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Common Sense in a Coma
“Then there is the issue of how the Afghans will be able to pay for their greatly enlarged police and military, which by some estimates will require $10 billion a year to sustain come 2014 — 10 times the Afghan government’s annual tax revenues.”
Of all the ironic absurdities and preposterous twists in the war on — I mean the war to promote — terror, this quote from the New York Times back in April, which I came upon as I was researching something called the Strategic Partnership Declaration between the United States and Afghanistan, felt the most like a mugging.
This is the price of being liberated from the Taliban — a security system costly beyond reckoning, in perpetuity, in order to protect the country from itself. Something’s more than just wrong here. Common sense is in a coma.
Or as Kathy Kelly put it: “We are startlingly, terrifyingly lost, and we’re getting ever more so.”
We’re lost because we keep strafing and bombing our troubles, along with any people who happen to be in the way, rather than facing them with the least sort of honesty, let alone humanity. We’re lost because our actions churn up problems infinitely worse than the ones we set out to solve. We’re lost because we are so morally compromised we have to keep piling on more of the same — more troops, more missiles, more carnage — in order to avoid facing our consciences.
“…men kill in order to lie to others and themselves on the subject of violence and death,” writes social scientist and philosopher Rene Girard, in Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World. “They must kill and continue to kill, strange as it may seem, in order not to know that they are killing.”
The Strategic Partnership Declaration, an agreement soon to be signed between the government of the United States and the government of Afghanistan — two entities usually referred to in geopolitical reportage simply as “the United States” and “Afghanistan,” in order to perpetuate the fiction that the governments and people of a nation are the same thing — bears out Girard’s thesis, as far as I can tell.
The current relationship between the two governments is set to end in 2014: You know, troop withdrawal, mission accomplished, see ya later. But of course it can’t be that simple. The nation-wrecking we’ve accomplished in the last decade is so extensive, we have to do something to repair the damage and restore stability.
Enter the Strategic Partnership Declaration, the main point of which is to entrench the U.S. presence in Afghanistan well into the foreseeable future. It would, among other things, establish a number of permanent U.S. military bases in the country — or “long-term” bases, as U.S. officials put it, meaning two or three decades and then we’ll talk about it some more.
The “partnership” part of the deal is that we’d keep the cash flow open to the makeshift Afghan governments we install so that, lacking actual legitimacy or popular acceptance, they could stay propped up militarily. The war, in other words, wouldn’t end. We’d never have to admit defeat and therefore a backwash of public soul-searching wouldn’t flood the media, paralyzing the country, and its military-industrial economy, with conscience.
Of course, the agreement also gives the U.S. government a permanent, “enduring” military presence in Central Asia — a dominant position in what has been called Great Game 3.0 — and, oh yeah, one other thing: It would likely so enrage the Taliban that they wouldn’t come to the negotiating table, keeping the pretext for war— and the Afghan government’s economically catastrophic security needs — alive in perpetuity.
“The U.S.-Afghanistan Strategic Partnership Declaration will perpetuate terrorism and bring it to everyone’s doorsteps,” reads a statement issued by a group called the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers.
“The ‘partnership,’” the statement continues, “will allow permanent joint U.S.-Afghanistan military bases to launch and project hard power. The ‘extreme’ Taliban would conveniently use these bases as a stand-alone reason for their ‘holy jihad.’ We cannot forget that one of Osama bin Laden’s reasons for attacking the U.S. on Sept. 11 was the presence of U.S. military bases in Saudi Arabia.”
This small organization is not, of course, the sort that has a voice in important and weighty geopolitical matters, or most mainstream coverage of same — but, my God, such voices must be heard. If they aren’t, our future is about nothing but large, impersonal “interests,” not human needs or the human soul.
“No Power today represents the people,” the statement cries. “Today, ordinary Afghans are denied the basic human dignities, living in a country that Save the Children said was the most dangerous place on earth for mothers, and that UNICEF said was the worst place on earth to be born in, and to be a child.”
How can this matter so little? And what are the implications? In how many spots on the planet does dominant political power represent anything but itself, in tandem with the worst of our instincts, our fear and our rage? It’s time to declare the Strategic Partnership Declaration, the covenant of permanent war, null and void everywhere.
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40 Comments so far
Show AllThe abyss yawns just ahead. There are already many falling headlong over the precipice.
Every day now we wake up to the nightmare.
Manysummits
=======
Commonsense is not comatose...in the US it died long before the book titled THE DEATH OF COMMONSENSE was published.
This article, to borrow from its title, makes a lot of common sense which is why in all probability Mr. Koehler will never be seen on any of the Sunday talk shows to explain to the American people why an American military presence will remain in Afghanistan in perpetuity.
As David Swanson accurately notes in the title of his book, War Is A Lie.
Should have been Peace Is A Lie...
Ask yourself why this would make sense?
Afghanistan is a very poor nation and the idea that tax revenues could be increased tenfold seems, like Robert Koehler suggests, absurd to the extreme.. ..Unless there is a reason to invest vast sums on money in anticipation of economic returns that boggle the imagination.
