Showing posts with label American politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label American politics. Show all posts

Saturday, July 17, 2021

Journalism, Judges, and Justice: a Neglected American Alliance

The United States, after losing propaganda wars against Russia and China post-Trump, appears to be doubling down on anti-democratic allegations while elevating Asian-Americans into visible positions of power. This hybrid strategy is too little, too late, and will do nothing to alter China's rise to superpower status. 

By now, American politicians and CEOs know their country's institutions are no longer export-ready without substantial advertising and trillions of dollars of government stimulus. To add ballast to the strategies above, they are consolidating media and using government lawyers to prosecute perceived enemies of the state. Such maneuvering, which attempts to combine a Soviet hammer with American marketing and banking expertise, will fail because it brings nothing new. 

No government, irrespective of the political party in power, is really interested in freedom of the press. All democratic governments are keen to control the media by using undemocratic means. -- Preetika Dwivedi

Six corporations already control most of what Americans see, but social media, streaming services, satellite radio, and podcasts represent challenges to crafting a united narrative. As media further consolidates, it can distract you on firmer financial footing, sidelining critical voices by drowning you in options. For example, the American journalist most resembling Edward R. Murrow or Dan Rather is British-born Mehdi Hasan, whom most Americans have never heard of; meanwhile, any American wishing to read America's most honest political commentary would need to turn to the opening letter of Larry Flynt's Hustler magazine. When a semi-mainstream pornographer is a country's most incisive native-born journalist, it is unclear how further media consolidation will assist the role of journalist as the legislature's unofficial fact-finder.

"[I]mperative is the need to preserve inviolate the constitutional rights of free speech, free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free political discussion, to the end that government may be responsive to the will of the people and that changes, if desired, may be obtained by peaceful means. Therein lies the security of the Republic, the very foundation of constitutional government." -- Chief Justice Hughes, 299 U.S. 353, 365 (1937)

Regarding "lawfare," the current Democratic Party majority has failed to secure significant jail time against even one alleged bad actor. Republican Steve Bannon's indictment was dismissed. Republicans Paul Manafort and Roger Stone were pardoned. Army lieutenant general Michael Flynn pled guilty to lying to the FBI but was pardoned. The list of pardoned and/or convicted military personnel is long and, the occupation of Afghanistan having lasted 20 years, includes members under both Democratic and Republican administrations. 

History may not be kind to Clint Allen Lorance, Robert Bales, Jeremy Morlock, Edward Gallagher, or Mathew Golsteyn, but they can always claim they were victims of a corrupt military hierarchy, thus casting doubt on America's justice system. Such doubt means the law, designed to punish the guilty and free the innocent, cannot be wholly trusted, which in turn means American lawyers and judges cannot be trusted or believed. Doubt and legal maneuvering are not new phenomena, but when they have appeared together, the first casualty has been the credibility of the legal branch. In a ternary system where the judiciary supervises the executive and the legislature, it is not difficult to predict rot from one branch spreading everywhere. This, again, is nothing new. The 1995 O.J. Simpson trial foreshadowed issues not only within the criminal justice system, but the entire legal branch, including police departments, just as the Rodney King beating foreshadowed George Floyd's manslaughter. (The result of the upcoming Theranos trial, where a blond-haired, blue-eyed CEO is claiming she was the victim of a brown-skinned svengali, will determine whether California's justice system is capable of reform or irrevocably corrupt.)

Rot is particularly apt to spread where students lack proper civics and history instruction, and Americans who study the My Lai massacre are not taught the following facts: 1) twenty-six soldiers were charged with criminal offenses, but only Lieutenant William Calley Jr., a platoon leader, was convicted; 2) the "day after the verdict, Nixon ordered Calley released from the post stockade and placed under house arrest in the Fort Benning bachelor officer quarters. Appeals would eventually reduce his punishment to time served." 

Why didn't President Nixon pardon Calley outright? The public--including a majority of whom voted--wouldn't have tolerated it, and their political engagement allowed Congress to use impeachment to drive Nixon out of the political arena. In contrast, when a divided Congress impeached Trump, few Americans cared because Trump was already out of office. (Politics may be a show, but it must contain some substance to maintain viewership.) 

Understanding events between Nixon and Biden requires remembering what happened between the American War of Aggression against Vietnam and twenty years of Afghan occupation: the Iraq War and Guantanamo Bay. There, too, justice and judges were feckless. Iraq War criminal Charles Graner served six and a half years of his ten year sentence. Lynndie England, Graner's co-conspirator, served only eighteen months of her three year sentence. As of July 2021, Guantanamo Bay is still open, despite former President Obama's pledge to close it. After the Mahmudiyah rape and killings, justice prevailed against Steven Dale Green, James P. Barker, Paul E. Cortez, Jesse V. Spielman, Bryan L. Howard, and Anthony W. Yribe, which made it all the more disheartening to see political and judicial integrity retreat again during the Afghan occupation. In stable countries, the scales of justice ought not to wobble so much. 

Now would be a good time for Americans to re-evaluate why political parties exist. It is not only to elevate intellectuals onto public platforms so they can compete with others under transparent rules that advance the nation. Ideally, politics is played by people who first and foremost prevent corruption within government itself, thereby gaining credibility to regulate the private sector, including criminals. Without such credibility, China's one-party system will succeed against the more complex, more variegated American system of checks and balances for obvious reasons: more variety is inferior when it allows more rather than less corruption, and when it renders corruption harder to root out. 

When the United States lacked global political competition, its political negligence was understandable. Today, America's political negligence is perplexing as well as unforgivable. After all, every empire eventually expires, but whether systemic corruption is part of its history is entirely up to its people and its politicians. Perhaps, in the end, not all empires are doomed to fail--just ones that make a mockery of their judges and journalists. 

