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12/29/2006


 

HUMINT: Iranian Bonsai


M. DODGE THOMAS: There are good reasons why you don’t see modern examples of durable Theocratic regimes, and as the role of religion in public life changes in Iran reformers will at least have the advantage of living in a country that is already operating under a limited form of representative government that grew out of an authentic national revolution rather than being “imposed” from the outside.

HUMINT: Broad generalizations about what "neocons" think or want aside - external economic pressure on Iran is causing a socio-political bonsai effect on the growth of that nation. Iranians, particularly Iranian officials who survived the Iran-Iraq War, have a warped identity that is deeply influenced by anti-identity. By anti-identity I am referring specifically to anti-Americanism. More importantly, Iranian instability today has a root cause that will no go away. The effect of the 1979 Revolution is completely disconnected from its cause. I think that’s the point that most people banking on "reform" miss. What you are talking about in terms of policy change in Iran is in fact personality change. For the Iranian government to survive as it is defined right now, it has to subject its populace to blatant psychological operations while simultaneously blocking external influences.

Observing individuals approach Iran over the years I've come to realize something about all things external, in reference to Iran. We in the West are not talking about the unique nuances of diverse political platforms when we talk about reform in Iran. What we are actually talking about has more to do with Westerner's connectivity to the Iranian regime in terms of trade and influence. If you think relieving pressure on the Iranian regime is the best direction to move in, then consider these Qs. Do you think the privatization of Iran Air was because of internal pressure on the Iranian government? Do you think that had anything to do with public opinion? When a Rafsanjani figure or a Khatami figure stands in front of you, smiles and shakes your hand - what do you think he's thinking? Those kinds of people’s actions cannot venture too far from their toxic rhetoric without being labeled a “puppet” or “spy”, (remember the anti-identity syndrome) so don't pin your hopes on personality.

I've no desire to rob you of your optimism about Iran but if you look at that country in terms of what it is saying as well as what it is doing, it is the most egregious abuser of democratic rhetoric to sustain tyrannical policy in the world. Look at what Ayatollahs do for a living. You're being bamboozled by career speech making spiritualists. The can spin any event to serve their interests as well as any Sigmund Freud disciple. If you’re banking on them to reform then I beg you, put them under your finest microscope and watch very closely. If you find evidence to contradict what I’m saying, by all means, post it in bold.

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12/26/2006


 

HUMINT: Dream Killer

THE HISPANIC CHALLENGE By Samuel P. Huntington
HUNTINGTON: Such a transformation would not only revolutionize the United States, but it would also have serious consequences for Hispanics, who will be in the United States but not of it. Sosa ends his book, The Americano Dream, with encouragement for aspiring Hispanic entrepreneurs. “The Americano dream?” he asks. “It exists, it is realistic, and it is there for all of us to share.” Sosa is wrong. There is no Americano dream. There is only the American dream created by an Anglo-Protestant society. Mexican Americans will share in that dream and in that society only if they dream in English.

HUMINT: How could anyone dictate anyone else's dream? They can't! If a person conceives of an Americano Dream, then it exists. An Americano Dream doesn't devalue Huntington's American Dream or my American Dream or your American Dream. I have to respectfully disagree with Huntington who I will now refer to as a "dream killer". Let's play a game called flip the context - Ask yourself; what does a Christmas tree have to do with Jesus Christ? Decorating the tree is a convergence of several cultures into something beautiful. The custom would've been impossible to imagine for a "dream killer" like Huntington. Analytically speaking Huntington's intuitive commentary is a self fulfilling prophecy. If you look at an American and arbitrarily disqualify him or her as a potential compatriot, besides being an asshole, you're probably arbitrary yourself. Ideas are not language dependent constructs. IMO The Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, Emancipation Proclamation and every other important American document should be written in every language ever conceived by the mind of mankind, printed at tax payer expense and the books should find there way onto the shelves of every office, library and home in the world. That's a dream to behold! IMO The most quoted man in the World should be Thomas Jefferson! But that too is a dream worthy of execution by Huntington's sociopathic conclusion. His forth coming book, "Who Are We?" might be better titled, "Who We Were!" because Huntington certainly cannot figure out "Who We Will Be!". Irrespective of Huntington's problematic conclusion, the problem he points out is very real.

To my mind, the influx of legal and illegal immigrants is a serious problem only if integration into America's dynamic culture is impossible. History shows that it's possible for people to integrate from virtually anywhere to virtually anywhere. Therefore the problem he outlines is solvable. Right now, there are points of failure in the process of integration. That's the primary problem. At this moment, it is difficult for anyone to offer a solution without good data. Hopes and dreams are important data. In fact casually dismissing an immigrant's hopes and dreams will exacerbate integration woes. One should consider hopes and dreams to be essential to evaluating the capacity of an immigrant community to successfully integrate. If the current dreams are destructive, don't murder the ones that exist, offer better ones.
RURUDYN: I'm sorry but the inescapable fact––at least for me––is that illegal aliens carry this baggage with them that should make them absolutely unacceptable:
They imagine that because of their reasons or motivations that whatever immigration laws there are, these are laws they don't feel they should have to obey.
When you cut to the chase that means they have already demonstrated that if they can justify to themselves why they should not obey any given law they should feel they don't have to obey: they will not obey it. It would be one thing if these laws were arbitrary and unnecessary; however, given the fact that the debate is now being set by those who impose themselves on us rather than those who have the right as citizens to decide the status of their borders for themselves: how can anyone say these are arbitrary or unnecessary concerns?

HUMINT: When a person breaks the law they forfeit their rights as a citizen. It is redundant to point out that illegal immigrants never had rights as a citizen. Look at what they are doing with their lives. What they’ve done by entering the United States illegally is shift responsibility for their future to the people of the United States. It's a responsibility we have no choice but to own up to. The list of options regarding what to do about their illegal act is long. Incarceration, deportation… the most cowardly decision of all is to move away. If your neighborhood is going to hell, don't pick up and move away! Clean it up! Do something about it! Quit retreating! This problem cannot be ignored. It appears as though politicians are ignoring illegal immigration because Americans are unwilling to do anything about it.

BLACKELK: The United States is a dynamic nation with a wonderful, if occasionally flawed, and proud history. The future should be likewise. We are a nation and not a museum. We are [neither] homogenized nor pasteurized as a nation. Had we been either, we would be a museum, with a brilliant past and stultifyingly boring present reality like much of what Rumsfeld accurately derided as "old Europe." The amazing thing about "old Europe" is how very much it proves day by day not to have been worth saving. Today, the Japanese are among our closest allies and strongest supporters. With the occasional exception of a Winston Churchill, a Margaret Thatcher or a Tony Blair, Europe (outside of the Vatican) has been generally useless since WW II. They want their own freedom (to some small extent) but don't care about anyone else's. When France falls to Islam, I hope we let them grovel for a few years while we throw the insolent words of Chirac and de Villepin back in their faces before Uncle Sugar comes to the rescue of the French. We should let them know it is the last time we save their useless backsides unless they closely follow our foreign policy and military lead thereafter.

