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Weapons: Our #1 Export?
The phrase "Obama has a lot on his plate" is the understatement of the year. The president has a to-do list a mile long, and every day a new crisis (like the coup in Honduras) gets added to the list. Can we really fault him if he sneaks the occasional smoke?
But before he heads out to the presidential woods, one of the tasks still undone is to update and revise U.S. arms export policy. The last official version of U.S. arms export policy is from the Clinton years. In addition to the usual rhetoric about promoting regional stability, ensuring U.S. military superiority, and promoting "peaceful conflict resolution and arms control, human rights, democratization," Presidential Decision Directive 34 (February 1995) inserted a new consideration: "enhanc[ing] the ability of the U.S. defense industrial base to meet U.S. defense requirements and maintain long term military superiority at lower costs." In other words, a potential arms sale should be judged in part on whether it is good for weapons manufacturers.
Not every administration needs a formal export policy. Under the guise of the global war on terror, President George W. Bush fast-tracked weapons sales, released countries from arms embargoes, and pumped more money into foreign military aid. His policy was — in essence —sell, sell, sell, and he did it without issuing a formal policy statement.
But now, President Barack Obama needs to decisively break with Bush era practices. Unfortunately, so far the administration is opting for less clarity and more verbiage.
With Friends Like These
At a May 2009 Defense Writers Group convened by the Center for Media and Security, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy was asked "whether the Obama administration will follow the general policy of supporting exports?" and "do you anticipate any change in terms of where US arms will be sold?" Flournoy responded: "We don't have a sort of arms sale policy as much as more a sense of commitment to building partner capacity." But she asserted that the United States isn't going to "hawk" a given weapon system around the world. She said something similar a month earlier, at the Center for Strategic and International Studies: We "have a direct interest in helping our allies and partners build their capacity to be security contributors, to be able to step up alongside us in shoring up the international system."
Vice Admiral Jeffrey Wieringa, the head of the Pentagon agency that administers weapons exports, was blunter: "We sell stuff to build relationships."
But last year, the United States sold arms or military services to well over 100 nations. Can they all really be reliable security partners? If not, will the Obama administration shorten this extensive list of customers? And will it seek better ways to build ties to countries like Pakistan than sending them nuclear-capable F-16 fighters, which are more likely to be used against India than in fighting al-Qaeda or the Taliban?
Absent an explicit shift away from Bush administration policies, U.S. weapons sales are likely to continue to fuel conflict and abet human rights abuses. During the two Bush terms, the majority of U.S. arms sales to the developing world went to countries that our own State Department defined as undemocratic regimes and/or major human rights abusers. And over two-thirds of the world's active conflicts involved weapons that had been supplied by the United States.
One thing is clear. In the absence of a firm and clear policy, a lot of weapons are being exported. In fiscal year 2008, the foreign military sales program sold $36 billion in weapons and defense articles, an increase of more than 50% over 2007. Sales for the first half of 2009 reached $27 billion, and could top out at $40 billion by the end of the year. In contrast, through the early 2000s, arms sales averaged between $8-13 billion per year.
The Push Factor
Among the many limitations of Undersecretary Flournoy's formulation of the Pentagon's "commitment to building partner capacity" is that it avoids confronting the domestic constituency for weapons exports, namely weapons manufacturers and their congressional allies.
This dynamic is now being played out over the F-22 Raptor.
This irrelevant high-tech wonder, originally conceived to counter a
Soviet-era plane that was never built, has for the moment been saved from the ignobility of Defense Secretary Robert Gates' cutting room floor by a concerted effort from Lockheed Martin executives, machinist union members,
and congressional representatives with manufacturing facilities in
their districts (and company checks in their coffers). The Air Force
has said they don't need the F-22, and Gates himself pointed out that
it had flown no missions in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But rather than planning for the eventuality that the F-22 production
line will close in a year or two, Lockheed Martin and its allies are
fighting back. They may or may not win their battle
to add up to a dozen F-22s to this year's military budget. But should
these efforts fail, they have a fallback position: export them. Japan,
Israel, and Australia have all expressed strong interest in the fighter
plane. Current law prohibits foreign sales of the F-22,
but Lockheed and its friends in Congress are pushing to change that.
Japan is playing its part by harping on fears of foreign competition.
Japan has announced that if the F-22 is not available it could go with
the European Typhoon instead.
Japan's stoking of the competitive fires is just one example of rising global demand for high-tech weapons. A dozen or so nations are in the market for fighter planes, including Brazil, Denmark, and Greece. And as Boeing's Vice President Robert Gower told reporters in Paris, "It is a great time to be in the fighter business."
Loren Thompson, a pro-export pundit with the Lexington Institute — and not so coincidentally, a consultant to Lockheed Martin — takes it a step further, predicting that for the United States, "weapons could be the single biggest export item over the next ten years."
Increased weapons sales will certainly help defense contractors weather the current economic crisis. But they won't help the overall U.S. economy or the security of the international community.
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87 Comments so far
Show AllWHAT'S SO FUNNY ABOUT PEACE, LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING?
We can build a supersonic jet fighter that can hover like a helicopter, but when it comes to solar, wind, wave, or other alternative energy technologies: 'we cant do it yet, the technology just ISN'T THERE yet'
Thats BVLLSH*T!!! These energy alternatives could very well SAVE THE PLANET (as well as pull our sorry *ss*s out of the latest GOP-gifted depression), they represent investments that pay back major dividends in reduced global wars for oil, energy independence, sustainability, and maintenance of climate.