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat, active member of International Federation of Journalists as of date of publication (July 2021)

Bonus: The war crimes mentioned above are by no means an  exhaustive list. According to CNN, 

"In testimony at an Article 32 hearing -- the military's version of a grand jury or preliminary hearing -- [Colonel] West said the [Iraqi] policeman... was not cooperating with interrogators, so he watched four of his soldiers from the 220th Field Artillery Battalion beat the detainee on the head and body. West said he also threatened to kill [the policeman]. 

Military prosecutors say West followed up on that threat by taking the suspect outside, put him on the ground near a weapons clearing barrel and fired his 9 mm pistol into the barrel. Apparently not knowing where West's gun was aimed, [the Iraqi policeman] cracked and gave information..." 

However, the policeman, Yehiya Kadoori Hamoodi, "said in an interview that he did not [provide any valuable information], because he knew nothing." According to the NYT, "Hamoodi said that he was not sure what he told the Americans, but that it was meaningless information induced by fear and pain." 

"At least one man named by Mr. Hamoodi was taken into custody... and his home was searched. No plans for attacks on Americans or weapons were found. Colonel West testified that he did not know whether 'any corroboration' of a plot was ever found, adding: 'At the time I had to base my decision on the intelligence I received. It's possible that I was wrong about Mr. Hamoodi.'" (Source: NY Times, THE STRUGGLE FOR IRAQ: INTERROGATIONS; How Colonel Risked His Career By Menacing Detainee and Lost, May 27, 2004, by Deborah Sontag) 

95 members of Congress signed a letter to the secretary of the Army supporting the colonel. West was fined 5,000 dollars. He became a Florida Representative and is now Chair of the Texas Republican Party.

"There was a looming sense of doom in America, a perception that established politics had failed. Many pundits had said that--after being motivated and defined for 30 years by the Communist threat--Americans seriously needed to find a new enemy." -- Mark Lawson, The Battle for Room Service (1993) 

After candidate Ross Perot's popularity, the "unnerving burden on President [Bill] Clinton was to restore democratic equilibrium--and confidence in the conventional ballot box--or America might yet be the territory for a populist, anti-political, sinister Mr. Fixit." -- 
Mark Lawson, The Battle for Room Service (1993)

Tuesday, March 2, 2021

Hiking into the Wilderness

Recently, I hiked with a friend. After losing over 100 pounds, she enjoys walking an hour a day and can get along with anyone, which explains her willingness to spend time with me. I'd call her a "Southern belle," except she's Midwestern and from Minnesota. 

Speaking to any native-born American in 2021 involves some degree of post-traumatic political disorder. They are beginning to realize the same tools that elevate deserving and undeserving elites also shield just about anyone capable of generating marketing dollars. Consequently, once multi-million dollar advertising campaigns are bought, a domestic violence incident becomes insignificant to local police departments as well as private security and PR firms receiving assignments from those same marketing firms. Though a symbiotic relationship between the entertainment industry and government--which issues permits and provides consultants--encourages positive portrayals of government employees, once upon a time, Americans recognized the difference between protecting talent to promote leadership versus advancing people to mislead the public. (Neither General Eisenhower nor General Marshall saw combat but were justifiably recognized as military experts, and their values shaped the entire world after WWII.) 

Obviously, government's corruptibility when receiving non-transparent, private funds is nonnovel. Mobster Al Capone wasn't convicted of federal tax evasion rather than murder because local governments were more honest in the 1930s. Moreover, even if local governments manage honesty, they are often outgunned technologically. (Someday, Americans will realize expertise allowing an intelligence agency to "spoof" surveillance video of a competing country's nuclear reactor may also be used to replace domestic surveillance footage, complicating police work.) Though marketing departments have never been bastions of integrity, a sharp eye isn't required to see USA's content machine degrading as it produces flimsier copies of the same celebrities, with Kanye West replacing Puff Daddy, Kim Kardashian replacing Dolly Parton, and several more attempted clones I'm glad not to know. (We don't immediately recognize clones because their color or ethnicity has changed, diversity used to sweeten superficiality.) Meanwhile, as America's upper echelons also enable the trend of marketing dollars overwhelming substance, politics has mutated into a jobs program for content curators and other persons intent on occupying space otherwise open to competitors hostile to the status quo. 

Against this backdrop, my friend and I walked and talked for two hours at a local park, having enough of a pleasant time to schedule another hike in two days. On the day of the hike, however, my friend texted me, saying she needed to change plans. She was going to the beach by herself to "listen to some music and not talk about governments or politicians or politics." "I need to recenter my vibe," she said, and in that moment I fully realized the precariousness of the American experiment. That my friend and I were able to converse at all was a small miracle. Our time occurred only because the American marketing machine convinced my father and mother, whose second language was English, to leave Scotland for Texas. From these two ESL learners came a son who earned an English degree and whose linguistic ability you are now seeing because of the risks they took. Had my parents been inundated with media reports of school shootings, police brutality, and other American events, it is possible they would not have taken the transatlantic journey. Risk-reward ratio is a concept everyone understands, regardless of mother tongue. The marketer's or propagandist's job is to render the equation in their client's favor and leave the rest to fate.