HUMINT: Excellent post! The comparison between your family - German settlers raising a family on a farm - to a near relentless wave of unskilled and destitute immigrants hitting our cities, suburbs and rural zones is a stretch, but well worth the time to think about. I've started to think about the immigration problem in engineering terms of equilibrium, pressure and diffusion. In less complicated words, like human dominoes - conditions in one region degrade which results in an exodus. America's leaky borders and ambivalent citizenry have yet to resist diffusion of illegal immigrants. As noted on this thread, dense enclaves have a destabilizing effect. What happens next? The people moving out of the areas immigrants are moving into become secondary and tertiary immigrants. The more affluent of these "cowardly" movers drive up property value in areas priced out of reach of first and second tier movers. If my domino theory is accurate, where does the last one fall? It's easy enough to pick up and move now... or is it. Our children aren't going to be able to afford a home in the neighborhoods they grew up in, or their neighborhoods will become unrecognizable due to the demographic shift. To approach a solution we have to consider reducing the geopolitical pressure causing the primary wave of immigrants. Secondarily, Americans cannot treat their property and community so casually as to abandon it when their neighborhood undergoes a demographic transition. My fellow Americans, in regions overrun, hold your ground. Do what you must to make your community worth living in.

A. POLE: German and Scandinavian Lutherans were integrated rather smoothly with British Calvinists (Congregationalists and Presbyterians), so were the Episcopalians/Anglicans (despite their loyalist leanings), various more home grown groups like Baptists or Pentecostals are in sync by definition. Integration of Catholics was a difficult process, but somehow went OK at the price of redefining aspects of American culture (Orthodox could find a place in opening created by Catholics). Harder to integrate were Mormons despite of their domestic origin. The real question is if Muslims can be integrated in large numbers. Or if the large influx of Latin Americans with a very strong identity will not prevail over British element. If they do, USA will become other Latin American countries. Buddhist/Confuctionsts tend to conform and to convert. Hindu so long as they adhere to the cast tradition can remain within their own circles avoiding conflict, as they change they will be more willing to adjust or even convert. The last but not the least the militant secularists cannot fit by definition, but they abort/gay themselves out of existence.

HUMINT: When you think about the word "integrate" do you consider "merge" or "sustainable society" to be a synonym? IMO The sustainability of humanity is proportional to its diversity of culture and ideas. Cognitive clarity of the - past * present * future - is something that many minds asymptotically approach together. That's the real power of the United States! The philosophical and cultural contributions to our society do come from the Protestant Reformation but what do those ideas actually do for us? How did those ideas transform into Super Power?

The power of Reformation logic is that it makes room for diversity of culture and ideas. Do not give it uni-polar credit for creating new culture and new ideas. Agreeing to disagree opens the doors blocking progress and prosperity for all mankind. Now let's ask the question again, why are we powerful? Americans manage to live through iterative bouts of disagreements, learning from each, and finding new agreements about the mechanics of humanity. The more we know about “us”, the more able we are to face unpredictable challenges to “us”. In America, “us”, can fit any human being you can imagine.

In this work, Huntington has utterly missed the point. Why? I think he's an antisocial sociologist. Somebody needs to remind him that humans are the most social entities on the planet. Between you, me and Huntington, let's make the point clear. WASP logic facilitates society but is not directly responsible for it. WE ARE!

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12/23/2006


 

HUMINT: Civil Lincoln

Bush, Lincoln, and Johnson: Presidents In Wartime

Posted by humint to stainlessbanner
On News/Activism 12/22/2006 5:38:06 AM PST · 14 of 17

The islamofacist comparison [to the U.S. Civil War] is way overdone and has been thoroughly vetted on other threads. Try another approach. [Lincoln's emancipation of the slaves vs.] Moses, God's people, Egypt, Canaan.

On issues relating to individual liberty, the major premise is established by the federal government and the minor premise by the state. The non-interference assertion suggests sovereignty but only as long as the minor premise does not break the major premise.

  1. All citizens of the United States are free
  2. IF ONLY Some citizens of States are free
  3. Not all citizens of the United States are free

Let's look at our federal system in terms of perception. How do you refer to yourself? In terms of geopolitics, are you global, national, state, county...? Federal documents have the widest relevance in terms of population cohesion. In other words, most Americans think of themselves as American first because that definition of who they are has the greatest geopolitical solidarity. You've probably noticed when reading about the history of humankind, geopolitical solidarity is proportional to power.

To your second point - comparing Lincoln to Moses outside of a spiritual context, Lincoln is indisputably more accessible. The American Civil War took place less than 150 years ago. IMO, the significance of any event is proportional to its accessibility.

  1. Rational logic is good
  2. Accessibility is required to apply logic
  3. Accessibility is good


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Bush, Lincoln, and Johnson: Presidents In Wartime

Posted by humint to billbears
On News/Activism 12/21/2006 11:29:17 PM PST · 11 of 17

BILLBEARS: [Lincoln] ignored the [Constitution] and destroyed the Republic

HUMINT: Thomas Jefferson compared slavery to holding a wolf by the ears. He knew the country would eventually let the wolf go and be bitten. He wrote extensively on the subject. Lincoln was profoundly impressed with the works of Jefferson. The Declaration of Independence did not support the Southern position once the concept of slavery had been abandoned somewhere in America. What happened when the first slave state became a free state? That meant that there was national schizophrenia over the idea of citizenry, liberty and slavery. In light of that and the prewar history I don't think slavery was a peripheral issue at all. North-South reconciliation in the post-war period cast the abolitionists as a marginal issue after the war. They rewrote history to establish some measure of normalcy but that wouldn't come for decades... The echoes of American slavery are still evident in contemporary American society. The wound will take time to heal completely, if it can heal completely.

In terms of your Constitutional argument, any State among the United States has certain characteristics. A prime, if not the most important characteristic, is to remain a state under any and all circumstances. Let's fast forward and consider your logic. Consider a majority of Muslims in Michigan were to institute Sharia law in place of the existing State Constitution. What does your interpretation of the Constitution suggest you do? All of the rights of the citizens in Michigan, guaranteed to them by the Bill of Rights, are meaningless under Sharia law. To protect the integrity of the Bill of Rights for all Americans inside and outside Michigan, the President of the United States would be obligated to protect the rights of the non-Muslim minority. What if the majority Muslims did not drop Sharia as the law of the land but instead decided to secede from our Union? I have little doubt that both you and I would stand shoulder to shoulder and go to war with Sharia Michigan.


