as leverage on the Iranian regime; without such leverage, why would Iran negotiate in good faith. Iran believes that it should negotiate only when there are no such sanctions or leverage in place.” An adversary, Feaver evidently believes, will only negotiate in good faith when under pressure. He wastes no time with such nonsense as positive-sum outcomes; life, to Feaver, is simple: adversaries only understand the language of force. One might wonder how he deals with relatives or students; for a professor of political science to take such a perspective suggests that he skipped a couple of theory classes. But that is unfairly personal. Feaver is presenting the neo-con view and, as such, is quite correct: the language of force does indeed appear to be the only language that the neo-cons understand. Were he to say that the Iranian neo-cons (i.e., the Saddam war generation of secular military leaders that rose up literally in the trenches defending Iranian independence in perhaps the most vicious war since Vietnam) are dangerous because they only understand the language of force, he would be presenting a defensible intellectual position worthy of debate, but, as stated, his remark is useful only if read as revealing the prejudices of the neo-con/Likudnik worldview. Given the tenacity of Iran’s self-defense and the caution with which it has conducted its foreign policy when not under direct military attack, there is in truth every reason to assume that a genuinely conciliatory approach might elicit willingness to compromise on issues where mutual benefit can be identified. One might give Feaver the benefit of the doubt and assume that, as an intellectual, he can see this, but that in his capacity as presenter of the empire-builder’s world view, he would not mention it because such considerations are so far outside such a person’s perspective.

Feaver's presentation of the neo-con/Likudnik attitude toward Iran is a highly valuable explanation of why the world has seen so much war this century.

Ahmadinejad has slapped down the gauntlet to Washington on the fundamental issue of nuclear equality.

It matters little whether or not Westerners pay heed to Ahmadinejad’s message. It matters little even if the non-Western global majority trusts Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad posed a fundamental question:

whether granting extraordinary authority in the IAEA to the nuclear weapon States and entrusting them with the critical issue of nuclear disarmament is appropriate

Summarizing the issue neatly as “a knife never cuts its own handle,” Ahmadinejad issued to the West a fundamental challenge to its right to lead the world. What matters is whether or not this challenge will strike home in the minds of world decision-makers.

To the extent that Ahmadinejad’s message rings a bell in the minds of Cairo and Ankara and Brasilia and perhaps even Tokyo officials, not to mention the broad masses of the non-Western world, Washington will have lost stature and, consequently, power. This is not about Ahmadinejad. It does not matter if you do not like him. This is about ideas, and the question is the degree to which this idea stands on its own.

Imagine a Different Israel

Can we imagine a moderate, secure, democratic Israel?

Imagine a moderate Israel dedicated to living in peace and cooperation with all those who were willing to meet it half way, without regard to religion. Such an Israel could be Jewish and democratic existing within its 1967 borders plus or minus mutually agreed variations or it could incorporate both Israeli and Palestinian societies and territory in one secular and democratic state. But it could not be Zionist, expansionist, fascist, garrison state, or colonial empire.

Such a state could be holder of a regional nuclear monopoly, holder of the region’s greatest nuclear force, or it could renounce nuclear rogue status and lead the region toward the vision of a denuclearized Mideast. But it could not threaten nuclear aggression against other states nor could it threaten non-nuclear aggression under the cover of its nuclear force.

Such a state could be the region’s most democratic state and could also be the region’s greatest military and economic power. But it could not possess a foreign policy based on overwhelming superiority of force, nor could it believe that its neighbors understand only the language of force.

Such a state could be a home for the world’s Jews. But it could not institute an apartheid regime condemning Muslims under its control to second-class status.

Such a state could be an ally of the U.S. and as such could make a critical contribution to explaining the region to Americans and introducing Americans to Israel’s neighbors. But it could not teach the U.S. such lessons as how to conduct urban warfare to defeat an independence movement through bloodthirsty and barbaric collective punishment. It could not use its alliance to trick the U.S. into a pathological state of permanent war against Islam.

Such a state could be secure with its American backing. But militarist factions within such a state could not pervert that backing into a power grab nor could militarist factions in the U.S. exploit “Israeli security” to advance their own private agendas.

Imagine!

"Change"...and Deception

Americans may never know the degree to which Democratic Party leaders actually intended to promote "change." Perhaps we the voters should have demanded that they "prove" their intent, just as they are currently demanding that Tehran "prove" that it has no intent to construct nuclear bombs. Whatever the intent of the elite, the people voted for change, and one key component of that was changing medical care from a business designed for the enrichment of insurance companies to a right of all citizens.

The right wing elite, concerned about its potential investment losses, is now claiming that legislating any requirement that everyone pay for health insurance would be unconstitutional. One wonders what they imagine we, as a society, are going to do when some irresponsible person who chooses not to buy health insurance gets sick - just watch them die? This is a classic example of the commons, a term everyone needs to know in this debate. The right wing elitists are classic free-loaders. Don't be tricked by their protests about "freedom."