Such a paradigm might not be inherently immoral, except fate isn't the correct term. What we deem fate--including an empire's decline--is the direct result of whether institutions uphold their principles in ways balancing the status quo with changing demographics. If native-born citizens (aka the majority) no longer have the patience or willingness to adjust their institutions as circumstances change, the result is failure fated by reason of indifference

Can one possibly view indifference as a virtue? Is it necessary at times to practice it simply to keep one's sanity, live normally, enjoy a fine meal and a glass of wine, as the world around us experiences harrowing upheavals? -- Elie Weisel (1999)  

Thus far, I have approached the situation from the perspective of a political minority, but indifference is contagious and does not spare the majority. It is only that the majority takes notice of failing institutions much later than the minority unable to use government connections or political savvy. For example, last week, I needed a response from the county to complete some work. An automated reply indicated a three-week wait, an unacceptably long time for a process requiring 10 minutes per individual application. No database exists showing the number of outstanding applications--they are handled as soon they reach the appropriate department--and the public has no choice but to trust government workers are not dallying. 

In a one-party state like California, my immediate reaction was to assume a lack of accountability based on non-transparency, but I realized a more connected, more trusting, more faithful person might take a different approach. He might, while accessing the application, notice translations incorporating our city's sizable Vietnamese and Spanish speaking population and conclude resources were being diverted that would otherwise accelerate the process. A tale of two cities emerges: whereas I blame the majority for using government to boost their influence under unaccountable terms, the majority can counter by blaming the costs of greater inclusivity. Just like that, two residents reach vastly different yet reasonable conclusions using the same data, but with one distinction: as a political minority disdaining the state's political Establishment, I cannot vote in ways that impose my interpretation on the majority, and without millions of dollars allowing me to advertise my opinion, I cannot convince dispersed voters to change their minds, nor can I nudge government lawyers to investigate themselves. In contrast, my fellow resident can more easily access established channels of communication used by the majority to carry out his proposed solution(s). Put simply, he is not bound by the weight of historical vested interests and their present-day progeny. 

Of course I do not mean to suggest a native-born American can flip a switch and inspire a mob. The journey from an open society to isolationism, from curiosity to scapegoat, requires sustained effort from government and the private sector, particularly when eluding self-blame. Somehow, whatever the time period, as services degrade, a minority is always there to deflect attention from 
the majority's own mismanagement or to assist powerful interests eager to associate with a vulnerable group. Given humanity's wont to project faults onto dissimilar groups or to create institutions whitewashing weaknesses (e.g., regularly including bars and pubs in Christian media makes alcoholism more acceptable), true diversity always denotes cultural powderkegs.

A small part of an aisle selling alcohol in an American grocery store

What happens to a dream deferred? ... Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode? -- Langston Hughes, "Harlem" 

Another example: to some native-born citizens, a police officer is helpful and to be trusted, but to many others, the same person represents danger. Yet, neither the minority nor the majority know which uniformed officer will come calling when needed, and since many honest officers exist, any gap in perception results from one side having faith in their institutions' willingness to impose accountability while the other is skeptical of equal treatment. 

From where does the majority's faith arise? Is it segregation, a feature of post-WWII planning that divided groups by religion and race in order to better manage them through targeted investments and tax spending? (Not all international law experts realize segregation and partition, often with United Nations support, go hand-in-hand: Israel was partitioned into three states based on religion: West Bank (Christian), Gaza Strip (Muslim), Israel (Jewish); Czechoslovakia became Czechia (non-Catholic) and Slovakia (Catholic); Pakistan (Muslim) split from India (Hindu); South Sudan (Catholic) seceded from Sudan (Muslim); etc.) If Western city planning includes segregation, which may have resulted from Western dependence on slave labor and an unwillingness to see black/Negro slaves as fully human, then gerrymandering and other legal maneuvers ("separate but equal") are features, not bugs, of American culture. As such, while American progressives are taught their country is continually striving for "a more perfect union," in reality, perfect divisions have succeeded. Yet, so long as any group is skeptical of equal government treatment, even well-meaning government employees become viewed as non-individuals--a matter not helped by government unions--which in turn leads to contempt of public institutions by violating the principle of the sanctity of the individual.

"My mom and dad may have been segregationists, but we were taught fairness and decency, and what we were seeing [in the South with Bull Connor and KKK bombings] was not fair and not decent... It was a turning point [in our critical consciousness]." -- progressive Judge William Alsup, who grew up in Mississippi and attended MS State in the 1960s (February 25, 2021)

If a diverse society requires effective checks and balances to maintain trust between residents and government, can a segregated society function without legal safeguards by using tribal affinity as a cost-effective replacement? Our political betters certainly seemed to think so. 

Where does this leave my kindhearted friend and I, her cynical compatriot? Nowhere new. Conflict portends opportunity, giving citizens, politicians, and business leaders a chance to mediate, gather information, and achieve a balance between vested and new interests. Absent open conflict, information gathering requires cloak-and-dagger operations ill-suited for local governments. Conflict, however, is a two-edged sword: at the same time it improves the signal (and hopefully the fidelity) of noise, it stress-tests political structures, often finding them wanting, especially as voter-targeting technology encourages soft deceit. (I've seen photos of my Catholic-educated mayor kneeling in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and also standing next to a Catholic-educated police chief encouraging cooperation with federal deportation authorities. To see the hypocrisy, watch Immigration Nation (2020).) 

Sadly, it has never been easier for public leaders to dissemble and in doing so, bamboozle their communities. When confronted with conflict, some attempt solutions, and some get better at public relations. The United States, like my friend, probably prefers a bit of both, but also finds it easier to avoid the matter altogether. Unfortunately, avoidance or better PR masks indifference while allowing authorities to temporarily solve issues using unoriginal ideas like debt and deportation. Somewhere along that path, diversity's long-term benefits are put in danger of being subsumed by short-term negatives, with the mob always waiting for its cue.     