After about $300 billion a year, the defense department represents a waste of money. At $150 billion, it can fulfill its purpose, which is protecting America from invasion. At $300 billion, it can protect America and anyone else we want to protect from invasion. At $600 billion, it represents $300 billion in protection, and another $300 billion in welfare-for-cold-warriors. Most of whom live high on the hog in Orange County, CA, vote GOP to keep the gravy train coming, and look down their noses at 'those welfare immigrants' in LA county.
Good points. What boggles my mind is that millions of fools in the US buy into the notion that we need to spend a trillion dollars a year on defense (all said and done) in order to protect us from a small group of militants holed up in the mountains of Tora Bora or where ever, who have no tanks, helicopters, jet fighters, bombers, aircraft carriers, satellites, drones, CIA, etc, etc.
I was talking to this college "educated" fool who tried to justify Obama and his Afghanistan/Pakistan wars on the grounds that, "Oh, it's the Taliban." Like the Taliban are coming to get us therefore we need to bankrupt our nation spending a fortune on "defense", but we can't afford single payer health care or enough stimulus money to avoid massive job losses.
Notice how it's okay to lay off teachers, police and firefighters and shut down companies, but what's never on the table is, "Hey, lets drop a few less bombs and kill a few less people so we can have more money to spend on health care and education."
The problem is that the very fools who are suffering as a consequence of policies directed at enriching Big Business & War Inc. are the very same fools that defend them.
We need to educate the fools one by one.
Sioux Rose
UBREW: Totally right-on! Just as rather than close up G.M.'s shops these should be retooled to produce green technology and domestic infrastructure; the military should not get another dollar from any public/tax program until they similarly start retooling to bring constructive rather than destructive initiatives and projects to this world.
One problem with turning the paradigm around now is that the U.S. elites in their selfish disregard have virtually made war into a self-fulfilling prophecy by arming so many other unstable nations with lousy rulers. Someone is prone to have itchy fingers with lots of fancy weapon systems floating around.
One way or another the karma of investing in destruction rather than construction is about to head home. It's a shame that so much wealth was squandered on such primitive and useless behaviors. There is a price for this level of depraved indifference, and while the current U.S. leadership has granted impunity to its chief smooth operators, higher universal forces (being cognizant of the cries of widows and children in too many lands) are not so lenient nor naive.
Abolish weapons.
Well is'nt it just dandy, our whole country has made the marketing of death, torture, extortion, rape, and instruments and methods of domination into the only novelty we now can sell worldwide. Our whole nation is a prison, and even the most priveleged of us are mere trustee's of a system guided by the needs of undead, inamate "corporations" that have no human experience to draw an empathic ethical connection from.
This is a lose-lose proposition for the top and the bottom rungs of our society there is no aristocratic agenda to illuminate the firmament, just "winners" of our shlock-o faschist game-show of a culture. Then of course there are the rabble. Only just barely contained by our police state. A mass of little tyrants who tax us all with their citations. good work ruling class! Now you and your children are as screwed as everyone else....
Finally we know that our system has no victors, just a heirarchy of victims. with each tier torturing the level directly below. On top of this structure are the "elite" , are they pretty? are they profound? no, they are sad, alcoholic, over medicated mediocrities, like all the poor shmucks below them.
When will the elites realize the we are all the MIDDLE, the top is the center and the bottom is the center and the bottom is the center. we have been decentralized, maybe we always were. New breakthroughs in physics display unequivically that there is no "top" but only a vast network of centers all radiating from within.
Over this ontological reality is a mask of power, and all of our militarism poverty and repression is the product of this error in our perceptions.
We are killing ourselves, now more effectively then ever. Every leader knows the score.
A politics of love must find it's place in our world, but as long as it is the killing machine that is making all the money, we are trapped.
I think of the problems you described as generally belonging to the class of Free Rider problems. The elites are better off if they take advantage of those on the lower rungs, but all members of society, including the elites, are worse off if all the elites take advantage to the point that those on the lower rungs are broken and crushed, because the feedback loops that all depend on for sustenance run through all the rungs of society.
The classic Free Rider problem is that where an individual X is best off if every rider pays for the transit service except for X, so X is a "free rider." However, if too many others try to copy X and ride for free as well, then the transit service goes bankrupt and so everyone is worse off.
Even a parasite needs to be careful enough to not kill off its host.
The banking industry is not as careful as a flea.
Sioux Rose
XZO: Good post. The only way to reclaim the balance writ into things ranging from minute particles to those as vast as planetary systems is to add VENUS and her expressions (which include love, art, cooperation, culture, beauty, sensuality, pleasure, romance, fine food, gardens, exotic scents, bewitching music) to the human mix/experience. This would offset the disproportionate emphasis on MARS (lover of war) as sponsored foremost by the U.S., but spreading like a lethal disease (hint: via profligate weapons sales)around the world.
It's all about fear, isn't it? The government has been scaring the public since the late 1940s that there are numerous existential threats in our neighborhood and the world and that more police, bigger armies, and more powerful weapons are the only way to address these 'threats'; that taxes must be increased to pay for more police, armies, and weapons and more socially-directed activities like education, health care, infrastructure maintenance, civil and social justice, etc. must be put on the back burner because we can't afford them.