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Bush, Lincoln, and Johnson: Presidents In Wartime

Posted by humint to billbears
On News/Activism 12/21/2006 10:28:31 PM PST · 9 of 17

[LINCOLN] a man that worked to destroy the Constitution.

The Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights were a compass guiding Lincoln's Presidency. If Lincoln sanctioned cessation as a result of Southerner's disgust of the abolitionist movement, those documents would've been meaningless and forgotten pieces of paper today. What's fascinating about Lincoln is that he served the United States as though those documents were his personal identity. I disagree with you, IMO he saved the Constitution.


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Bush, Lincoln, and Johnson: Presidents In Wartime

Posted by humint to Valin
On News/Activism 12/21/2006 9:59:59 PM PST · 7 of 17

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln barely won the Republican nomination in 1860, barely won the presidency, suffered a near total defeat in the elections of 1862, and presided over a Civil War that claimed the lives of 600,000 men out of a population of approximately 40 million, while leaving another 2 million wounded and large swathes of the country devastated. Copperheads openly demanded peace, and as the war dragged on, millions in the north began to wonder whether the country was worth the cost in carnage. General after general disappointed him, some turned against him publicly, and one –McClellan—ran against him in 1864.

Team of Rivals is an outstanding book. Unfortunately Lincoln is still stigmatized by many Americans, IMO, unfairly. Under his leadership, arguably the most significant emancipation in the history of all mankind took place. Nevertheless, the pain of that war still sends shivers through time across generations. Irrespective of that, champions of controversial causes tend to be stained immediately after their greatest moments. Only a clear appreciation of history and the passage of enough time can wash away the blood that blurs our eyes. My consolation has always been that we, as a nation, know where we've been, know where we are and know where we're going.


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12/13/2006


 

HUMINT: Ali McSassinated

DUMB ANSWERS OF INTELLIGENCE CHIEF- Times Online: He is expected to have an acute understanding of terrorist groups and their threats to American interests. But the incoming chairman of a congressional intelligence committee was yesterday struggling to explain his ignorance of al-Qaeda and Hezbollah. Silvestre Reyes, the Democrat chosen to head the House of Representatives committee, was asked whether members of al-Qaeda came from the Sunni or the Shia branch of Islam. “Al-Qaeda, they have both,” he answered, adding: “Predominantly probably Shi’ite.” In fact, al-Qaeda was founded by Osama bin Laden as a Sunni organisation and views Shia Muslims as heretics. The centuries-old now fuels the militias and death squads in Iraq. Jeff Stein, a reporter for Congressional Quarterly, then put a similar question about Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia group. “Hezbollah. Uh, Hezbollah . . .” replied Mr Reyes. “Why do you ask me these questions at five o’clock? Can I answer in Spanish? Do you speak Spanish?” Go ahead, said Stein. “Well, I, uh . . .” said the congressman. [EXCERPT] The report from the Iraq Study Group expressed amazement that more was not being done to “understand the people who explode roadside bombs”. Only six people in the US Embassy in Baghdad are fluent in Arabic, about two dozen of its 1,000 employees having some familiarity with the language.
A.POLE: "Al-Qaeda, they have both," he answered, adding: "Predominantly probably Shi’ite." This is a very common view. Many people believe that 9/11 bombers came from Iraq, Iran and Syria.
HUMINT: Do you suppose it is safer to understand or ignore the world around us? Should there be a citizen quiz, and if one fails it, are they nothing more than slaves to the citizens that passed it? Maybe that's how the world works... In terms of knowing the difference between Sunni and Shi'ite and who subscribes to either, what exactly would that qualify a person to do anyway? Let's look at it another way. What if I offered you a method, 84% accurate under almost every circumstance, that could determine if a man or woman was a threat to your predefined "interests"! Then told you, it didn't make a difference if the person was Shi'ite, Sunni or Kurd? Of course I'm surprised this guy didn't know the difference, but does it make a difference that he didn't know the difference? Does it make a difference that Imam Ali was assassinated and his story has much to do with the divisions? Would it not be easier to blame Hollywood for not making a feature length film on the subject? In this era - what alternative is there to Borat? Why wouldn't Silvestre Reyes just spend a minute on WIKIPEDIA? Too many questions... today. I'll stop here.

WIKI: According to tradition, three Muslim zealots (purists later termed Kharijites) had agreed to assassinate Ali, Mu'awiyah and `Amr, as the authors of disastrous feuds among the faithful. The assassins sent against Mu'awiyah and `Amr failed as on the day Muawiyah happened to be wearing his armour underneath his clothes and Amr did not attend the mosque as he was ill; the only assassin who succeeded was the one who attacked Ali. This event has always been shadowed by speculation of a plot masterminded by Muawiyah. The fortuitous coincidence that saved Muawiayah and Amr, both bitter enemies of Ali, is considered to have the mark of Muawiyah's shrewd planning. [24] Ali suffered a mortal head wound on the 19th of Ramadan while he was performing morning prayers in mosque in the city of Kufa. Some say that the sword that wounded him was poisoned. According to the Shi'a tradition, as he was being struck Ali said "By the Lord of the Ka'bah, I have succeeded!" [25] Ali died on the 21st of Ramadan (three days after receiving the head wound) in the city of Kufa (Iraq) in 661 CE.


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12/12/2006


 

HUMINT: Oligarchy Propaganda


100-Fold_Return: The emotions of average American and the world are being manipulated to invade and attack Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela through a barrage of propaganda. What's the oligarchy's real scheme behind for the shedding of young men's and women's blood outside of the lamestream's rhetoric??? I'm AFU from my military service, sgt, disabled and disfigured all to hades, Sergent, an E-5, not getting one nickle of disability.

HUMINT: Our emotions are manipulated every day in America. We are being manipulated further and further away from reality and responsibility by our constant promises of instant gratification to each other. I enjoy it. It truly is great. While there are a number of great places in the world outside of the United States that are very different, I wouldn't call a single one of them better. Unfortunately there are a great number of places in the world that do not share our culture of tolerance and customer service - with a smile. In fact, some individuals view our collective success through the explicit guarantees of individual liberty as immoral and decadent. You might be asking, what changed? So what? It's always been that way!