You are not free to drive on the left. You are not free to refuse to pay for garbage pick-up. You are not free to take illegal narcotics. You are not free to refuse to "buy" health insurance for your sick car (i.e., annual check-ups). You are not free to refuse to pay taxes. Societies need rules to function. It is time the U.S. joined the modern world and recognized that a good society provides health care for everyone. One way or the other, we will all pay for that benefit: either we will pay to take care of the desperately ill (e.g., the beggar who sits on the street coughing and infecting everyone with TB) or we will gain the maturity as a society to decide to pay for health care to make the society healthier.

The West & Political Islam

Americans need to take the blinders off and look squarely at the political world we are creating before we lock ourselves into a future that we may find extremely distasteful. Fortunately, we have a surprisingly wide array of choices.

The neo-con mythology about political Islam depicts a homogeneous mass of crazy, violence-prone, evil aggressors motivated by religion and willing to use any method to achieve their goals. In truth, political Islam is a highly differentiated, disunified social universe motivated by as wide a range of goals as Americans and overwhelmingly non-violent.

There are several curious aspects of this neo-con mythology. Not the least interesting is the degree to which the neo-con portrayal of Islam reflects the reality about the neo-cons themselves. The utility of the neo-con myth for various neo-con projects—above all, the transformation of the U.S. into a global empire in control of the world’s oil and the transformation of Israel into a regional mini-empire—also merits reflection. But perhaps the most curious—and most tragic--aspect of the neo-con myth about political Islam is the degree to which it is a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Regardless of the true condition of the Islamic political world, to the degree that the world’s only remaining superpower portrays it as a monolithic, frightening, evil, and implacably hostile entity and treats it accordingly, then political Islam will evolve into that which it is accused of being. The greater the tendency of Washington to use force to get what it wants from global political Islam, the greater will be the tendency of Muslims to respond with force. The greater the tendency of Washington to view all activist, independent-minded Muslims as enemies, the greater will be the tendency of this highly factionalized array of political actors to unite against the common enemy. The greater the degree to which Washington views Muslim activists as evil, the greater will be the tendency of Muslim activists to conclude that they have no hope of finding an acceptable compromise with Washington.

The Muslim-Western contest has existed for far too long for a “chicken vs. egg” debate to have any value. Whether one dates it from the Arab attack on Spain, from the Crusades, from the neo-colonial era of imperialism, or from 9/11, the Muslim-Western contest waxes and wanes as each succeeding generation learns its own lessons. If the future of the world and the security of ourselves and our countries constitute our areas of primary concern, what matters is not so much the presumed nature of any specific person or group as the attitudes of broad social sectors. A man may decide to change the world but find that being a political leader is more like being a train driver, who can change the speed but must stick to the track, than being an explorer who can wander wherever he wishes.

The constant flow of the new generation into society offers endless opportunities for changing the course of events. A new Western generation may grow up imagining that war of civilizations is normal. A new Muslim generation may grow up without the frustrations that persuaded their mothers and fathers to view terrorist gangs as their only hope for justice. Support for and rates of recruitment into this or that political movement consequently change, leaving political leaders wondering why they can no longer accomplish what they were accustomed to accomplishing in the past. Physics may concern immutable laws of nature; politics concerns the possible.

In a political world of ever-evolving possibilities, yesterday’s assumptions will be today’s blinders. The neo-con myth about political Islam, born from a combination of rage over 9/11 and short-sighted desire to exploit 9/11 to fulfill private agendas, has, a decade later, become a set of blinders Americans can no longer afford to wear. We need to take the blinders off and look squarely at the political world we are creating before we lock ourselves into a future that we may find extremely distasteful.

Whatever your political views, you owe it to yourself to consider two questions:

1. What sort of world are we creating?
2. What can we do about it?

The Islamic world was on a role from the 7^th to the 15^th centuries, whether viewed militarily, culturally, politically, scientifically, or morally. Illustrating only the last point, a comparison of religious freedom in 13^th century Muslim Spain with 13^th century France or England or Germany would show Muslims centuries ahead of their Western neighbors. But since the 15^th century, roles have reversed. That long twilight of Muslim activism, that ceding of Muslim initiative now seems to be reversing.

Today, the Muslim world is in ferment. Popular interest in politics is intense, even as Westerners are becoming dangerously jaded about their governments.

The West, with its military superiority, has the option of resisting tooth and nail, risking everything to retain its top-dog status. The West also has the option of looking for a mutually beneficial and historically innovating restructuring of our political world that would leave the West secure while accommodating Muslim aspirations. We in the West today face few challenges more urgent than the challenge of figuring out which goal is best and how to bring it to fruition.

