Ted Auch

Just another great map from The Economist. Refer back to the map in a previous post regarding The Trigger Line as it is called in Iraq. Here it is essentially the line separating the Two Shades of Iraq.

This is truely an informative and needed reminder of the nuanced divisions in Iraq. It is from The Economist (http://www.economist.com/world/middle-east/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15502375). The article basically is discussing the issues surrounding NE Kurdistan and the rest of the nation. The author discusses how the Kurdish v. Arab tussle may be of more long-term importance than Sunni v. Shiite, which is the classic struggle we hear about in the west. The Shiites being the party of El-Maliki. However, the Kurds in the NEastern section of the country guard what they call “The Trigger Line”, because they were burned by Saddam Hussein and feel as though with their oil riches Hallibur…Oops I mean Exxo…Kidding I meant El-Maliki wants desperately to divide and conquer the region. The article makes the point that with General Odierno et al leaving at the end of this summer it will be worth keeping an eye on “The Trigger Line”.

GOOD

“The United Nations received today the 30th instrument of ratification for the Convention on Cluster Munition,” said a statement from Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s press office.

“The Convention on Cluster Munitions was opened for signature in December 2008, and it has taken only 15 months to attain the 30 ratifications necessary for it to become binding international law.”

“The Obama administration has not yet made its views on the convention known, but President Obama signed a law on March 11, 2009, banning the export of all but a very tiny fraction of the cluster munitions in the US arsenal.”

BAD

“Unfortunately, albeit unsurprisingly, the US, Russia, China, Israel, India and Pakistan – a group that includes the biggest makers and users of the weapon…” attended negotiations or showed any interest of signing an agreement.

“It’s also no surprise that the US, Israel, but also Russia refuse to ratify the 1997 Ottawa Treaty, signed by 158 countries – as of 2007 – which prohibits the production, transfer or use of landmines.”

UGLY

“According to the group Handicap International, one-third of cluster-bomb victims are children. Equally alarming, 98 percent of the weapon’s overall victims are civilians. The group estimates that about 100,000 people have been maimed or killed by cluster bombs around the world since 1965.”

“Defense…has become this mantra…and once people hear the word defense they stop thinking.” Rabbi Arik Ascherman, Rabbis for Human Rights, Israel

There is alot of talk right now about Tea Party Revolution and Socialism via the Obama administration. However, the thing that these people that are not seeing is that most of what is happening is being inflicted on them via both parties in concert with the banks, health care industry, and the Military Industrial Complex (MIC). I used to be very skeptical of the socialist ideologues and remain skeptical of those that invest all their emotional and intellectual capital in one school of thought or religion for that matter. Such philosophies remove the individual’s personal responsibility. They also allow themselves to be easily manipulated through advertising. The fact is that when you look at two long-term sets of data – income disparity and the MIC – you see the true problem AND to those that blame Obama as a fascist or whatever I say a trend does not 9 months or 1 adminstration make. This guy is clearly overwhelmed but based on the data I will present he is facing an inertia whose depth and scope is quite daunting.

As you can see from the figure to the right when plotting the returns on 10 of the largest military industrial contractors it is clear that they are rapidly overtaking this country’s production sector.

What we are seeing is that those firms with a long-term presence on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) have done quite well for themselves from the 94,171% increase in share price of General Dynamics since it’s initial offering in January of 1977. The MIC giants Boeing and United Technologies have since their share prices increase by 21,788 and 18,633%, respectively. Interestingly two new players in the MIC industry KBR a spin-off of Dick Cheney’s Halliburton and DynCorp a leading competitor of Blackwater (now called Xe Services LLC) have declined by 105 and 119% since their arrival on the DJIA in 2006. In summary the MIB has on averaged gained 15,448% relative to the 823% increase on the DJIA.

So, while the economy suffers and jobs are lost at the rate of 250-750,000 per month in the last 2.5 years the MIB is operating at a profit ratio of 15:1 relative to the DJIA. This type of ratio would usually raise red flags, but since these companies are True Patriots their profligacy is viewed as an inevitable result of the War on Terror and the Spread of Democracy. I wonder if these companies are also Too Big To Fail?

The other contention is that Obama is a looking to redistribute wealth at the expense of most Americans. Hand in hand with this argument is the idea that all citizens have access to the American Dream. Well if you look at data from the Census Bureau you will see that redistribution is absolutely happening but it is occurring in the opposite direction. Two correlated trends are quite evident from the data:

1. Every year the Upper 5% of this country increases it’s average income by $2,049, while the income of the lower 2 Quartiles increases by $93-164. This seems unfair yet the common concern amongst those that are benefiting the least is accruing enough wealth to realign themselves with those that benefit the most form the Efficient Capitalist Market. However, those that benefit the most are doing their darndest to insure that they and only they benefit from this increasing disparity.

They are doing this by promoting war in the hopes of keeping this country divided and invoking patriotism as a means to encourage those with nothing to fight for those with everything.