If the past were to forever resemble the future, in near perfect detail, we'd all be wealthy investors wouldn't we? If the geo-political mechanics never changed, it would take the risk out of every decision we might make at home or abroad. Well... these times, they are a changin -

Here's why. A balance was struck during the Cold War that toppled when it ended. The Cold War was fought in the aftermath of WWII and relied heavily on technology. The Soviets couldn't keep up. Where they lacked bright ideas to confront American ingenuity they had a surplus of bad ideas. With the spread of their bad ideology went Kalashnikov Riffles among other weaponry, still very much in use today. Now the Soviets are gone, leaving the United States as the only remaining Super Power in the world.

In Asia, South America and the Middle East there are ambitions men entering the equation at least in part, because the Soviets sank. Kim Jung Il, Hugo Chavez and Mahmood Ahmadinejad are all unique threats to the United States. They are not threats simply because they seek to balance American authority in the world. If that were all they wanted to do, our industries would be pleased to help them. These men are belligerents. They seek power at the expense of the United States. These men are ascending to power on the back of bad ideology and lies about the United States. It is what they say and do that makes them a threat to the United States. They represent an oligarchy, two of whom, (Chaves and Ahmadinejad) are in a position to use their nation's petroleum reserves to extort cash from petroleum importing nations. When they are not extorting us, who are their customers, they are subverting the policies of free trade and free enterprise by subsidizing their nations natural resources. While some socialists may not agree, overwhelming evidence demonstrates that all they are doing is dangerously isolating themselves economically and fostering a petroleum black market! Black markets - undermining international policy - lies about the United States... These are the facts - So, going back to your original point. Who in your mind is manufacturing the propaganda and how do you imagine we might stop it, or at least expose it?


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HUMINT: Agree to War

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of flag-waving protesters flooded central Beirut on Sunday after a call by the Hezbollah-led opposition to step up their 10-day campaign to topple Lebanon's Western-backed government. In a huge show of force, the chanting crowds swamped two squares in the heart of the capital and rivers of men, women and children poured through surrounding streets demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. "Siniora out," demonstrators shouted. "Beirut is free," others yelled as possibly the biggest rally in Lebanon's history kicked off in bright sunshine. Giant loudspeakers blared out nationalist songs and drummers thudded a relentless beat. There were no official estimates of the crowd size on Sunday but one security source said it was the largest such gathering ever seen in Lebanon. Opposition sources said the crowd was 2 million strong -- roughly half Lebanon's population.

QUESTION: Is the Ceder Revolution undone?

WHO KILLED RAFIK HARIRI AND WHY IT MATTERS

I'm haunted by the opening paragraph of Michael Scheuer's brilliant book, Imperial Hubris, in which the ex-CIA agent in charge of going after bin Laden wrote:
"As I complete this book, U.S., British, and other coalition forces are trying to govern apparently ungovernable postwar states in Afghanistan and Iraq, while simultaneously fighting growing Islamist insurgencies in each – a state of affairs our leaders call victory. In conducting these activities, and the conventional military campaigns preceding them, U.S. forces and policies are completing the radicalization of the Islamic world, something Osama bin Laden has been trying to do with substantial but incomplete success since the early 1990s. As a result, I think it fair to conclude that the United States of America remains bin Laden's only indispensable ally."
With the Hariri assassination by an al-Qaeda operative, however, we see that this works both ways.
HUMINT: In my opinion, the Cedar Revolution is not over at all. Democracy is on the march across the greater Middle East and it is traveling a long and rocky road. If history has shown us anything, Lebanon is a flashpoint in a greater conflict. The Cedar Revolution was a step forward. Hezbollah's ascendance is a step backward. It is important to learn the lessons from the shifting sands without being crushed by the weight of emotion or confused by conjecture. Let me reiterate my opinion, the Cedar Revolution is not over. In terms of the movement for democracy in Lebanon and the greater Middle East, we should assume it is still underway, despite this dark moment in its history.

We are engaged in a long war with very old forces and it would be wise to recognize a significant pattern. The quoted paragraph of the AntiWar.com article "Who Killed Rafik Hariri? And why it matters" Michael Scheuer points out the kind of collusion that occurs between all enemies. It's an unmistakable pattern. In war, all sides agree to kill and to die in order to achieve their objectives. Men like Scheuer cannot accept that Americans, existing in a land of liberty, respect and tolerance are apt to forget how we got here. We, the people, do not make agreements to kill and to die anymore. In war, we suppose, the killing and dieing part can be skipped. Unfortunately, liberty and happiness cannot be bought and sold like a car. There have been cases in history where liberty and happiness have been achieved by processes as peaceful as buying and selling cars, but not in every case. The most remarkable cases where liberty was born, blood was shed.

Obviously, war is not going to go away. People are still going to kill and die for reasons they perceive to be righteous. Indeed there are still righteous causes in the world worth fighting for. It is my opinion that, with the right tactics, far fewer need perish by violence than in history. To be sure, the fewer members among two societies engaged in war who agree to kill and to die, the less killing and dieing there will be. War is a very different state of affairs than peace. Right now, Many Americans are blaming management for a warring world and their own healthy proclivity for peace. I think that is a wrong approach. Instead they should implore management to consider hiring a new sales team instead. In CONCLUSION, if we are willing to interpret the patterns in our history and the history of our enemies, we will be less likely to draw counterproductive conclusions, even rhetorical in nature, that confuse our enemies with our allies. Despite any implicit agreements between enemies to fight, enemies remain enemies until death or reconciliation.


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12/10/2006


 

HUMINT: ENEMIES OF A

Sun Tzu: "If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle."
  • A = The logical result of mankind merging with itself geographically to foster a sustainable, dynamic and popular - culture.
  • B = ENEMIES OF A = Sociologically isolated collectives ignorant of the irrepressible steps of mankind towards inevitable convergence.
  • While A may lose battles to B, A will forever defeat B in war.
  • A is the future.
  • B is the past.
  • With every sunrise, A defeats B.


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12/06/2006


 

HUMINT: Going Somewhere


Turki al-Hamad: Iraq is a country that is made up of various ethnicities and sects; it has always been like that and always will be, and no one group, however powerful and long-lasting, will be able to subdue all other groups.

Jaysun: The same can be said of America. So what?

humint: Outstanding observation. Virtually all Americans are coming from somewhere. If you were to measure identity as a function of family heritage, Americans have one or more geographical breaks, whereas our friends in Iraq do not. It's not uncommon for families to be able to trace their lineage back many generations. Here in the United States, most of us either cannot or simply do not for lack of interest. Recall the phrase "Bring me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free." That is the starting point of America's national identity. It's an identity that almost every culture on the planet can relate to but does not share.