The fact is, fear is a personal and internal perception and has nothing to do with actual conditions and the number and potenency of our police, our armies, or our weapons. This is why with the most potent military apparatus in the world we're still afraid as a nation and demand the impossible from our government - to be free from fear.
Tirebiter - Very, very good. You are correct about fear as the big motivating factor in furthering the agenda of the military/industrial/national intelligence complex since the end of World War II. Please indulge my foray into yet further paranoia anyway.
If F-16's, and presumably F-22 fighter jets, are "nuclear capable" as Freda Berrigan's article says, then selling this potential delivery system to a growing number of nation state customers all over the globe enhances the existential threat to the United States of a 9/11 style terrorist attack. Should a rogue state or a non-state actor like Al Qaeda somehow get ahold of a black market nuke or two, the evil doers would still have to have the technological capacity to somehow detonate it on American soil. There are not many loose ICBM's, missle carrying subs, or long range bombers for sale in the international arms bazaar, or listed for auction bids on e-Bay.
Nuclear capable fighter jets, made in USA, proliferating around the world?
Now there's some blowback I'd rather not think about.
Bill from Saginaw
Anything that can carry air-to-ground munitions is technically nuclear-capable. A WW2-era P-51 Mustang could be nuclear capable if there were nukes light enough to fit its hardpoints. F-22s probably aren't...they're interceptors, and only carry air-to-air missiles.
Sioux Rose
TIREBITER & Bill: You are both of course correct about the manufactured "fear factor," but don't forget that it serves the mechanics of that dark profit motive borne from a marriage between mammon (putting $/profit first) and Mars (lusting for war, and purposely setting conflicts/conquests into motion). This insidious duo is deadly to persons, ecosystems, nations, and souls. The fact that it's in charge creates a reign of terror vaster than anything history has yet witnessed. Of course there were never 6 billion living "targets" or such vast sums invested in systems that could take them out, thousands at a time like so many inhuman animation points flashing across a video screen. Amazing the "progress" a society can make when its priorities remain unexamined, part of a mythology far more sinister than anything the astro-logos could replicate. But war is championed while astrologers are branded dangerous heretics. There remains an ancient fear of looking up and expanding our collective sense of meaning, gentleman. To see the earth as a singular spinning sphere that belongs to a cosmic neighbhorhood could vastly alter the mindset that has managed to pit nation against nation for centuries. In fact given the greater "enemy" or should I say threat is climate change, it would behoove persons to recognize we're all in this together, if our common stake is the sustainability of life on this impossibly beautiful and amazing planet!
"But war is championed while astrologers are branded dangerous heretics."
I generally agree with your comment, but wouldn't call astrologers 'dangerous heretics', only superstitious silly-billies.
Sioux Rose
Bite that tire: Well, you obviously know little about history and the fate of astrologers, nor do you recognize the degree to which this subject is rendered taboo across the media. I am talking about SERIOUS astrology. Have you ever seen an astrologer interviewed on television? How come sports casters get all kinds of perks, and the religious right has several 24/7 networks pulsing with their unbelievably insane End Times discussions; and our own newscasters smile while they deliver the night's deadly details, over and over again. The voice made conspicuous is the one that has something that could do a lot to shift collective awareness. You have taken on the prejudice of the old church-state, made a value judgment based on a superficial understanding of a subject I have devoted 30 years to studying. To the white person, the Black person's experience of direct prejudice is frequently passed off. To the male, the aspects of culture that impact the lives of females are also easily passed off, like the sexist jokes that demean women and are a CONSTANT in too many movies and a number of TV shows. The list goes on. Just because you don't see it, and it's not in your experience, hardly makes it not so.
I thought you were boycotting me? I even thanked you for it in advance. How quickly we forget.
Be that as it may - I take your point about the cruel historical treatment of astrologers. But many 'heretics' - protestants, deists, and believers in other 'gods', agnostics, atheists, free-thinkers, scientists, in fact anybody whose different views the church feared - received the same treatment. But I doubt that many astrologers are burnt at the stake these days and more often than not receive the kind of attention their bronze-age mumbo-jumbo merits - which is polite scorn. To be fair, I have the same opinion of religion and other superstitions as well.
I agree with you about the vacuous fare available on the media. But how envious you sound of 'sports casters perks'. How bitter you sound about 'newscasters', and the 'religious right' who occupy the limelight and SERIOUS astrologers who don't, and men (those violent minions of Mars) who you often sound like you blame for the apparent feelings of whatever personal angst it is you feel - rather than blaming the nonsense you say you've devoted 30 years of your life studying.
In the dark, it may make sense to be led by the blind, but in the light it makes no sense at all. Astrology may have been a reasonable approach when we were in the dark and knew little or nothing about the world, but now that we do know something astrology has no practical utility except as entertainment.
I know you don't like my views concerning astrology which is only fair since I don't like yours. I find astrology silly and delusional, you find me ignorant and judgemental. So be it. There's probably some truth in both our observations.
Finally, I actually respect your often reasonable posts here - that is, until you offer as support for your argument the machinations of Mammon or Mars as rationale. That's when to me you begin to sound...let's just say less than convincing and leave it at that.