That reason exists; the petroleum wealth of “the Stans” must flow through the borders of Afghanistan to reach the markets of the world.
Afghanistan also has mineral wealth that would be highly profitable to develop and export.
The corporations that control our world will profit mightily from these projects if Afghanistan can be made exploitable.
The people of Afghanistan? Not so much.
The forced contributions, withholding taxes, by taxing the labor of USAn's will fund the occupation and pay the necessary funding for the corporations to exploit the wealth of Afghanistan and reap the profits while not paying taxes on the booty while still being protected by the Pentagon protection racket scheme, of fund US or else. These wealthy and corporate welfare kings, many of which pay little or no taxes, will reap the forced contributions, transferred to them by the USG,EITHER IN LIKE KIND AND/OR benefits, such as the Pentagon protection racket scheme, protecting those who don't pay for it. This is unethical gangsterism.Al Capone was an ethical gangster, Al didn't protect those that didn't pay for it.
“Then there is the issue of how the Afghans will be able to pay for their greatly enlarged police and military, which by some estimates will require $10 billion a year to sustain come 2014 — 10 times the Afghan government’s annual tax revenues.”
Earth to Mr. Koehler!!!
How is ANY entity - be it a nation or an individual - supposed to shoulder the costs of living in our neoliberal fascist state of vassalage?
Hmmm, could it be that the elite strive to put the yoke of debt around every person and political entity on the planet so that everyone is in debt peonage to the system?
Wake up, man, this plan makes perfect sense from those at the top of the system - everyone becomes indebted aka slaves to the new masters.
There is no way Afghanistan can ever pay this so they will get loans forever and be minions of the West in perpetuity.
There is no way Greece or any of the Euro nations will be able to pay their debt off, so they will get loans forever and be vassals forever.
There is no way individual people will be able to pay off their debts so they will be slaves forever.
See, here "common sense" is actually being used to enslave us all for it is only "sensible" that a person or entity pay off their debts.
Seems very reasonable, huh?
But nearly everyone seems to miss the whole creditor side of the equation - why loans were extended in the first place, what is the purpose exactly of these loans, is there a true ability to repay?
None of that matters.
Once the papers are signed, everyone is then relentlessly hit over the head with the "common sense" notions that debts need to be repaid no matter what.
The only way out is for everyone - individuals, cities, states and countries - to declare all of these debts void and fraudulent.
The system is enslavement and "common sense" is one of the chief weapons of the elite.
Agreed. Debt created by a keystroke can be Removed by a keystroke.
No sweat, foreclosure, layoff, crash, or millions of deaths even required.
The control of our money was illegally stolen, and we are illegally beggared/ destroyed. Time to stop this madness!
Well observed, polycarpe.
FWIW, it's at least possible that Koehler actually understands that the rigged, fraudulent game responsible for "Strategic Partnership Declaration" gimmicks is universal.
He may be confining his discussion to Afghanistan in hopes that complacent or uninspired readers will have their consciousnesses jacked up off the ground to a point where their wheels start turning more freely.
I ought to mention that this possibility does not normally recommend itself to me. It's a result of being lectured by an intelligent and well-informed relative in a religious community who writes and teaches, and purports to have a natural "teacher" mind-set.
He thinks I'm too hard on many of the writers regularly published here for not going far or deep enough with their analyses. In his opinion, I fail to understand that they are (or may be) writing in the "teaching" mode: seemingly pulling their punches, but in the service of connecting with a less educated and sophisticated audience.
He's pointed out cases to me of people he's encountered who are unexpectedly confronted with powerful, disturbing truths, and become so overwhelmed or shocked that they more or less freak out, shut down, and flip into traumatized denial or incomprehension.
So he thinks I should be more tolerant of seemingly half-baked, half-true articles here on the grounds that they might be helpfully meeting well-intended information-seekers where they live instead of preaching to the choir and alienating less radical thinkers in the bargain.
I'm not actually convinced of any of this, which may be why I'm throwing it out here for consideration.
I think your relative is probably onto something...because like you in expounding "powerful, disturbing truths," I've been called delusional or a "conspiracy theorist" by the unknowing or blissfully ignorant. So I guess we have to emulate these writers while throwing in a smidgen of shocking truth in order not the overly traumatize the half'-truth seekers.
However, I have greatly appreciated all of the informative commenters on this thread...so keep up the good work!
"So he thinks I should be more tolerant of seemingly half-baked, half-true articles here on the grounds that they might be helpfully meeting well-intended information-seekers..."
Disagree. He assumes that the sheeple are dumb. In my experience, many (most?) are not dumb, but rather have nutty ideas due to lack of information and bigotry.
Truth can be simple & elegant (Occam's razor). Most of us sheeple will be helped with truth (even if it is aka Eureka), rather than half baked statements (that won't even have punch of the writers' convictions).