Along a similar line - When an Iraqi travels to the United States, they have made an investment and a commitment to the Journey that does not occur when America went to them. I think many Iraqis thought that they were going to become part of the "land of opportunity", overnight. If Americans had %100 control over the script, I have no doubt Iraq would have. It's a pleasant fantasy many Americans still like to have. "If only we had done this or that" they say. War however is one of the most complex social relationships any two nations can engage in. I think the commonsense notion that we are losing in Iraq has more to do with "control" than it does "war". We're certainly not in a position to lose a war with Iraq under any of the current circumstances. For sure, the mess could get messier but that is not losing in any historical sense. So how do Americans get some measure of control back and engender a sensation of winning amongst other Americans? That is another post entirely.

Here's another difference between Iraqis and Americans for you. Americans tend to be control freaks whereas Iraqis are more interested in power. The difference is subtle but important. If you can control a situation, a symptom of that control is power. If, on the other hand, coming from a culture where cooperation is rare, power is conceived to be a static quantity. Power in the Middle East is accumulated parasitically, harvested from other corrupt overlords. To the average Middle Easterner, power is the spoils of conquest, never cooperation. Cooperative command and control took an American team to the moon. That spirit has a lot to do with the identity of Americans. Americans all came from somewhere so they expect that they are going somewhere, if not now, eventually. In other words, Americans have a future - Iraqis only have the present. al-Hamad is asking his fellow Middle Easterners to transcend the present and consider their future. His words are very powerful.

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12/05/2006


 

HUMINT: IRAQI FRATRICIDE


ALLOYSTEEL: Muslims are in greater danger from the bad behavior of other Muslims, than even the most concerted assault upon all of Islam by the combined forces of all their opponents in the entire world. Maybe the best of all possible outcomes is to allow the Muslims to continue their mutually murderous fraticide until they get to the last two men standing, each with a mortal wound inflicted by the other.

HUMINT: You are not alone in your thinking. Kissinger said it was "a pity both sides can't lose" the Iran-Iraq war. So let's consider it. My maxim about your plan, If chaos is king, God will be the law. If I'm right, follow my logic. Look around the region at the myriad interpretations of God. The most prominent interpretations are rife with hate speech. The rhetoric of hate is the rhetoric of violence. Now ask yourself where are they going to get the money to buy arms to fuel the violence? Oil. Now ask yourself, who is going to trade weapons for oil? China, Russia and a great number of our European allies are willing to swim in a river of Iraqi blood to make a buck. As bad as it sounds, that's assuming the killing can be contained in Iraq. My bet, it can't be contained because the West never actually controlled it.

It's as if brilliant Western minds have cognitive hiccups about their own self importance. They keep coming back to the idea that the West is the problem - As if the West has as much control in the Middle East as it does on Main Street, USA. Containment was already collapsing when Saddam invaded Kuwait. It continued to collapse in discrete stages that represent a clear pattern. Unfortunately, most of us in the West either want to take responsability for the collapse of containment or are entirely blind to the failure of that policy.

You can blame it on Islam if you like but theological problems have spiritual solutions. Do any of you have any spiritual policy suggestions? Don't answer that... Since the crusades have long ago ended and rightfully so, I've turned to philosophy in my search for an answer. It is through philosophy that early Americans dealt with religious extremism. The behavioral pattern occurring in the Middle East is as old as civilization. Corrupt minds redirect spiritual and nationalistic energies for material power. They enjoy local domination only at the expense of national security and national sovereignty.

Leave them to their own fratricidal chaos and the lowest common denominator will eventually rise from the ashes. People very unlike Westerners will ascend to claim a throne among the ruins. There is no salvation in a plan like that. A society subjected to constant chaos breeds dysfunctional psyches among its people. We don't want a social mindset capable of committing the least civilized acts a person might imagine. Why, because the low to mid ranking henchmen have permission to be ultra violent from their chieftain and their God. They interpret God's will to suit their needs which includes absolute validation of their acts of torture and violence.

That's the brink upon which the Middle East stands right now. GWB knows it. I think he has a very good grasp of what the players need to be doing to prevent it. Unfortunately, he can't do it for them. Besides a few of us here and there, he is not getting the kind of moral and rhetorical support he needs or deserves. Our President is a public servant but micromanaging every move President Bush makes is an anathema to Middle Eastern politics. Providing suggestions makes him look as strong as an American President is, but admonishments for differences of opinion are petty and look petty. GWB knows this too and that's where his near unconditional support for PM Maliki must be coming from.

In short, I disagree with you alloysteel. I think the logical result of an ongoing fratricide in Iraq would represent the worst of all possible scenarios. We have to do what we can to stop the trend toward chaos in Iraq and bring the situation to a sustainable peace. More violence may occur between now and then but we cannot be distracted from the goal of a sustainable peace. That goal is the only plausible definition of victory.

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12/04/2006


 

HUMINT: Estimate the Future

AMERICAN EMPIRE

The United States is not an empire and never has been. CEOs behave like micro empires but are primarily contained within their industries. Free trade is a construct that facilitates the redistribution of wealth in ways that socialism could never do and the criteria to do business with America's industrial empires is low - but that is hardly facilitated by the United States Government through militancy. If it were, the factories that make American Industry's competitors products would be flattened by JDAMs. By supporting the rule of law, freedom of speech, religion and press - the United States is anti Empire. Consider the definition of empire and how unlike the United States it is.

  1. a group of nations or peoples ruled over by an emperor, empress, or other powerful sovereign or government: usually a territory of greater extent than a kingdom, as the former British Empire, French Empire, Russian Empire, Byzantine Empire, or Roman Empire.
  2. a government under an emperor or empress.
  3. (often initial capital letter) the historical period during which a nation is under such a government: a history of the second French empire.
  4. supreme power in governing; imperial power; sovereignty: Austria's failure of empire in central Europe.
  5. supreme control; absolute sway: passion's empire over the mind.
  6. a powerful and important enterprise or holding of large scope that is controlled by a single person, family, or group of associates: The family's shipping empire was founded 50 years ago.
  7. (initial capital letter) a variety of apple somewhat resembling the McIntosh. –adjective
  8. (initial capital letter) characteristic of or developed during the first French Empire, 1804–15.
  9. (usually initial capital letter) (of women's attire and coiffures) of the style that prevailed during the first French Empire, in clothing being characterized esp. by décolletage and a high waistline, coming just below the bust, from which the skirt hangs straight and loose.
  10. (often initial capital letter) noting or pertaining to the style of architecture, furnishings, and decoration prevailing in France and imitated to a greater or lesser extent in various other countries, c1800–30: characterized by the use of delicate but elaborate ornamentation imitated from Greek and Roman examples or containing classical allusions, as animal forms for the legs of furniture, bas-reliefs of classical figures, motifs of wreaths, torches, caryatids, lyres, and urns and by the occasional use of military and Egyptian motifs and, under the Napoleonic Empire itself, of symbols alluding to Napoleon I, as bees or the letter N.