I wish my friend would reflect on the following: "Why do we not remember most native-born Germans fondly from 1932-1938, if at all? And why, given Germany's past and present ethnic and religious diversity, do we not lionize anyone but anti-Germans from that time?" One clue involves German emigration; after all, if Germany's Albert Einstein left in 1932, other talented individuals must have also departed, shifting attention away from monolingual Germans. Be that as it may, given Germany's economic success after 1936, which includes movie-making, why are we, the recipient of so many German immigrants, mostly indifferent to Germany's individuals based on the accident of time? Though Americans may be in denial, we know the answer: indifference spreads quickly and spares no one in its wake. In murdering millions of minorities, Germany obliterated its citizens' place in humanity's remembrance, even though most Germans were not directly culpable. A people indifferent to brewing conflict or skilled at avoiding genuine inclusion tend to be as forgotten as the minorities they neglect or deport, whether knowingly or unknowingly.

A leading voice in the chorus of social transition belongs to the white liberal... Over the last few years many Negroes have felt that their most troublesome adversary was not the obvious bigot of the Ku Klux Klan or the John Birch Society, but the white liberal who is more devoted to “order” than to justice, who prefers tranquility to equality... The White liberal must see that the Negro needs not only love, but justice. It is not enough to say, “We love Negroes, we have many Negro friends.” They must demand justice for Negroes. Love that does not satisfy justice is no love at all. It is merely a sentimental affection, little more than what one would love for a pet. -- Martin Luther King, Jr., from Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? (1967) 

I forgot to mention my friend enjoys trance music, a form of electronica. There's a metaphor in there somewhere, but I won't belabor it. It's too easy. Almost as easy as going to the beach.   

© Matthew Rafat (March 2021)

Bonus I: My friend and I discussed cruise ship workers, who are often non-citizens because of low wages. Cruise ships are not subject to labor laws because their operations mostly take place in non-territorial or extrajudicial waters. I said 
given currency arbitrage, the hourly wage was not as important as working conditions and the likelihood of citizenship. Additionally, an empire's ability to underpay, in relative terms, foreign workers improves its willingness to accept immigrants. My proposed solution? Mandate one-year contracts with quitting for good cause or early termination immediately vesting all contractually unpaid wages; and require companies to put foreign workers on a path to citizenship after two years' tenure. Of course, companies may "game" such rules by terminating employees after two years, even good ones, and aggressively litigating the meaning of "good cause," but the law was never meant to replace integrity, and at some point, journalism must play a role in modifying unfair corporate behavior. (Note: upon hiring, one years' worth of wages could be put into an escrow account handled by an independent entity.)

Bonus II: Some people may see a conflict between my appreciation of Jehovah's Witnesses, Mennonites, and Amish and the ideas herein. There is no conflict. The aforementioned groups are apolitical as a matter of morality, not apathy, and have ample evidence supporting their intent. 


Friday, February 26, 2021

Most Political Debates, Summarized in Two Conversations

The majority of America's political debates can be summarized in just two short conversations:

SCENE ONE

A: "Look at this wide-ranging, comprehensive legislation that will change everything." 

B: "Have you actually read it? This legislation spans several volumes, much of it indecipherable. If it really replaces the existing paradigm, then you're seeing a bonanza for politically-connected players as they swoop in to provide what this legislation requires." 

A: "Under existing legislation, your side benefited because you passed it and your friends and lobbyists doled out contracts based on your understanding of the legislation. Why it is a problem if we do the same thing?"

B: "Well, if it works, we're going to catch hell because it'll look like we didn't know what we were doing before, so I'm going to try to stop it. Then we'll copy the parts we think we can incorporate into our existing framework, take the credit, and let the judges resolve any poorly-worded sections." 

A: "Sounds like you've got a lot of faith in lawyers and litigation, but go ahead and try to stop us. We'll blame you for harming the poor, handicapped, [insert vulnerable group], and the country by not passing this." 

B: "How are you going to fund the legislation? More taxes? Good luck with that." 

A: "We will do exactly what you do--borrow money. We're the federal government. We can borrow as much as we want." 

B: "What's next? Are you going to promise voters a unicorn in every backyard?"

A: "If it wins us the election, why not?" 

SCENE TWO 

A: "We've been getting complaints about [INSERT GOVERNMENT AGENCY]. They are too slow." 

B: "We can centralize the work, but eventually we'll become a sprawling, intractable 
bureaucracy and lose all efficiency we gained pre-consolidation." 

A: "But right now, by spreading the work across different local and state agencies, we're creating unnecessary complexity." 

B: "Sure, but we're also reducing opportunities for centralized corruption and giving residents an easier time contacting local officials, who are more closely situated to the issues." 

A: "That may be true, but decentralization also potentially creates entrenched political fiefdoms because multiple agencies can slow down the work deliberately or claim they are not getting enough credit or recognition. Can't one entrenched city council hold up the entire process if it rejects accountability or if it tacks on additional requirements purely to justify its existence or expansion?" 

B: "Sort of. The more decentralized a government process, the more lawyers are required to navigate the system. In other words, more government complexity reduces personal agency, but also potentially improves the system as it adapts over time while keeping lawyers, judges, and legal associations in the loop." 

A: "So decentralization oftentimes means more lawyers, which either improves efficiency or reduces it based on finding the right lawyer; on the other hand, centralization might makes everything easier by creating a 'one-stop shop' but in doing so, eventually increases the risk of corruption." 

B: "In theory, the smaller the country and the smaller the population, the better centralization works, whereas the larger the country and the more diverse the population, the better decentralization works. This, however, is only a theory. Many other factors are in play, such as inflation, social cohesion, etc." 