Sioux Rose
BITING TIRES: I do forget. I have LOTS of irons in lots of fires, and can't keep track of all the CD threads and those I respond to. But I'm sure glad you're not a therapist as conflating my personal response to a media that shuts out voices like mine and the FACT that patriarchal cultures under thrall to MARS do enormous damage to life, persons, and ecosystems are hardly the same thing. I think you threw everything into the spin cycle except the detergent. So glad I don't have to suffer your presence at any social events. The tire metaphor is a good one for you, as you cling to the ground, and can't see the stars or anything that exists beyond your limited ego/mind's capacity to discern it. Talk about limiting your universe to a foot extending past your belly button. Yuck! Do balloons deflate as soon as you enter a room? Maybe your name should be "tire inflater" and you can boost your income carrying one of those gadgets that adds air (to tires) as needed?
'BITING TIRES: I do forget. I have LOTS of irons in lots of fires, and can't keep track of all the CD threads and those I respond to.'
You forget. A sorry excuse. I thought you were supposed to be one of the 'enlightened ones'?
I'm sure you have LOTS of people who call you out that you vow to ignore. Perhaps you should keep a list of us next to your computer. Here's a thought, you could call it your 'enemies list'.
And blaming that pesky MARS again - poor red planet; tarring it with all the destructive acts of homo sapiens. It would be far more realistic and productive to blame people's flaws for their choices than a hunk of oxidized rock millions of miles away.
'I think you threw everything into the spin cycle except the detergent.
The tire metaphor is a good one for you, as you cling to the ground, and can't see the stars or anything that exists beyond your limited ego/mind's capacity to discern it. Talk about limiting your universe to a foot extending past your belly button. Yuck! Do balloons deflate as soon as you enter a room? Maybe your name should be "tire inflater" and you can boost your income carrying one of those gadgets that adds air (to tires) as needed?'
Spin cycle usually follows the wash cycle and is used to drive water and detergent OUT of the wash. One doesn't put detergent in the spin cycle. Well, normal ones don't.
True, tires cling to the ground. It's called being in touch with the world. I prefer it to not being in touch at all.
'Yuck' - 'Yuck?' - what is this a Peanuts cartoon? Tell the truth, are you actually Lucy in disguise?
Oh, and one of those 'gadgets' is called a 'pump'. Add it to your vocabulary.
Jeez, Rosie, you sound confused. Even your insults match your philosophy - they are childish and idiotic.
"astrology has no practical utility except as entertainment."
with respect, it is my suggestion that astrology started with farmers wanting to know how the seasons and the moon's phases affected their crops.
we still successfully tend our garden according to these principals.
'Astrology' perhaps started that way, but that's because farmers didn't know any better. They know better now. Planting these days is or can still be done based on the phases of the moon, but I do not consider this 'astrology' in need of 'SERIOUS astrologers' as has been suggested here.
My understanding is that, among other things, astrology is an 'art or science' that ascribes characteristics to individuals based on the alignment of heavenly bodies. If you consider the modern understanding of agricultural techniques - specifically planting according to the phase of the moon - 'astrology' then I will just accept that we have a semantic difference and let it go at that.
my contention was that this is where it started - the possible effects on a person's psyche is a different matter.
as for predicting future events - HA.
(but this does not mean that I think Sioux Rose is in the fortune telling business. What she attempts is identifying POSSIBLE trends based on millennia of observations - not all her own, of course)
Tirebiter:
You write "In the dark, it may make sense to be led by the blind, but in the light it makes no sense at all. "
If you would just like to look up and read again the article and see how "enlightened" mankind is to dedicate quite so much of his science and technology to the arts of OFFENCE and destruction, principle for power and greed, I think you must either have to laugh at this statement of yours or take a good look into some mirror that reflects the inflated view you have of your own species, and its most pathetic progress.
I remember a story about a frog who lived in a well, and he thought it was the whole world. Another frog, his cousin, came to see him and tried to explain to him what the sea was. He said it's very big. "Is it twice as big as my well?" he asked. “No, it's much bigger than that” answered his cousin. "Four times?" asks the well frog adding "nothing can be that big".
So his cousin took the well frog to see the sea and when he saw it his mind just exploded.
Remember, we only think we know what is real and what is true. We are limited by our perception and our relation to the dimension in which we think we find ourselves. I guess scientifically, you could call it relativity.
So there are different ways to see the same phenomena too. They can be all true.
"take a good look into some mirror that reflects the inflated view you have of your own species, and its most pathetic progress"
I think if you peruse my posts on CD you will find that I have no such 'inflated view' of my species. In fact, I consistently compare it to yeast (with apologies to yeast) and think it particularly amusing and incapable of long-term survival.
You deride science and technology but use a computer, probably drive a car - or a bicycle, or a bus, take or may take medication to treat any illness, marvel at the Hubble photos, use a phone, listen to music, watch TV, and on and on - all products of science - not superstition - which was the object of my criticism.
"So there are different ways to see the same phenomena too. They can be all true."
Perhaps true. All you need is evidence to demonstrate their truth.
Mankind is not being held back by his ability to reproduce experiments and give phenomena names and extrapolate or apply science to technical problems. We can light fires and control the atom, but we are not much further advance from the Neanderthals when it comes to controlling our own ego and greed.