CHINA

I don't see China taking the U.S.'s role as super power because of who we are and who the Chinese are. If one compares size alone they are missing the most important trend driving globalization - culture! Diversity is the core component that makes globalization possible and China doesn't have it. It never will. The Chinese do well as sub-cultures inside other cultures but they do not integrate well. Their industries are mostly copy-paste version of American models and they do it for less. If anyone nation were able to take the gauntlet away from the U.S. it would be India. With Baliwood, they are copy and pasting as much of our culture as they can and doing almost everything we can do, for less. Right now, they are doing Seinfeld impressions and our kids are doing Harold and Kumar impressions. Pop culture drives the trends driving globalization. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon... Nope, no room for product placement there.

WORLD GOVERNMENT

The purpose of world government is only to facilitate international trade. Inviting nation states to the table that do not subscribe to the rule of law makes world government an impossibility. Any World Government body would have to establish constitutional criteria for each existing nation to be considered a nation by the body. Doing so would destroy the concept of national sovereignty. The national identity would also come under question because relativism couldn't interfere with World Government policy and remain functional. For example, look at the IAEA. Mohamed Elberadi is perplexed that he has to protect Iran's nuclear reactor deals with Russia from a concerned U.S. and Israel - while his behavior is highly predictable, I don't call it World Governance.

TECHOCRACY

To some extent it is already happening but no system is benefiting more from interpersonal interaction online than sitting governments. Beyond commerce, the internet serves as a means to track political and economic sentiment. Such measurements can go almost directly into policy formulation thereby creating a sense in the public sphere that the government is always one step ahead of the concerns of its citizens. The Internet is also a means to organize but is also subject to supervision. The supervision, benign or not, facilitates the prosecution of certain policies. In Iran for example, bloggers are regularly imprisoned for blogging. The Internet is developing a sense of freedom among Iranians but poses no significant threat to the Iranian government as long as the government is able to filter content. In terms of information liberty and information empowerment, the internet is only limited in terms of access. In the new world of Technocracy there are only two breeds of human being - online and off line. The off line individual will miss out on the ability to participate in Technocracy but the majority of those online will only opt to participate in ephemeral commitments such as porn and joke email. The freedom to choose content affords the user the ability to isolate themselves instead of explore. Presumably both types of behavior will occur. It would be interesting to see how internet usage evolves for those individuals not fixated on entertainment. It may be that trivial entertainment and some higher pursuits merge as has occurred with - "human computing" - see Google video tech series.

WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT - My Guesses

India and Europe, the two cultures diverse enough to capture the world's imagination and attention away from the United States, are both bogged down by socialism, language barriers and poverty. Both are lacking room to grow. The best and brightest from those societies will continue to move to the United States. To balance the quality of life they'll send money they make in the United States back home. In places that have room but do not share American cultural traits I see a need for new developments like those popping up around Las Vegas. To accommodate a growing, internet using, middle class - I think community developments are going to start springing up in places we wouldn't have anticipated before. The foreign policy of the United States will continue to transition away from containment to empowerment. Containment is the antithesis to globalization. A great number of societies may commit suicide in the process but isolation isn't an option any longer. The pace of growth around the world is such that the US will serve itself by creating copies of American community infrastructure in corners of the world accepting to the idea. Mexico might be a good place to start in order to stem the tide of immigration from that country.

CONCLUSIONS

  • Expect changes in the near term.
  • Responsibility will remain on the shoulders of Americans so long as we maintain our rule of law, popular culture and still have room to grow.
  • Thinking like this helps us deal with change even if we're all wrong.

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HUMINT: Dec 03, 2006

White House to resist Iraq Study Group
Posted by humint to Steel Wolf; FairOpinion
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 3:01:29 PM PST · 65 of 65

ARTICLE: Mr Bush is to meet with Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the powerful head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, in Washington today. "If we have to pick sides, it will be the Shi'ites," Mr Goure said. "It is the only strategy because they are the majority."

STEEL WOLF: The President will play hard to get, but will find himself overcome with the spirit of bipartisanship, and give it a chance. Troop levels will go down, Iraqi security forces will step up. Once the U.S. body counts drops off to nothing, and Iraq stabilizes, the U.S. public will forget all about the 'cut and run' fixation, and be pleased with the progress. That's as close to victory as President Bush is going to get in 2 years, and it's not a bad one. Maybe not as cathartic as getting a declaration of surrender signed on the deck of the Missouri, but it'll be good enough.

HUMINT: you paint a nice picture Steel, but I have to ask about the flow of Sunni foreign fighters from Saudi, Egypt and other countries that we should expect are going to start streaming across the border when the Shiite Death Squads step up the killing of Sunnis around the country? Under Iran's guidance, maybe Iraq won’t devolve completely into a wasteland like Afghanistan under the Taliban but in terms of US national interests, it might as well. Do we know Tehran pulls Muqtada Al-Sadr's strings well enough to prevent him from murdering his way to the top? Or do you think the Iraqi Shi’i are going to establish a confrontational relationship with the Iranian Shi’i to establish a Karbala-Qom spiritual balance? Given that the ideology held by the theocratic government of Iran translates into cycles of upheaval and war, why should we pick sides with the Shi’i? Based on who SCIRI represents how can we consider your scenario plausible? Is the ISG the right group to be getting advice from at all, given their history? The message is loud and clear right now and I don't like what I'm hearing.


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The latest casualty: Detailed foreign news
Posted by humint to Starman417
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 2:03:20 PM PST · 28 of 28

Yet the same economic pressures driving mid-size papers to close foreign bureaus are also squeezing big papers; both the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune may soon be sold. Who knows how long these papers will maintain all their foreign outposts? Get your news from blogs? Those that comment on foreign affairs also depend on mainstream media for their information. With more newspapers closing foreign bureaus, will we soon depend on a shrinking pool of foreign correspondents to inform the whole country? Or will most Americans come to view the world through the prism of partisan bloggers who don't feel the need for facts?

This article is simply self promotion at the expense of the competition. Bloggers hate the MSM and the MSM hates bloggers. Why, because one is a legitimate alternative of the other. Blog commentary is by far superior to print commentary in terms of flexibility. There are no editors to filter out articles outside of a current or prospective readership. Blogs are not subject to space requirements. Newspapers require zero technical expertise. They are two very different animals that actually compliment each other - but that doesn't quell the mutual hatred. The core of this author’s argument is that the information of her media is superior to the information contained in other media. I don’t believe her. She is right about a corollary point. The fewer journalists you have, the fewer stories are going to get coverage. But the trade off is to do with career journalists who sacrifice tough questions for access. Bloggers produce far more information most of which is lower quality so skepticism becomes a part of the process of searching for information. It is harder to crosscheck an article in print than a blog so… I think I’ll stick to blogging.