END SCENE

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat (February 2021)

Bonus: In the spirit of political cartoonist Tom Toles, I'll add the following sidebar to the first scene: "It's almost as if an independent third party could somehow help." 

Saturday, November 21, 2020

Something Wicked This Way Comes?

The United States recently held an election, and results are pending two weeks later. Regardless of the outcome, we must finally admit the American political scene isn’t something others want to emulate—at least not without substantial bribery. No longer confined to smoke-filled rooms with nondescript doors, today’s Pax Americana bribes take place at golf courses, academic institutions, and legislative bodies, culminating in an American national debt of 26 trillion dollars. 

Empire-building requires allies, and allies are apparently becoming more expensive. Though the inscription on the back of U.S. currency states “In God We Trust,” debt appears to be the undisputed binding agent. According to the Institute for International Finance, the coronavirus pandemic increased global debt to 272 trillion American dollars, adding symbiotic ballast to the more honest phrase, “In Debt We Trust.” Like all co-dependent relationships, momentum is key, and any well-traveled American has realized the momentum that made America great after 1991’s fall of the Soviet Union has shifted elsewhere. 

The United States was particularly vulnerable to political slogans due to its inability to recognize propaganda even as groups hardened around selectively-edited truth. (The world would be more decent were recruiting and advertising budgets called by their true name: propaganda.) Future historians will note entrenched divisions but are less apt to recognize its causes—and oh, the causes. Not only are they large, containing multitudes, Walt Whitman’s earlier words ne’er rang truer: “The past and present wilt--I have fill'd them, emptied them…” And for what? Lacking context, the abyss awaits once again, another empire ready to fall. 

My intent is not pessimism, but edification; namely, to show future generations the many-splendored ways a great nation can falter and never recover. Most astoundingly, though sources of political divisions are well-known to many Americans—gerrymandering plus local resistance to unfunded national mandates seeking reform—nothing can be done because once divisions encompass the weight of trillions of units of debt, everyone's interest is to go along. You'd think “going along” would coincide with “getting along,” but as it happens, the inevitable isn’t always certain. That’s our first lesson: knowledge is wonderful, but knowing the right path doesn’t mean anyone will follow you. Knowledge needs credibility to be meaningful in civil society, and credibility’s formula is complex and sometimes impervious to examination. 

We mentioned institutional bribery, but nothing fundamental has changed since at least the 18th century. Samuel Johnson may have said it best: “In civilized society, personal merit will not serve you so much as money will. Sir, you may make the experiment. Go into the street, and give one man a lecture on morality, and another a shilling, and see which will respect you most.” Americans would do well to remember governments can increase debt to win friends and placate enemies, but lasting loyalty is hard to find and even harder to buy. Lesson number two: unless institutions ensure they serve values of infinite duration and are able to reverse course when—not if—they go astray, nation-building and globalization are all for naught. 

If money and knowledge mean little in the long run despite their attraction, on what grounds shall we stake our claim? Locating suitable ground is difficult in every era because the future is always fragile. Money--a universal siren song--increases ego and power even if its possessor lacks wisdom and especially when debt is readily available. In this way, the greater the outward success, the more humility, a crucial element of all progress, cries out: Help!  To mitigate prosperity's unctuous byproducts, note the following: everything is incremental unless abject failure occurs. In other words, if you have succeeded, it is because you and your neighbors learned from others’ failures and benefited from time’s accumulative value. Note also that knowledge is neither good nor bad, neither positive nor negative. Its trajectory of success depends entirely on one’s ability to link personal knowledge to institutional knowledge useful to future generations. You have understood our third lesson when you realize it is the same as our second lesson.

Our fourth lesson is two-pronged: history and incentives. Growing up in the United States, I was inundated with the superiority of the Western capitalist system and believed it true not as an inherent economic matter, but because of its ability to absorb immigrants and thus new ideas. At the time, I had not traveled extensively, and I did not understand world history. I had no way of knowing USA’s most recent immigrants were present as a result of foreign policy mistakes and attempted coups rather than organic openness. A short summary may be useful: 

 White residents with Hispanic last names filled Miami, Florida after a failed CIA coup against Cuba’s Fidel Castro, ironically himself from noble Spanish lineage.

Seen in Sintra, Portugal

 Cupertino, California is home to residents who are Taiwanese and not Chinese because they were on the losing side of the Chinese Revolution, which rejected Western corruption. (Malcolm X called the Chinese who fled "Uncle Tom Chinese," i.e., people who betrayed their culture and country in service to American and European hegemony.)

 In southern California, Iranians live in Beverly Hills, California only because Western governments saw value in Iranian oil and natural gas.

 Meanwhile, in northern California, numerous Vietnamese restaurants exist because the Catholic Church, using Joseph McCarthy and Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc, successfully lobbied Congress to split north and south Vietnam into de facto Communist and Catholic countries. The two-state attempt was unsuccessful, forcing the United States to re-settle foreign agents, who were conveniently assisted by Catholic nonprofits receiving both taxpayer funding and tax exemptions.

Even America’s Olympic medals appear immoral when considering American Christians (and others once connected with Catholic Spain) were able to breed the strongest Africans because they were convinced of God-given racial differences within a context of global trade of tobacco, sugar, and cotton.