I do not berate science and technology but put them into their perspective and place along with philosophy to understand logic, ethics, and morals, with arts to understand communication, imagination and creativity. In short without all the other bits there is no spirit in man and there is no mystery to explore and give names to what we find or grasp or meanings to pin it all together. What we don’t know we cannot name. But, the more we know, the more we know we don’t know! Each answer gives us further questions. The meaning and the truth is in the journey.
I do berate man’s greed, avarice and cruelty, that turn so many of his ideas and handiwork into applications for suffering, death and destruction, rather than valuing all sentient life, and cherishing the precious resources on which it depends.
In your flat world it seems if something is not scientifically explicable, explorable,, measurable it does not exist or it is apparently simple superstition. But there are many things to which scientific tools are just not appropriate, and do not afford the capacity to measure; things that have no physical expression to grasp, but without fully understanding them we know they have an effect. One day perhaps we will evolve to have the senses and capacity to appreciate them fully.
Example; Try and measuring how much love and compassion we must generate to save our planet and each other?
I agree that greed and cruelty are destructive. I also know that science is a neutral tool and is put to use for both good and bad. I know too that when it is put to a bad use it is inevitably because of superstition or the greed and cruelty we agree exists.
As for saving the planet - you don't need to save 'the planet', the planet will be just fine. But mankind will self-destruct because it is incapable as a species of the love and compassion you suggest. The perceived need for survival will trump both love and compassion. Survival is an innate impulse while love and compassion are learned ones. Consequently I do not think we will ever evolve to have the senses you suggest are a possibility.
I agree too that the more we know the more questions that arise. That's how life and the aquisition of knowledge works. Or would you rather forego knowledge and accept the conventional wisdom found in dead philosophies and remain ignorant of the world, or accept that everything that is to be known is either already known or necessarily provided by the priests and prophets?
True, science cannot measure everything in my 'flat world' (funny, I thought it was round - or slightly pear-shaped), and I don't find all the claims (or disciplines)of 'science' convincing, but I find it a better overall measure of the world than subjective 'feelings' (feelings I experience like any other normal person) about how things are.
Actually, you don't need love and compassion to save the world - only enlightened self-interest.
And finally, while many bemoan the lack of love and compassion in human beings, no one, including you, has provided any concrete way to instill greater love and compassion in human beings. More often that not 'education' is suggested; but specifically, what kind of education is appropriate; that is, specifically what methods or curiculum have been successfully demonstrated to instill more love and compassion? My contention is that no such methodology exists - that is, of course, unless you can enlighten me.
Of course you are right that love and compassion are learned, although some elements are primordial instinctive as in the love of a mother for her child. The existence of these "feelings" is essential to the survival of humanity, as the child is totally dependent on the nurture and warmth both physically and emotionally given in his early development. Children deprived of such love, have difficulty to love others, and in turn have difficulty caring emotionally for their own offspring or empathizing with society. These emotions are principally transmitted in the relations between family members and then can be further extended to close friends, and one can even project a sense of compassion to total strangers on the other end of the world.
Enlightened self interest would teach you that your greatest and most tangibly lasting "happiness" does not derive from the pleasure of acquiring things or receiving love, but the ability to make others happy, to be needed for the infinite love you can give, or appreciated and respected for your services to, or care for others, therefore I contend love and compassion are essential, without them ones perspectives are narrowed to the dominance and demands of the ego. You can never be happy making yourself happy to the exclusion of others. Over time and generations if the egos reign societies collapse.
The appropriate education to learn love and compassion is meditation on the four noble truths and impermanence. If you seriously seek enlightenment you need no faith nor superstition, just discipline and perseverance and you will find it on the way of the path not as the destination. Once you commit to the path your destination will inevitably be modified.
The four noble truths
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXmdKWVirUA
I am familiar with the four noble truths but have to ask, do you really think it realistic that they would be taught across this world by the current crop of humans? We can argue what should be forever, as long as we recognize what is and what is not likely to change anytime soon - whether a good idea or not.
There are of course exceptions that test the rule, but I would suggest that the rule is that humans as a species are not geared for compassion and love, but for acquisition and survival. It is what has abetted our survival for millenia and I don't see that changing anytime soon. Which is why I think that before long we will be history.
The 'love' of a mother for a child is cherished by society - but its value to society is not for its intrinsic value, but because it is a survival trait. If infants were abandoned because they are a pain in the ass (they are a colossal pain in the ass) the species would immediately expire.
When a predator is near, birds with chicks often pretend to be vulnerable - often faking a broken wing to convince the predator that it is easy prey - to draw the predator away from the nest. Is this love and/or compassion? Or merely a survival mechanism?
The one thing that is constant is change, and the current crop of humans will adapt to the disasters they are creating by their material greed and spiritual dessert. The survival mechanisms on which that depend are also to a great extent the social skills of cooperation, tolerance, understanding and communication, which all may have to be re-learned PDQ as the present system collapses, the group dynamics and economies change. It is normal too, that at times of trouble human bonds become tighter and more important. So those that can find the necessary qualities for the next era will be the winners. So yes, love and compassion may be a buy.
Acquisition is as important as sharing given the above dynamic, so one thing does not exclude the other. As for the parents or the birds why can’t it be both love and instinct that are at work together; is it for love or more money that the noisy kids, already hyper from stress, are dumped in the crèche and collected and fed by the nanny, so that mum and dad can follow their careers, all for what ….? Happiness?
I like to see my glass is half full, but enjoyed the exchange.