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Fighting to win in Iraq [Stone Cold Must-Read With Revelations of Past Baker Failures]
Posted by humint to McGavin999
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 12:23:39 PM PST · 38 of 40

It's a bit more simple than that. When you start down a road and it starts raining, there are always a certain number of people who think taking a trip was a bad idea.

Excellent analogy. Cognitive imprecision in the time domain is what you're talking about. You've astutely pointed out an interesting pattern. Beyond the time domain - individuals often make bad decisions due to other forms of cognitive imprecision. But the mechanics "wrong or right" tend to lead back to personal responsibility and respect for individual liberty. It's an age old problem that the founding fathers of the United States nearly solved. They did the hard work - Lincoln did a little more - Wilson did a little more - GWB is doing a little more - and so on.

In history diverse societies have demonstrated incredible resilience. Just like a free market has self correcting properties, so too do free societies. No, the sky is not falling. It's being held aloft by philosophical genius.


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Fighting to win in Iraq [Stone Cold Must-Read With Revelations of Past Baker Failures]
Posted by humint to uncbob; McGavin999
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 10:18:49 AM PST · 36 of 40

McGavin999: Why is everyone so worried about the study group? President Bush isn't going to do what they say. He's going to thank them for their wise council and then go ahead and do what he planned to do all along.

uncbob:That is true BUT what has he planned all along and why wasn't that explained to the American Public instead of letting the democrats frame the issue

humint: In today's complex communications matrix, grabbing the microphone and keeping an audience's attention is extremely difficult. The expectations of the crowd leave little if any room for leadership. By observation, a free minded citizenry is in fact prone to rejecting authority. My guess as to why we do this – it’s for the sake of building within us a perception of independence. It’s not uncommon for smart people to test the waters of dissent. Some never graduate past that phase of their politics. But what if the logical conclusion of a type of dissent is corrosive to freedom in general? If responsibility is not married to freedom in society, anarchy will ensue. To quell anarchy, the same authority that couldn’t encourage responsibility will have to restrict freedom to protect the society from itself.

If the POTUS and other influential figures continue to feed into this trend without correcting it, the situation is going to get messy. But what if it cannot be corrected? Leadership will never disappear completely. Play the logic out - if a free citizenry collectively concludes that their independence can only be achieved by rejecting authority – for leadership to function, at best it must hide the fact that it is leading – at worst, it must be deceptive. To make progress on the economy or national security the POTUS will have to develop a strategy for success and then commit to the exact opposite strategy. In so doing, the public will predictably reject it and independently conclude that the secret strategy of the POTUS is the correct one.

It's something to think about, but not too hard. I'm no conspiracy theorist, so I'll stop here.


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Fighting to win in Iraq [Stone Cold Must-Read With Revelations of Past Baker Failures]
Posted by humint to governsleastgovernsbest
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 8:09:20 AM PST · 33 of 40

But I would wager that countless Americans are upset with Bush, not because he isn't skedaddling from Iraq quickly enough, but because he seems to have no serious strategy for winning. It is losing that Americans have no patience for -- not casualties or a protracted war. Let Bush make it clear that he is serious about victory, and that he will do whatever it takes to achieve it, and the political support will follow.

This is the crux of dissociating good leadership from bad in the midst of a national or international crisis. Responsibilities cannot be abandoned simply because the effort to live up to them is uncomfortable. Great post.


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From Beirut to Baghdad - The ghastly predictability of nihilist violence.
Posted by humint to neverdem
On News/Activism 12/03/2006 7:28:08 AM PST · 4 of 4

Those who blame the violence in Baghdad on the American presence must have a hard job persuading themselves that the mayhem in Beirut and Afghanistan—and the mayhem that is being planned and is still to come—is attributable to the same cause. But the instigators are the same in all cases: the parties of god and their foreign masters. If we cannot even stand up for Lebanon in this crisis, even rhetorically, then we are close to admitting that these parties have won.

I too am concerned about our capacity to "stand up". I've heard and read stories about Iraqis behaving chaotically and dangerously after the fall of Saddam Hussein. I'm not referring to insurgent attacks but general misdemeanors - driving the wrong way down one way streets - sexually harassing women - littering - When asked why they were doing what they were doing, they replied, "this is democracy, I can do whatever I want". That behavior sounds as if Iraqis were not ready for democracy and the system is too unstable for them. Among other things, democracy is managed chaos so their misunderstanding of democratic behavior and governance does not suggest stability through democracy in the Middle East is not possible. What it really means is that it will be a long and hard road to establish.

I then realized something about Westerners. How different is the average Westerner's understanding of democracy? If our law abiding compatriots in the West are only civil in society because they don't know any other way to behave then there is no moral justification to "stand up" for anything. If standing up for something like democracy in Lebanon is not done in Western Democracies then one might ask if representative government has any room at all for genuine leadership, even in times of crisis. If the trail of blood and bread crumbs previous generations of Westerners made for us is so faded and can't be recovered then all that is left are habits. So what's the danger if our habits are healthy? Simply exercising healthy democratic habits while the philosophy that created them is disparaged or even ignored will engender new habits. Apparently, one new habit is the West's inability to "stand up" for our allies when doing so is inconvenient.

Part of the logic that delivered the West to where it is today is the realization that the forces of chaos never actually win but only guarantees that we all lose. Fortunately, it is never too late to "stand up". Good post.


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EXCLUSIVE: Iranian Weapons Arm Iraqi Militia
Posted by humint to jmc1969
On News/Activism 12/02/2006 11:43:00 PM PST · 202 of 203

WASHINGTON, Nov. 30, 2006 — U.S. officials say they have found smoking-gun evidence of Iranian support for terrorists in Iraq: brand-new weapons fresh from Iranian factories. According to a senior defense official, coalition forces have recently seized Iranian-made weapons and munitions that bear manufacturing dates in 2006. This suggests, say the sources, that the material is going directly from Iranian factories to Shia militias, rather than taking a roundabout path through the black market. "There is no way this could be done without (Iranian) government approval," says a senior official.

I wonder why the factory that produced these weapons still stands? My expectations are for a 3 or 4 second video taken by a predator drone - or some other high tech gadget - showing the site being struck hard followed by a fire and dust cloud. I expect to see the video of the factory being destroyed and at the same time I expect to see the weapons that that burning factory produced. At the same time I want to see the dead bodies of the terrorists who were using the weapons produced at the burning factory. I'd expect that all of these events unfolded within a reasonable amount of time.

Justice in war must be delivered quickly or the enemy takes the advantage. How selfish of me. What about all of the other factors making my countrymen indecisive?!?!?