Now we may discuss incentives. Most people view incentives from the back-end—being nudged in a particular direction—rather than the front-end, i.e., marketing and mandates. In USA, one reason I am certain of near-term decline is because politics has been reduced to another marketing gimmick, a show where governments signal importance by reacting decisively to events while protecting image at the expense of authenticity. Some cauldrons should not mix together, and the aforementioned political dynamic places the witches’ recipe firmly in the hands of unaccountable third-parties, with politicians serving a pre-fabricated brew guaranteed to poison. An attorney might cite Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310 (2010), as the date marketing received a license to overwhelm sense, but marketing, at its root, is merely a promise based on words and images. W.H. Auden, my favorite poet, aptly summarized the age-old conflict inherent in mammalian speech:

Not one of them was capable of lying,
There was not one which knew that it was dying 
Or could have with a rhythm or a rhyme 
Assumed responsibility for time. 

Let them leave language to their lonely betters 
Who count some days and long for certain letters; 
We, too, make noises when we laugh or weep: 
Words are for those with promises to keep.

Is a legislator’s time at the podium or media outlet an attempt to effectuate a promise? If so, how can this be possible unless we assume a one-party state or a paradigm lacking checks and balances? 

Is billionaire Warren Buffett an insurance salesman propped up by a banking system further propped up by an unaccountable Federal Reserve? Or has he singlehandedly changed the world by bringing together billionaires in search of the public good? 

Is the Catholic Church’s anti-abortion stance designed to more easily funnel government funding to Catholic-dominated voting districts, or genuine concern about society’s moral failings? 

Does a black American “welfare queen” represent personal failure or the failings of an economic system unable to correct racial segregation? If over 80% of African-American women are overweight because their ancestors were bred like animals by enterprising slave traders, should companies allow certain groups more gym time, or should some people more readily accept a manual labor position? On the flip side, when an African-American athlete proudly salutes the American flag, is he ignorant of his country’s history, or is he an optimist who believes in progress? 

All of the above questions have objectively correct answers, but none ascertainable in our lifetimes. Each answer begins with one of the two interpretations, and then depending on the time of analysis, ends somewhere at the other end. If we are lucky, we muddle in the middle as long as possible. By way of example, imagine the Alpha and the Omega or al'Awwal (الأول) and al'Akhir (الآخر), but in a quantum computing setting involving collective free will: the answer is ever-present and yet always changing. 

Perhaps a more concrete example would be instructive. Consider the now-unified country of Germany, once known as the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland) and the German Democratic Republic (GDR) aka the Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR). When we discuss Germany, which Germany are we entitled to use for analysis? The future and past are necessarily intertwined, so if we only take today’s Germany, will our analysis be complete? If our analysis is almost always incomplete, then do you now understand the “crucial element” we discussed earlier? 

Yes, the fourth lesson is indeed the same as the second and the third, but you could not see it because marketers and politicians have spent billions of dollars proselytizing the belief everyone can go wherever they like on the al'Awwal (الأول) and al'Akhir (الآخر) timeline—often at a cost exceeding selectively-blind allegiance. In reality, your life involves predetermination as well as free will, a fact evident to those who recognize history was always assigned a seat at your table, whether invited or not. Luckily for Americans, their table may wobble, but it is still vast, it still contains multitudes, and unlike Hong Kong or Singapore, there are many, many empty seats available. 

I will leave the last lesson to baseball player Peter “Yogi” Berra: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” I am uncertain of our specific place in the nation’s timeline, but at this point, whether America’s table continues to wobble until it breaks is an outcome favoring free will over predetermination. In simpler terms, it is, once again, up to the youth, especially the builders, lovers, writers, and artists. Fix the table. There is time still. 

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat (November 2020) 

These are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they are not original with me, 
If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing, or next to nothing, 
If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing. 

– Walt Whitman 

And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own, 
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own, 
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women my sisters and lovers, 
And that a kelson of the creation is love... 

– Walt Whitman

The "rise of [American political conservatism in the 1980s] showed that hypocritical nostalgia for a kinder, gentler, more Christian pseudo-past is no less susceptible to manipulation in the interests of corporate commercialism and PR image. Most of us will still take nihilism over neanderthalism." -- David Foster Wallace

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

Joe Biden: America's Golden Retriever

Listening to Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden is like watching an old golden retriever--you know it doesn't mean any harm, and you don't expect great things. 

Yesterday's speech was the habitual barking: Biden, who ran for president in 1988, began well and meant well, but soon reverted to his old playbook. In a talk timed to support freedom of speech and racial justice, Biden began praising unions and "essential workers" in the same sentence, unaware his linguistic separation exposed a harsh truth: that the rise of the "warrior cop" and failures of K-12 education nationwide can be traced to teachers' and police unions, which have created separate and unequal disciplinary and compensation terms disadvantaging dispersed voters. If that's too much information for you, let's make it simpler: the more complex a government--especially one with three different layers--the easier it is to hide institutional corruption and to create jobs benefitting only loyalists.
Though I switched to a different channel soon after, it wouldn't surprise me if Biden also mentioned the value of lawyers, judges, and rule of law in an outing meant to address the fatal black boot of a white police officer on the back of a black man's neck for eight minutes and forty six seconds

As voters, we must reject the usual platitudes and demand to know why, if politicians have been sincere or awake for the past thirty years, we're seeing an exact replay of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, but with George Floyd replacing Rodney King.