The simple fact is that current crop of humans (and their children) will adapt to change or they will perish. And while I agree that cooperation, tolerance, and understanding are far more useful as survival traits than the diet of competition we've been fed for millenia, I don't see those aspects of human nature rising to the surface in what I think will be the coming era of scarcity - not when they've been absent in a time of relative global abundance - notwithstanding the uneven distribution of that abundance around the world.
"I like to see my glass is half full, but enjoyed the exchange."
I would like to see the glass as half-full, but too much life-experience and the constant disappointment in my fellow homo sapiens, has led me to see it as half-empty. As for the exchange - same here. Thanks for the effort.
"It's all about fear, isn't it?"
It's what the church dealt in, too.
(Many still swallow it.)
There is no need to fear the unknown.
Rather, respect the dangers we know to exist.
Want to see our biggest government contractors?
http://www.usaspending.gov/
Bottom-right corner.
The de-industrialization of the US economy is almost complete. GM has been dismantled, unions broken, and much of the productive capacity will be outsourced to other countries, just like most of our former industrial capacity in general.
The one manufacturing sector left is weapons manufacturing. It is very sad that just about the only things made in the USA are planes and weapons systems. It becomes harder to deny that the USA is becoming more like a neo-fascist country every year.
Sioux Rose
SOCIALIST: Add Hollywood producing the cultural soft propaganda that sexes up all these weapons; and pornography to degrade the very notion of human being(s); and big pharma inventing new dis-eases to hardly cure, but manage on maintenance programs that essentially rent back to persons the right to remain in their own functioning bodies. Oh, and all those frankenfoods & their seed equivalents. What America produces is almost straight across the cosmic board TOXIC and/or deadly!
It seems to me the supider and more OBVIOUS the supidity of a Policy, the stupider and the more obviously stupid the rationale for such an absurd policy.
A man who thought Ketchup a vegetable warned of a millions man strong "Communist army" marching to the borders of Texas and the people ate it up.
Of course, those who would be tasked with rewriting weapons export rules for BO are basically the same ones who wrote the Clinton version, so expecting anything other than more of the same would be like expecting BO not to keep handing the banksters trillions, or expecting him to stop mountaintop removal, or expecting him to not keep pushing for more government secrecy, or expecting him to stop calling for indefinite prolonged detention without charge or trial, or expecting him to...
Apparently, a lot of Americans intend to keep living in a delusional world where BO doesn't work for "the owners" of "the place."
Deepa
The question is, why is the United States aggressively pursuing this deadly trade?
The first reason is strategic. The executive branch wants to preserve its “freedom of action” to arm U.S.-allied countries such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and groups like the Afghan mujahadin, Jonas Savimbi’s UNITA movement in Angola, warlords in Somalia, and terrorist groups opposed to the current government in Iran.
The related second reason is economic (i.e. control of markets and natural resources). Us supplies weapons to strengthen those regimes that promote and protect the US economic interests.
It is known that the recent occupation of Somalia by Ethiopia and the subsequent appointment of Somalia government have been orchestrated by the United States of America, was to control of oil fields there. Salim Lone, a columnist for the Daily Nation in Kenya and a former spokesperson for the UN mission in Iraq says: “Somalia itself and the region, the Horn of Africa, is newly oil-rich. Kenya has some oil. Oil is the key to domination for the United States -- global domination, I mean. But it is going about, you know, the wrong way to get that oil. The US is also worried that its welcome in the Middle East is diminishing, and they need to make sure -- both they want to encircle the Middle East with the oil field, and they want to make sure they have Somalia and other countries handy for the oil.” (www.democracynow.org, 27.4.2007).
US supplies weapons to the opposition groups in countries where the current governments are opposed to promoting the US economic interests. This creates instability and civil wars and conflicts.
The record of predatory capitalism and heartless, absolute greed is consistent. It leaves mass human wreckage everywhere. The US and the Western economic neoliberalism and the shock doctrine of deconstruction and chaos can be seen around the world. For example, the capacity to control natural resources in Africa is enhanced by spreading terror, uprooting people, destroying families, and sowing distrust and hatred.
Since 1990 twenty-two of the thirty-two countries in the lowest economic development category have experienced armed conflicts and the deadly arms have been supplied (either directly or indirectly) by weapons producing and supplying countries. The armed conflicts in countries cause political chaos, destroy the infrastructure and make a huge dent on their economies, which make them vulnerable. This, in turn, provides an easy access for the transnational companies to their markets and natural resources.
This is what is happening in Congo.
Sioux Rose
DEEPA: Sound analysis. I think in terms of the type (and massive amount) of karma all this pro-killing activity induces. The moral depravity is made clear when the same countries that buy arms don't do much to feed their own people. And in the U.S. while the MIC beast is coddled and given its share of pork barrel welfare checks, increasingly more go without homes, food, or health care. If there was such a thing as Satan, imagine the width of his grin seeing all this done in the name of mostly "Christian" nations. It's been said that evil works primarily through the tool of deception. If this was a basketball game, evil would have a higher score right about now.
Deepa
Sioux Rose, you are absolutely right about moral depravity of the leaders of countries that buy weapons.