2. The data also demonstrates that the share of this country’s income allocated to the Top 5 Percent has risen from 43% in 1965 to 50% in 2008. If this trend continues this sector of society will account for 60% of this country’s wealth by 2050.

So I just finished an amazing book by Naomi Klein called “The Shock Doctrine”, which basically chronicles the dark side of capitalism via the actions and thinking of folks like Milton Friedman, Friedrich Hayek, Eugene Fama, and Jeffrey Sachs. Anyway the book is revealing and pokes lots of holes in the Efficient Market hypothesis of Fama and Adam Smith’s “Invisible Hand”. Ms. Klein mentions in passing the SPADE Defense Index, which according to www.amex.com

“…is a modified market capitalization weighted index, comprised of publicly traded companies that seeks to measure the performance of securities in the defense, homeland security, and space marketplace.”

For those that deny the existence of the Military Industrial Complex (MIC) described by Dwight D. Eisenhower as he left the oval office I think I can prove empirically that the SPADE Index demonstrates the naivete of such a view (See Figure).

Between the end of 1997 and September 10th 2001 the SPADE rose by 107%, but between 9-11 and 9-14-2009 it more than doubled (205%). Overall the SPADE has grown by 233% since it’s origination in December of 1997. So whats so important about these data? Well looking at the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), S & P 500, and NASDAQ we see that they grew by 103%, 99%, and 90% respectively between December of 1997 and 9-11. These trends are well alligned with what I described for the SPADE during the same time period. Heres the rub these indices only grew by 111%, 103%, and 142%. It is understandable that the NASDAQ would outpace the DJIA and S & P 500 as it was operating from a lower base. We are seeing that this country is relying more on the financial services and war profiteering industry 2 nefarious and wealth concentrating sectors of our economy. I must wonder where the outrage is? We have been conditioned to believe that all of us can have a big piece of the pie when infact the folks that pull the strings of these industries would in no way allow such an event to occur. It would be called wealth redistribution and we know what the neoconservatives and evangelical right-wingers think about such a prospect. The SPADE provides concrete evidence that we are moving towards a society that embraces Frederick the Great’s belief that “Diplomacy without war, is like music without instruments.” For those that think that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfield, et al’s fingerprints have been removed from the dialectic I call your attention to the Supreme Court and the SPADE’s trajectory.

The answer is George Bush et al. (that means you as well Ms. Pelosi, Mr. Reid, and the rest of you supine Democrats)! For that President Obama we as a nation wish we had handed you something with a little more pizazz, but we didn’t. In the words of the the NYT’s editorial board “We do not envy President Obama as he tries to undo George W. Bush’s illegal and shameful detainee policy.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/opinion/17sun1.html?ref=todayspaper) However, you volunteered Mr. Obama and I don’t think there was anything about this job and it’s myriad obstacles you had not been well versed in. You have the intellect of the last 10 presidents combined, but it appears that it escapes you every time you ponder Pakistan and your policy towards “resolving” the conflict. As press reports have recently discussed 14 terrorists have been killed by predator and reaper drone strikes in Pakistan’s northern tribal regions. If you combined that with Pakistan’s estimate of 700 civilians you get 2% efficiency. Okay I know you would reply that the military’s civilian casuality numbers are much lower. How much lower? A third? Well that still leaves us at 6% efficiency, which by my qualitative assessment would require that we not even use the word efficient when discussing remotely piloted drones in Pakistan. According to Kilcullen and Exum “…every one of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge, and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes have increased.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/opinion/17exum.html?ref=todayspaper)

Oh yeah and the fact that the title of an article about your new COO in Afghanistan Lt. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal is “MAN IN THE NEWS; General Steps From Shadow” (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E04E2DA113FF930A25756C0A96F9C8B63) really ain’t very assuring or indicative of the change you said was heading towards DC. I wonder is this shadow that McChrystal emerged from like a beacon in the night the same one that former VP Cheney referred to a week after 9/11 with Tim Russert

“We also have to work, though, sort of the dark side, if you will. We’ve got to spend time in the shadows in the intelligence world. A lot of what needs to be done here will have to be done quietly, without any discussion, using sources and methods that are available to our intelligence agencies, if we’re going to be successful. That’s the world these folks operate in, and so it’s going to be vital for us to use any means at our disposal, basically, to achieve our objective.” (http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/vicepresident/news-speeches/speeches/vp20010916.html)

Unfortunately by these folks Mr. Cheney meant Gen. McChrystal and his boss Donald Rumsfeld, along with the convenient advice of folks like John Yoo, David Addington, and current Federal District Judge Jay Bybee. This statement by Cheney is often cited as the tacit acknowledgement that torture was going to be used and more importantly was deemed well within our right as a nation under attack. Torture! Well it seems Mr. Obama is placing his eggs in the centrist to right of center basket on this one as well. Why? Well it probably has something to do with the Democrats feeling as though they have to flex their muscle Hulk Hogan style with respect to terror. Obama is dangerously close to having complete ownership of the war in Afghanistan and the quagmire that is Iraq (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/opinion/06herbert.html; bybee-torture-memo; bybee_to_rizzo_torture_memo)