We average a major war every 20 years in this country so we’re good at it! And it’s a good thing we are [because] we’re not very good at anything else any more! Can’t build a decent car, can’t make a TV set or a VCR worth a [damn], got no steel industry left, can’t educate our young people, can’t get health care to our old people, but we can bomb... your country, all right! Especially if your country is full of brown people. Oh, we like that don’t we? That’s our hobby! That’s our new job in the world: bombing brown people. Iraq, Panama, Grenada, Libya, you got some brown people in your country, tell them to watch... out or we’ll goddamn bomb them! -- George Carlin, Jammin' in New York (1992)

Such historical repeats do not occur without each part of the legal ecosystem considering its own needs above the public's over a substantial period of time. In 2018, New Jersey's Senator Cory Booker identified the results of decades of political inefficacy: a lack of empathy combined with excessive ego: 

What I often find is we’re at a point in our society right now where we have just stopped listening to each other and stopped being empathetic, and instead are leading with... judgment. The problem with that is it disables us and our ability to come together to do the kind of things that need to move our society forward. That’s why I think now more than ever... in America we need a courageous empathy, where we are willing to let go of our own ego and tune into another human being, to really listen to them. I may not agree with that Black Lives Matter march. They may offend me, but we’re all wired the same way. So why are they out there yelling and screaming? Is it because they’re bad and I’m judging them, or am I taking time to really try to surrender my own position for a minute and listen to that person in the Midwest who is a serious Trump supporter and try to really understand where they’re coming from?

Fortunately and unfortunately, Biden's problems do not stem from a lack of empathy, but a failure of pro-active thinking and, like many Catholics, a preference for colorful stories over accountability. On the same day of Biden's flaccid performance, Booker delivered a speech for the ages, one befitting a presidential candidate. Though we are told race and religion should not matter, I must mention an inconvenient truth: Booker is young, Baptist, and black; Biden is old, Catholic, and white. Verily, if Congress be the den of insiders, compromisers, and lifers, then Biden's comfort--and lack of discernible principles--can be understood just as easily as Booker's undeniable appeal. Indeed, it has always been this way, the conscience of America colored with the blood and sweat of black and brown bodies, even as the descendants of white Catholic Spaniards and white Frenchmen try to convince us San José and New Orleans represent not slavery and Dum Diversas but terracotta tiles and religious freedom.

There are only two kinds of men: those who compromise and those who take a stand. -- Muhammad Ali 

Such deliberate schisms between black/brown and white experiences in America necessitate if not a cover-up, indecent propaganda. Consequently, American citizenship requires school-mandated brainmucking, and ones who break free often find their way to other inconvenient truths, becoming sufficiently disillusioned to march forward independent of whiteness or American institutions, choosing Islam or southeastern France. 

My first rule. Never believe anything anyone in authority ever says. None of them. Government, police, clergy, the corporate criminals. None of them. And neither do I believe anything I'm told by the media... I don't believe in any of them. -- George Carlin, 3 x Carlin (2011)

And it is only after we remove the muck from our eyes that we find ourselves not in 1992 Los Angeles, but further back: at Vietnam, at Kent State, at the Watts riots, at Jackson State College, and at the Martin Luther King, Jr. speeches our teachers never taught. Such is the way of the military-industrial complex: deflect criticism, harass opponents, admit nothing, and when all else fails, murder and imprison "The Other." Seen properly, Mr. George Floyd is the victim of not only the police, but every lawyer, judge, and legislator who looked the other way when America repeated Vietnam by invading Iraq, preventing substantive reforms and allowing conflation between local police and national/international military.

My conscience won’t let me go shoot my brother, or some darker people, or some poor hungry people in the mud for big powerful America... Shoot them for what?... How can I shoot them poor people? -- Muhammad Ali

The invasion of Iraq was a bandit act, an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the concept of international law. The invasion was an arbitrary military action inspired by a series of lies upon lies and gross manipulation of the media and therefore of the public; an act intended to consolidate American military and economic control of the Middle East... We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleted uranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people... How many people do you have to kill before you qualify to be described as a mass murderer and a war criminal? One hundred thousand? More than enough, I would have thought. -- Harold Pinter (2005)
 
How did Biden vote when the time for independent thinking arrived? By now, you know the answer. Biden joined 76 other United States Senators in authorizing Iraq's invasion. Mind you, not all 77 were golden retrievers--some were surely Rottweilers and German Shepherds. At least when Biden enters the Senate Chamber and most likely the White House, one must admit to warm feelings when he stumbles, eager to please. The old boy just can't help himself; after all, don't we already know an old dog can't learn new tricks?

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat (June 3, 2020) 

Dedicated to political columnist George F. Will, who found a conscience in his later years.

In my beginning is my end. In succession Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended, Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass. Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires, Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth... Houses live and die: there is a time for building And a time for living and for generation And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane... humility is endless. -- T.S. Eliot, "East Coker"

Update: it took fewer than 40 days for newly-sworn-in President Biden to bomb the Middle East. 



Thursday, June 8, 2017

Political Posts

See below for older but popular articles if you're interested in American politics:

1.  https://willworkforjustice.blogspot.com/2017/04/credit-and-credibility-in-america.html (Credit and Credibility in America)

What is debt's impact on the average and even above-average American's mobility?

2. https://willworkforjustice.blogspot.com/2017/03/why-wont-someone-think-of-children.html (Why Won't Someone Think of the Children?!)

Why have voters lost faith in government, especially K-12 educational employees?

3. http://willworkforjustice.blogspot.com/2017/05/immigration-and-west-backlash-fueled-by.html (Immigration and the West)

4. https://willworkforjustice.blogspot.com/2017/04/rafats-law-inflation-elasticity.html (Inflation Elasticity)

How do we deal with increasing complexity as size increases, leading to greater reliance on formal norms? 

Wednesday, May 10, 2017

"What is your motto here?"

From University of Maryland research.
From Bloomberg. 
About half of American voters have realized their political system isn't working and are willing to do whatever it takes to be heard.  While many Americans, including myself, mention police unions as part of the problem, the entire system has become so convoluted, little accountability or efficiency exists in politics--not in public education, not in public policing, and not in public transportation. (Fun fact: our local "bullet" train was built by Japan in 1986 and takes about an hour and a half on its normal route to go 50 miles. I live in one of the largest, most affluent cities in California.)