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Afghan Details

Yemeni Details

Iranian Details

Israeli-Palestinian Details

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A look at the details of the political landscape in various Muslim societies and the nature of U.S. behavior will reveal that the U.S. faces a surprisingly rich array of opportunities.

Protect Your Local Billionaire

There is no time to waste; Government must take action now: we need to bail out Dubai. Dubai, for those who haven’t visited lately, is the Arabs’ version of Wall Street, and with its financial integrity and therefore the financial integrity of the global financial system as we know it threatened by Dubai’s until-now secret $80 billion shortfall, this Shangra-la of unregulated capitalism deserves a U.S. taxpayer handout every bit as much as Goldman Sachs and AIG did.

The only alternative may be the loss of the global financial system as we know it. Hmmm...

Government: Not Size, but Purpose

Good governments--big or small--exist to serve; bad governments exist to exploit. That is the issue.

Governments always exist. The issue is not the existence or size of government; rather, the issue is whom the government serves. As long as Americans waste their time debating the meaningless question of how big a government should be, reform will prove an illusion. Perhaps that is why so many who oppose reform insist on raising this straw man.

The first time a local bully demanded subservience as the price of avoiding a punch in the face, government was established...or, one might respond, the first time two neighbors shook hands and agreed to protect each other from roving wolves. When Goldman Sachs wanted its bailout to pay it back for gambling away billions of investor contributions, it demanded Big Government. When Big Oil wants a tax break, it too demands Big Government. And of course when the American voter wants the world’s best superhighway system, he and she also want Big Government. Big Government for me; Small Government for you.

To really understand politics, it is necessary to discriminate between governments for special interests and governments for all (i.e., for “society,” hence the label “socialism,” which has nothing much to do with Cold War communism but just means that the goal is to aid society rather than one group). Some of the shrill voices warning about “socialism” (e.g., Palin) may not know this; many of them do and mean exactly what they say. They oppose policies that are good for society because they badly want policies that favor their little group.

To rephrase, “Big Government” is not necessarily “socialist” nor does Small Government necessarily equate with freedom. That $19B that the American taxpayer will never again see was the ultimate in Big Government but totally capitalist, in the robber baron sense of using government to steal from the masses. The Middle Ages in Europe were classic “Small Government” – if you had a horse and a sword, you could pretty much do whatever you wanted, including grabbing a peasant girl, making a private empire in the Levant, or setting up a private toll booth to tax merchants.

When “Big Government” stops Hitler or provides a large free trade zone (e.g, the whole United States), I love it. When it bails out millionaire gamblers or bombs pre-industrial societies to protect stolen oil (no, no, I was referring to Churchill in the early 1920s in Iraq), I beg to demur.

“Big Government” for society has indeed built the world’s greatest highway system in the U.S. It also created a public education system accessible to all (like the highway system). The education system is not very good, but that’s a detail: if you don’t like it, you are free to go to the library or sign on the Internet (both also brought to you—all of “you”--courtesy of Big Government) and educate yourself further. That’s a clue: Big Government that provides and/or regulates a safety net available to all but does not restrict individuals from pursuing higher goals is Good Government. Big Government that takes from the weak and gives to the strong is Bad Government. So, generally, is government – Big or Small – that constrains everyone to the official choices (e.g., the Soviet system of telling people what they could read). The distinction is between government for private gain vs. government for service.

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Regulation

The small word "regulation" is of course the elephant in the room of evaluating the quality of government. For one of many horror stories that is effectively being concealed from the American people about the way life is and the terrifying way it could be if government regulation were even worse, read up on the state of America's nuclear plants.

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Just for one example, today we in the U.S. (other pre-industrial and industrial societies made different choices) have a health care system designed for health industry profit, i.e., for private gain. It works brilliantly for that purpose. The point of health care reform is to design a system for service. A reformed health care service (as opposed to a health care industry) will, if ever designed, not make a profit. The public education system and the national highway system don’t make profits either. They are not supposed to; they exist to serve society. So should the health care system. It would not offer everything; “everything” is a pipedream. It would offer a safety net—details to be discussed, but for everyone. You are of course free to buy more health care just as you are free to buy a private plane or buy a book. How much "service" the government will provide is open to discussion; the concept of equal access to all is not open to discussion – not with a government designed to serve society.

Israel Intimidates but Does Not Bomb Lebanon

Nothing happened in Lebanon today - just the normal Israeli belligerency to show who's boss.

In an act that anywhere else on earth would be considered an act of war, Israel today violated Lebanon's airspace with two jet fighters. This belligerent event of course neither deserved nor received any notice elsewhere because it is so routine. In the global crusa...sorry...war to teach Muslims a lesson, this is the type of trivial event no serious professional analyst of global affairs would bother mentioning.