Instead of choosing the 4:1 diplomacy:military ratio suggested by the Progressive Caucus the Obama administration is going to continue to rely on the 1:10 ratio employed by the hawkish policy makers in the previous adminstration (http://www.truthout.org/052109A) This will get us nowhere fast and will facilitate the creation of jihadist and anti-American sentiment where there was none. Gen. McChrystal who was the commander of the Pentagon’s Join Special Operations Command (JSOC) an ultra-covert crew of heavies not proned to diplomacy but rather brute force. According to Tom Engelhardt it was Cheney in endorsing the super-general that said “I think you’d be hard put to find anyone better than Stan McChrystal.” The general’s crews use of force clearly bordered on if not blatantly stepped over the line of torture in Baghdad specifically Task Force 6-26 according to Engelhardt (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-engelhardt/going-for-broke_b_206438.html).

So anyway Bush didn’t make his bed and for that he will be perpetually tarnished, but you Mr. Obama don’t need to make things worse, because if you do your name will find an equally unflattering fate. Use your superior intellect and immense resources to severe ties with the previous administration. That includes aborting predator and reaper drone attacks and the employment of an Afghanistan COO whose heavy-handed and borderline Geneva violating past will only fuel the insurgency and spawn generations of jihadists. Oh yeah and try giving the people of Afghanistan a viable alternative to poppy rather than simply scolding them for growing one of the only crops that could survive in AfPak.

Ever since former long-time US intelligence officer and more recently UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter visited us here in Burlington, Vermont for a lecture at the UU Church and later at St. Michael’s college his words have haunted me “This country isn’t against the war in Iraq because their against war or even one in Iraq. Their against it because we’re losing and Americans hate losing!” This coming from a man who while raucous and sometimes over the top is pragmatic and knows of what he speaks. I was left to wonder what does winning really mean? I guess it is easily quantifiable with respect to sports, but beyond that isn’t it really just a qualitative and highly biased measure of success? I mean ask the folks of Tijuana if Felipe Calderón’s war on drugs is working? How bout the war on AIDS? Are these winnable ventures or simply rallying cries geared at coalescing folks around an elusive goal? Many would argue that the War on Terror is winnable. Is that right? How? By pounding into submission fundamentalists? Or wait I know why don’t we just integrate them like the Canadian and US government did with native Americans and the Australians with aborigines? Yeah that’s it just wash them of their profligate ways imposing our culture so forcefully that they suffocate with consumptive glee. Or in the words of Henry Kissinger with Charlie Rose (December 16, 2008)
“I know the view that you start by converting the whole world to our political philosophy. I don’t think that can be done in one or two terms of an administration. That’s a historic process…”
OR Republican Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee on December 12, 2008 during the debate about what to do with the “Big Three” in Detroit “Crisis is when goods things happen. You know when you can make people do things.”
I would note these people we are trying to cleanse see all the angles and aren’t having it. Their convictions run to their marrow and beyond. If that wasn’t the case Alexander the Great or the Russians before us would have conquered the tribal regions of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and all the other “Stans”. They didn’t and we won’t because our definitions of winning couldn’t be more disparate from theirs. We’re impatient their not. Our convictions are fiscal and hegemonic in nature theirs are nationalistic. We paint broad regional character brushes, while prior to the war in Afghanistan and the occupation of Iraq, they were able to separate government from people. Unfortunately by most accounts the latter is no longer true, which is in large part due to the crimes of Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and Bagram Air Base.
Getting back to what it means to win a war. Are all the lives lost in the respective pursuit of eliminating cocaine and marijuana trade with Columbia and Mexico worth the countless lives lost? These on top of the lives lost in this country from addiction, which if given the money these wars were allotted would be a lot further along today.
It comes down to the simple fact that sans the Super Bowl or World Cup winning is not real it is not something that ever really happens, rather it is perception framed by the media or government or both working in concert so as to not worsen morale. When the latter happens and it has happened quite often recently this country is a dangerous place, a place where answers are hard to come, where secrets, redacted transcripts, and decisions by a few that affect the masses are commonplace. This was the case in the days of the robber barons and their overwhelming influence on Washington, specifically the Rockefellers, Carnegies, Vanderbilts, etc. Wait that doesn’t happen anymore does it? What would you call Exxon, Dow, Pfizer, General Electric? We are moving beyond those days because consolidation of wealth is at an all time high and this phrase we all have come to know and love “Too big to fail” threatens the fabric of this democracy, while phrases such as “Too big to exist” are shrugged off as socialist jargon, even though plenty of very centrist economists espouse the latter including former chief IMF economist (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200905/imf-advice). What about “Too Important to fail”? If we forget about the importance of the 3rd estate, K-12 education (and beyond!), and our civil liberties for the sake of “Homeland Security” what are we?