Ideological adherence, regardless of results, has destroyed America's ability to think logically or attain an agreed-upon national character.  Lee Kuan Yew once remarked, "The [Singaporean] system works regardless of your race, language or religion because otherwise we'd have divisions. We are pragmatists. We don't stick to any ideology. Does it work? Let's try it and if it does work, fine, let's continue it. If it doesn't work, toss it out, try another one. We are not enamored with any ideology."  In short, Singapore's ideology is not having one. Singaporeans pledge allegiance to practicality: does it work?  Is it sustainable?  Will it improve lives for the majority of our citizens?  Such an approach requires government to be citizenry-facing and pro-efficiency, admittedly much easier to do in smaller countries with only one border, but even with such advantages, "The bigger they are, the more corrupt they must be," shouldn't be an automatic motto.

America's tried-and-true formula has broken down.  With its vast natural resources, mighty Navy, low population density, two oceans protecting it from invasion, and advanced technology, the stage was set for perpetual success--as long as existing residents didn't get too greedy or selfish. Historically, America's expanding economy has relied on immigrants and treating their children--not immigrants themselves--fairly so they assimilate and sustain not only productivity growth but retirement programs.  I wrote about this phenomenon earlier:

To summarize, the natural progression of modern successful societies is as follows: industrialization; women receive equal rights; birthrates decline; unions are eventually formed; taxes are increased to support government union jobs [and tax or other benefits primarily accruing to natives]; native-born citizens refuse to do certain work, requiring the importation of poor people; the new immigrants create cultural tensions; and either society adapts and is able to welcome the new immigrants like the United States has done, or it fails to assimilate the new immigrants and begins a slow, steady decline.  

I should have added that an inefficient or outdated education system also requires the importation of skilled immigrants, not just poor ones. Being a bit naive, I never expected so many American voters to conflate giving more money to K-12 schools--no strings attached--with better education ipso facto.  Setting aside voter gullibility, why is a good, practical, and cost-effective education so important these days?

First, a bachelor's degree is required to get on track to a decent-paying job, even if the skills taught in school confer no practical value.  Yet, in most service-based or knowledge-based careers, people learn on the job--just like they did decades ago, though back then, an apprenticeship might have been just as good as a college degree.  (It's not just K-12 that has issues--I graduated law school not knowing where the courthouse clerk's office was or how to file a complaint in either state or federal court.)

Second, most college-educated people marry other college-educated people.  In fact, the most relevant factors in whether a marriage will last are age (the older, the better, but not after 32) and a bachelor's degree.  What percentage of Americans over the age of 25 do not have bachelor's degrees?  About 68%.

Now check out the second picture at the beginning of this post.  That's $1.2 trillion--yes, trillion with a "t"--in outstanding student loans.  Let's say you're in the lucky 32% with a bachelor's degree.  If you're ambitious and lucky and find a spouse in college and graduate, you could have non-dischargeable debt--debt you can't clear in bankruptcy court--of about $50,000 at the age of 30 and no assets other than a used car.  And still, college degrees are so in demand, my law school now charges $55,000 tuition for a single year.  Whom exactly does this educational set-up help?

It helps the federal government--which receives interest on student loans it issues directly, even ones targeted to lower income students like Perkins Loans; debt collection agencies and lawyers; consumer lawyers to assist against debt collection agencies; banks, which offer private student loans; universities, which are non-profits; and university employees.  It does not help an ambitious child from a hard-working immigrant family who has not had the benefit of asset appreciation during a time when prices for essential items were much lower, and the gap between wages and such prices much narrower.

Cost matters.  For example, a college education costing $5,000 a year with median entry wages at $5/hr is a much different hurdle to jump than one costing $55,000 a year with median entry wages at $15/hr.  At some point, the number of years required to be in debt delays important economic activity, especially the ability to save, which in turn delays the ability to rely on compound interest to build assets and disposable income.

If prices for essential items are increasing faster than wages, and the ticket to getting a higher wage requires $30,000 or more in debt, then without parental, grandparental, and/or scholarship assistance, the virtuous cycle of debt, sacrifice, hard work, and success is no longer available to a broad spectrum of people.  Even for the most well-meaning participants, the process changes from providing valuable solutions or services to getting along with the people in power so you can get into their club--or at least get a scholarship.

When reaching the middle class requires $30,000 to $50,000 in debt--excluding opportunity costs--most people will try to find loopholes and exemptions because "gaming the system" appears moral when the default is financial slavery.  Naturally, people will lobby politicians to help, but because the system is so profitable for almost everyone, no politician will implement fundamental changes.  Over time, the same problems multiply, such as tuition increases, and eventually the only people doing well are the ones who've convinced the government to give them a loophole, or the ones who've benefited from generational asset inflation and transfers, allowing them to keep up.  Moreover, absent predictable paths to success, cities become hubs of short-term thinking, unable to tame nomads, removing yet another potential check and balance on consolidation of power. In short, the Establishment wins every time, and immigrants and outsiders aren't able to shake up the joint in meaningful ways without being connected to the government's pre-existing objectives.

Welcome to America in 2017: "Here's Charlie facing the fire and there's George hiding in Big Daddy's pocket. And what are you [politicians and vested interests] doing? You're gonna reward [connected, listless] George and destroy [hardworking, middle class] Charlie... Now I have come to the crossroads in my life. I always knew what the right path was. Without exception, I knew. But I never took it. You know why? It was too damn hard."  

Hoo ah?

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat (2017)