Except...isn't there a principle here? If one country is allowed endlessly to violate international law with impunity, does that not establish a dangerous precedent? What if a less "advanced" country...say, Iran...were to follow this precedent? What if an IRGC general, perhaps one not well versed in the rules of global affairs, were to argue that the precedent of Israeli aerial violations of Lebanese territory justified Iranian placement of IEDs in Iraq where American military vehicles were expected to pass?

Yes, Israel owns victimhood. No, we, the rest of mankind, will never, ever be able to compensate Israelis for the harm done to their ancestors. Nevertheless, will Israel be grateful and wise in its use of its privileges if allowed to do what is permitted to no other nation? Will it use its privileges only when necessary, apologize for doing so, and go out of its way to offer to relinquish its privileges at the earliest possible moment?

Or might Israel actually cause harm to itself by too frequent indulgence? How much unprovoked violence can a state indulge in without becoming addicted? What are the impacts on a democratic society of becoming addicted to violence as the means of choice for resolving international disputes? Does it ever affect how society resolves domestic disputes?

I don't even enjoy the odd local police helicopter buzzing over my rooftop. If that aircraft were a loaded jet fighter/bomber sent by an enemy state that had repeatedly invaded my country and destroyed my home town, I wonder, how would I feel?

Politics by Prayer

Attention over the Iranian electoral dispute is shifting to Friday prayers in Tehran, which will be led by Rafsanjani. It is normal for him to lead prayers on rotation with about three other leaders, but he missed his rotation--perhaps because he saw that as an effective protest, perhaps because Khamenei managed to sideline him.

Uskowi on Iran has a nice summary of the latest based on Persian sources:

Qalam news website reports that the opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi will attend the Friday’s Prayer which will be led by Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani [Qalam, 15 July 2009].

Mousavi, in a letter published in Qalam, declared his readiness to join his supporters in attending the service, characterizing the move as the best way to protest the “unjust” suppression of the freedoms by the government.

It is expected that Mousavi supporters will also attend the gathering, potentially creating a protest atmosphere on Tehran streets after the service.

Countering the opposition, Hossein Shariatmadari, the influential editor of the ultra-conservative Kayhan, in an editorial to be published in Thursday's edition of the newspaper, has called on government supporters to attend the prayer services as well and has instructed them to chant pro-Khamenei slogans, such as “Khamenei, we are your soldiers; Khamenei, we are at you command!” [Kayhan, 16 July 2009].

So Mousavi has apparently finally discovered a forum--public prayer--from which even the regime sees no way to exclude him. Therefore, to compete, the regime feels it must meet him on his own chosen ground and compete on his chosen terms.

Details on typical atmosphere for such a meeting would be very interesting.

• Have they been politicized before?
• What typically happens on the street after prayers?

As for Friday:

• will the Basij be out in force on the street when prayers end?
• what will be happening in Friday prayers in other cities, especially Qom, where a lot of leading clerics--supposedly the conscience of the nation--are still trying very hard to remain invisible?

Historical Analogies for the Iranian Predicament

Finding Iran confusing? So is everyone else. We (i.e., Westerners threatening Iran and Iranian politicians who threaten it in their own myriad ways) might all just want to calm down and consider for a moment the lessons we might learn from history.

Zionist politicians intent on expanding Israeli territorial control and defeating any country (and Iran is the last) willing to defy Israeli regional military domination are doing their best to make the case the Iran is sui generis. On this one point, Khomenei would certainly have agreed. But Khomenei has been dead for a long time, and Iran looks more and more like other countries every day.

It is almost impossible to view the Basij without thinking of the Red Guards of the Cultural Revolution: naïve and no doubt frequently sincere youths full of indignation, minds crammed with ideology and played for fools by corrupt leaders. So far, they remain under control, but Mao ended up having to call out the army to control his teenage bully boys, and that pretty much trashed his revolution.

It is also almost impossible to view the IRGC without seeing that model of military kleptocracy, the Pakistani Army (see Alyesha Siddiqa’s Military Inc. on the latter). Pakistan and Iran are similar in many ways, not the least because both have politicized and educated publics that have demonstrated the will and capacity to take charge of their own fate and defend their rights. The impressive overthrow of Musharraf and the Lawyer’s Movement in Pakistan as well as the courage of protestors both against the Shah in 1978-9 and today in Iran hold lessons in democratic action that put complacent Americans, whose democracy is also under domestic attack, to shame. In Pakistan, the masses concerned about civil liberties tamed the military only to see corrupt and incompetent politicians slip back into power. Are senior clerics in Qom right now considering how Iran might do better?

There is no embarrassment in admitting that we foreigners don’t have a clue about what is happening in Iran. Events strongly suggest that Khomenei, Ahmadinejad, the IRGC, the Qom clerical establishment, and the Iranian populace don’t either. After all, while you were reading this article, the situation changed. But there are historical precedents worth contemplating while we all (hopefully) take a deep breath and calm down.