However, I think the issue is more complex. Take the example of India and Pakistan. The MISTRUST, created by political leaders in both countries (there are better relations between common people of India and Pakistan), the Cold War Era, and the British Raj, is the most conducive ground for the weapon industries. The tensions between these two countries continue to be heightened by political leaders for political gains, and weapons-supplying countries for business interests. Since the governing political leaders receive huge amounts of bribe from weapon industries, they benefit politically and economically by keeping the tensions between the countries at a high level. Even the political leaders in the weapons-supplying countries receive huge amounts of bribe from the weapons industries.
On the other hand, US continues to heighten the tensions between India and Pakistan by supplying more weapons to Pakistan. So india is forced to spend more money on buying new weapons. Now US is supplying weapons to Pakistan directly, and to India through Israel. Israel overtook Russia as the major weapons-supplier to India. This is where US benefits more if a dictator rules Pakistan. That is why US has been trying to dethrone the democratically elected government. (Musharaf is given safe haven in UK).
So weapons-supplying countries (which are not only economically rich, but also control international trade, financial agencies like IMF and World Bank, and UN & Security Council) create tensions among dependent/economically poor countries in order to create conducive atmosphere to sell their weapons.
This is very much evident in Africa. After the Cold War and the fall of USSR, US and Israel are the main culprits in not only creating and heightening tensions among countries, but also supplying weapons to countries, which further increase the tensions that lead to further spending on weapons.
Therefore, it is a vicious cycle.
The only solution, I perceive, is: citizens in US and Israel should fill the streets demanding their governments to stop this nonsense. Until and unless this happens, nothing can stop the GREED of those few, who are benefiting from weapons trade.
Sioux Rose
DEEPA: Thank you for broadening the scope of my argument (and points). You are totally correct. I was the guest of a young man from Kashmir as he was my humble travel agent when I courageously went through India on my own back in 2004. Needless to say those from Kashmir have their own regional interests that they feel justified in rigorously protecting, too. India could become a monster.
Perhaps the only thing that would help alleviate the situation of escalating world armaments would be enough persons experiencing a spiritual epiphany where they realize the price of so-called defense is more likely to destroy their children's futures. It is far more cost-effective to learn to get along, expand tolerance of cultural differences, exotic mores, and basic sensibilities. I believe women have MUCH to bring to this transformation as many have retained high levels of empathy in part from their own poor treatment by societies that still hold them as second-class citizens.
It is clear that the elites manipulate these differences to shore up enough antipathy to guarantee future wars; for after all, a great deal of profit results from these calamitous outcomes. If enough persons recognized the legacy of war in terms of the land mines that burn the limbs off children long after the conflict is over; and more recently in terms of the radioactive impact of depleted uranium, a global critical mass of higher consciousness might be reached. I don't rule out the intention on the part of elites to do what they can to reduce the world population. The fact that huge wars with enormous losses have been started over false pretexts is eery enough; and that no force (apart from that wonderful Spanish judge! and a few American legal experts) has demanded accountability does not bode well for those who love life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness everywhere. I do believe there are higher factors that can act as karmic arbiters, and on some level, these influences will (and are) come into play.
Thank you for your important post & response.
Kashmir does have a majority Muslim population but after all the disputes and fighting, Kashmir has remained with India while Pakistan didn't. Pakistan could equally be a monster on Kashmir as well. No offense but Pakistan needs to overcome its religious fundamentalism and so too does Kashmir need to rid itself of religious dominance. Nobody's benefiting except for the elites as it is. A lot of the spiritual teachings in India have been long abandoned and yuppie capitalism has been taking over. Ironically, some of Pakistan I believe is also falling for it in desperation. Anyone who thinks that religious fundies will be swept away by unfettered disaster capitalism are foolish. In fact, the two have plenty more in common and actually love each other as Saudi Arabia has shown. Both the Hindus and the Muslims in south Asia agreed to a lot of the male domination rules ages ago and most of it still stays intact. Kashmir could be more spiritual but the closest I think they'll come is Hare Krishna.
Hare Krishna
Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna
Hare Hare
Hare Rama
Hare Rama
Rama Rama
Hare Hare
The Hare Krishna movement has its controversies. The original founder had tremendous respect for women but some of the cultists ruined the movement but there have been recoveries. I still prefer remaining a Hindu Brahmin.
My wife and I may be Christians but we have a lot of respect and admiration for Hindus and especially the Brahmins who live a truly progressive life and would put even most of us on this site to shame. Unfortunately, neither the Far Right nor the Far Left has any respect for Hindus. The Christians on the Far Right accuse the Hindus of trying to convert when in fact, the Christian Taliban disguised as "missionaries" did all the mischievous violent conversion and Mother Teresa was no saint. The Muslims on the other side accuse the Hindus of violence when in fact it was the Muslims who did all the violence and abuse of women the most. There are good Christians and Muslims who respect and learn from the Hindus and help each other out but the fundies are the problem. There are a lot of good things to learn about Hinduism and it's not as bad as some claim it to be. Even the Palestinians love it.
I have no judgment on any movement, sect or religion. I was merely chanting a holy mantra. Maybe it helped someone to have a better day. Namaste. Shanti Om. Peace.
Deepa
Kashmir is divided into two parts: one is under Pakistan (POK), and the other is under India (You may find it in the Map).
Religious fundamentalism is found in all religions and in almost all countries. US has more number of Christian fundamentalists/ZEALOTS than any country. Some of the Christian ZEALOTS like Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, John Hagee, James Dobson...have been influencing the White House and the US policies. We all remember how the middle name "Hussein" of Obama was overemphasised by the American Christian ZEALOTS (because a non-Christian cannot be the president of the US). Every four years American presidential candidates stand in queue before these Christian ZEALOTS. This highlights the dominance of Christian fundamentalism in the US.