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12/03/2006


 

HUMINT: POTUS in Flatland

QUESTIONS FOR THE COMPLACENT AND COMPLICIT IN THE CYCLE OF VIOLENCE. HOW WE THINK MATTERS!

It is my opinion that American society is both willing and able to deliver Iraqis from the inherent danger of the world they live in today. It is in American's interests to do so and that is precisely why we shouldn't be distracted by the violence we are witnessing right now. Globalization has made their problem our problem. We can't afford to live with the dysfunction of a Saddam or Al-Sadr. Westerners - and increasingly Easterners - have been putting billions of dollars into the hands of dysfunctional tribal chieftains to satisfy their petroleum needs. That economic system is essentially what Henry Kissinger's policy of containment meant. His era is over but it's obvious we all don't know it yet. Some would like to go back to it, but the bridge was burnt. We don't have a choice. Iraqis have to transition to democracy in order to dissipate their petroleum wealth for the betterment - not detriment - of the region and world. Instead of the Wild West, now it's the Wild East. Of course it will be hard to make the transition, but the region and the world will be more secure when Iraqi society is sufficiently coerced into joining our global village. For this to start we need to know a few things about the people we are dealing with. Consider the following:

  1. Are Iraqi soldiers willing to fight and perhaps die to preserve democracy in Iraq?
  2. If so, how many?
  3. Are Iraqi soldiers willing to put loyalty to the nation ahead of tribal and religious loyalty?
  4. Will a Shiite kill a fellow Shiite in order to protect a Sunni or Kurd, and vice versa?
  5. Are Iraqi soldiers led by honest and competent leaders?
  6. If so, how many?
  7. Is the leadership at the top (especially Maliki) really committed to the success of Democracy?
  8. Do the people of Iraq want a unified nation?
  9. Do they want a unified nation even if their OWN faction is not in control?
  10. Can Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds EVER trust each other enough to trust their own protection to a central government?
  11. Even if the vast majority of people in Iraq really DO want the things above, are they willing to risk their own lives to achieve it?
  12. How many Iraqis are willing to risk their lives when the risk is moderate or high?
  13. Does the recent election in the U.S. mean the Iraqis now think this protection is about to go away?
  14. Are they willing to stand in the gap?
  15. Do Iraqis perceive democracy in Iraq is doomed?
  16. If so, what steps will they take for their own self preservation?

Questions like these can make what is being ignored today as intangible and immeasurable - both tangible and measurable tomorrow. These questions formulated by Free Republic's EternalHope are a bridge to the future built of clear rationale. Americans have to ask these questions and only Iraqis can answer them. There is a significant gap between us and them but for those of us who are paying close attention - in a great number of instances across Iraq - the United States Army has bridged the gap. The men and women who show their kindness and sense of justice has touched the hearts of many Iraqi. But how could we know that when the media both here and there strives to be nothing more than an obituary? We have to get our information from CENTCOM to approach the necessary balance required to formulate any kind of faith in the future. That's a scary thought because of how much trust one must give to an organization who answers directly to the POTUS. It's not that I do not trust the POTUS, it's that the founding fathers established freedom of the press as sacrosanct so that Americans would not have to trust the POTUS.

What a predicament we are in! In a world where our commercial culture and constant promises to each other of instant gratification, we are inadvertently spreading the disease of Attention Deficit Disorder. By commercial I am referring to the 30 second argument. What conclusions can anyone derive about the world when they are constantly bombarded with endless iterations of sensationalism? Rational debate is drowned in an ocean of sensationalism leaving little room for responsible leadership to build a case for anything at all. The cycle is breeding a deficit of informed debate. No one is more complicit in the "content deficit" than the "if it bleeds, it leads" MSM, but like it or not, the media is a reflection of our habitual need for sensational stimulation. It takes a brave soul like yourself to seek out Iraqis who have faith in the future of their country. There should be room for faith in the future in a country that could not have freely elected a parliament only a few years ago. Unfortunately, a contextual basis for optimism is lacking, not because it doesn't exist, but because it isn't as sensational as blood and guts.

Consider this abstract analogy based on the book flatland. Imagine that the popular belief in America is that the world is flat. For all practical human purposes it is flat, so the concept is not hard to believe. Now imagine that every day on the news the idea of "flatness" is affirmed over and over again. And then one day an outrageous event occurs and it immediately becomes essential to the sustainability of the United States that we all believe the world is not flat, but instead a sphere. The few arguments for "sphereness" do not approach the myriad of persistent arguments for "flatness". Believers in "sphere theory" are ridiculed as neocon idealists, but remember, this theory is not a luxury. Failure to grasp the subtle reality could cost more than Americans can afford. Now imagine that one man, an important but not particularly eloquent man, demands that we all understand "the world is not flat, but instead a sphere". In his modesty, he does not ridicule those who subscribe to "flat theory". In his modesty, he does not parade an army of lecturers out to preach "sphere theory" to Americans. So he takes the abuse, hoping that one day an epiphany will occur in the minds of his countrymen. That one day they too will see the world as he does and thereby save themselves.

GWB has asked Americans to understand that "the old world threatens us all" and "believe in a new world that has the potential to save us all". On that basis alone he is a heroic figure. It is utterly tragic that leadership of this sort is rarely recognized within the generation it occurs. Beyond the abstract, I can't fully articulate why I see it now and others can't. Maybe it's because I like to read books like flatland.

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TRANSLATION

POSTS

  • HUMINT: Iranian Bonsai
  • HUMINT: Dream Killer
  • HUMINT: Civil Lincoln
  • HUMINT: Ali McSassinated
  • HUMINT: Oligarchy Propaganda
  • HUMINT: Agree to War
  • HUMINT: ENEMIES OF A
  • HUMINT: Going Somewhere
  • HUMINT: IRAQI FRATRICIDE
  • HUMINT: Estimate the Future
  • HUMINT: Dec 03, 2006
  • HUMINT: POTUS in Flatland
  • ARCHIVES

    01.90   06.90   09.90   01.91   05.91   09.94   08.95   01.97   09.97   08.98   11.99   01.00   05.00   07.00   03.01   09.01   01.03   03.03   05.03   06.03   07.03   09.03   10.03   11.03   03.04   05.04   06.04   07.04   09.04   10.04   11.04   12.04   01.05   02.05   03.05   04.05   05.05   06.05   07.05   08.05   09.05   10.05   11.05   12.05   01.06   02.06   03.06   04.06   05.06   06.06   07.06   08.06   09.06   10.06   11.06   12.06   01.07   02.07   03.07   04.07   05.07   06.07   07.07   08.07   09.07   10.07   11.07   12.07   01.08   06.08   09.08  

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