Read this: "TV Evangelist John Hagee Wants War With Iran, and He Wants It Now!"
http://www.lewrockwell.com/barnwell/barnwell73.html
So lets us not link "religious fundamentalism" to Islam only. Religious fundamentalists and terrorists are found in all religions.
Male domination has divine legitimacy and sanction in the Chrsitian and Hebrew religious scriptures. This is still practised in Christian churches. In 230+ years history of US, there is no female president, vice president. Nancy Pelosi is the first female speaker. Katie Couric is the first and the only female evening news reader.
But I never heard of a Christian ladding him self up with bombs and blowing him or her self up in a market place or bus, have you? Fundamentalists is not a good word to describe a person who uses religian as an excuse to commit violence. The Amish are fundamentalists as well but they are set against the use of violence in any form.
Deepa
Read:
James Carroll, “The Bush Crusade,” in The Nation, 279/8 (September 20, 2004).
Commenting on the eleventh and the twelfth century Christian Crusades James Carroll says:
"In the name of Jesus, and certain of God's blessing, crusaders launched what might be called "shock and awe" attacks everywhere they went. In Jerusalem they savagely slaughtered Muslims and Jews alike - practically the whole city. Eventually, Latin crusaders would turn on Eastern Christians, and then on Christian heretics, as blood lust outran the initial "holy" impulse. That trail of violence scars the earth and human memory even to this day - especially in the places where the crusaders wreaked their havoc. And the mental map of the Crusades, with Jerusalem at the center of the earth, still defines world politics. But the main point, in relation to Bush's instinctive response to 9/11, is that those religious invasions and wars of long ago established a cohesive Western identity precisely in opposition to Islam, an opposition that survives to this day."
- George W Bush, who describes himself as a “born again Christian”, has been quoted by Bob Woodward in his book "Plan of Attack" describing himself as a “messenger of God” “doing the Lord’s will”.
- The US Christain soldiers’ savagery is epitomized by a video posted on the YouTube website. This video, called "Hadji Girl", shows a serving US Marine in uniform strumming a guitar and singing about killing Iraqis, while his colleagues laughed and cheered. It also refers to Iraqis as "hajis", a term usually applied to someone who has completed the pilgrimage to Mecca, but commonly used among the US troops as a derogatory term for the Iraqis. The four-minute song includes graphic descriptions of killings. Dressed in a green T-shirt and military style trousers and boots, the American “liberator” sings: "I grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me. As the bullets began to fly, the blood sprayed from between her eyes, and then I laughed maniacally."
- If you want to see the "evil personified American Christians", see the Abu Ghraib torture pictures:
The Abu Ghraib files
http://www.salon.com/news/abu_ghraib/
2006/03/14/introduction/index.html
Deepa
The American history is filled with its "sacred savagery" in the world. One of them was to Philippines. William McKinley, then US President explained:
"I went down on my knees and prayed to Almighty God for light and guidance more than one night. And one night late it came to me: 1) That we could not give them [the Philippines] back to Spain — that would be cowardly and dishonorable; 2) that we could not turn them over to France and Germany — our commercial rivals in the Orient — that would be bad business and discreditable; 3) that we could not leave them to themselves — they were unfit for self-government — and they would soon have anarchy and misrule over there worse than Spain's was; and 4) that there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them, and by God's grace do the very best we could by them, as our fellow-men for whom Christ also died. And then I went to bed, and went to sleep, and slept soundly, and the next morning I sent for the ... War Department map-maker, and I told him to put the Philippines on the map of the United States (pointing to a large wall map), and there they are, and there they will stay while I am President!"
The President described the combination of sadistic cruelty and starry-eyed self-adulation as a noble campaign to ``uplift and civilize and Christianize" the Filipinos. “Civilizing” and “Christianizing” the Filipinos took longer than McKinley thought. This noble campaign brought out the brute in the soul of the US Christian crusaders. A frustrated US General ordered troops to kill every Filipino male over age ten. The righteous American Christian warriors succeeded in their campaign by overcoming local resistance forces through their overwhelming superiority in weapons and sheer ruthlessness. They slaughtered about half-a-million Filipinos within the next few years. The American media explained that it would take patience to overcome evil, and bring liberty and happiness to the Filipinos.
One critical citizen satirized McKinley's war: "G is for guns/ That McKinley has sent/ To teach Filipinos/ What Jesus Christ meant."
Deepa
Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, summarized the savage activities of the US around the world:
"We took this country (America) by terror away from the Sioux, the Apache, the Arawak, the Comanche, the Arapaho, the Navajo. Terrorism! We took Africans from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism! We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians, babies, non-military personnel. We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with stealth bombers and killed unarmed teenagers and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard-working fathers. We bombed Gadafi's home and killed his child…We bombed Iraq. We killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed a plant in Sudan to payback for the attack on our embassy. Killed hundreds of hard-working people; mothers and fathers who left home to go that day, not knowing that they would never get back home…We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and Black South Africans...."
- I would appreciate if you could let me know a country as savage as the Christian country, the US, which claims to be the "God's chosen country" ("a city on the hill").