So, yes I'd suggest to continue full throttle in expressing the full disclosures, and don't disservice your fellows by pulling punches, or withholding information. Of course that does not imply that one has to be rude or rough: many truths can be expressed in a compassionate manner. Even those that "overwhelm or shock" are preferable to half-truths that may cause obfuscation, or decelerate understanding of the smart sheeple.
hey, OS!
I started to respond to this post yesterday, but lost it...intriguing question...
I'm afraid I find it difficult to get to the heart of many matters with most people due to the very strong holds upon our societal psyche the following deceptions maintain:
the veracity of the government
the necessity of nationalism
the sanctity of the Constitution
the power of the vote
the soundness of the financial system
the validity of religion
the concept of individual maturity
the value of education
the progress of technological advance
the ownership of property
the acceptance of tradition
the morality of nonviolence
the prestige of the work ethic
the naturalness of electricity
the right to drive
the effectiveness of representational government
the fairness of majority rule
the sustainability of the natural order
the consequence-free creation of product
the inherent goodness of authority
feel free to add your own...
I would suggest that, yes, while we may have to meet people where they are, we need to go much further in moving them from such, to where we want them...how they react to such intellectual intervention is no longer the priority issue...the viability of the living planet is...
whether due to age, or experience-driven frustration, I am finding it harder and harder to live within the pretend world we have created to allow ourselves to rationalize the death and destruction being done directly by others to provide us the products we willingly purchase, indirectly supporting the same death and destruction...
the planet is running out of time...this makes me much more comfortable confronting those holding conventional views...many traditional arguments utterly fail in light of late historical developments, and offer no advice regarding the near future, and the looming horrors of environmental devastation, resource depletion and technological control...
there is a point where one must confront that politics, in general, is fraudulent, for example, and that discussing parties, candidates, issues, etc. becomes a literal waste of brain cycles...
this frees one up to begin the next round of thinking...
given one's government is criminally corrupt, what should one do?
what should all do, collectively to address?
if one is still stuck on candidates, one can never get beyond...
when might such a one ever arrive at Fukushima, or the inherent right to viable lands?
The mealy-mouthed half-baked language is the language we've been given by our elite overlords.
The wishy-washy, polite analyses, the sensible musings, etc etc...
All of these are meant to both lull the minds of the American populace to sleep and make them believe that people - someone, somewhere - are actually engaged in some sort of discussion that would be to their - the peon's - benefit.
This is why EVERYONE of the elite use the same words, phrases, terminology, argot, volume, tone, "objectivity" - every aspect has been crafted to evoke the illusion that are actually communicating to us instead of attempting to further confuse people and hide truths from them.
As dubet stated below, it's too late to engage on these terms any more and as I have tried to explain above, they're not our "terms" to begin with.
"Common sense" and "reasonableness" have become very effective tools in the hands of the fascist elite.
excerpt from this piece:
the government of the United States and the government of Afghanistan — two entities usually referred to in geopolitical reportage simply as “the United States” and “Afghanistan,” in order to perpetuate the fiction that the governments and people of a nation are the same thing ...
YES! Someone has noted this almost universal use of clumsy, inaccurate language. One of my common rants. People make a big mistake in thinking of corporations as being, if not people, then sortof LIKE people--which they're not.
When people say in trade negotiations that "Brazil wants X" what does it mean? It has nothing to do with the territory we call Brazil, OR the people who live there. They were not consulted and their wishes are completely irrelevant. It means that a handful of government people, after listening to the representatives of some of the biggest corporations based in Brazil, have decided to demand X. It's a mistake to say, for example, that WE invaded Iraq. Plenty of Americans were and some still are stupid enough to buy the thin pretexts for this occupation--or they pretend to, so they can avoid guilt feelings--but the public was evenly divided on the question on the eve of the attack in March 2003 despite an onslaught of corporate-media propaganda. 80% want to get out of Afghanistan now. But our wishes are irrelevant, because the US is not a democracy.
"to perpetuate the fiction that the governments and people of a nation are the same thing — bears out Girard’s thesis, as far as I can tell."
"The state says I, the state, AM the people---it is a lie. Whatever the state says it lies. Whatever it has it has stolen."---Nietzsche
Anybody not acquainted with Rene Girard's work can find many of the answers to questions people have been asking for the last ten thousand years.
PNAC 5: Humanity 0
We spend more in afganistan than the entire country earns in income.
That is 100% insanity - But kleptocracy, sociopathology and murderous intentions seem to be the Main characteristics of Ametocan Leadership currently.
Its unsustainable but the question is will it last longer than the ecosystem that allows Humans to survive?
Or as Kathy Kelly put it: “We are startlingly, terrifyingly lost, and we’re getting ever more so.”
Q: how far can you walk into the woods?
A: half way, because then you're walking out.
i think humanity has been terrifyingly lost for centuries and not unlike horses running back into the burning barn for safety, terrified people make silly, often tragic and deadly mistakes. almost all of us as children heard the warning against blindly following the crowd, "if your friends jump off a cliff, would you?" obviously, we would. the presumption that the pampered educated class has some instinctive grasp on the complexities of life unavailable to the common man, we run to them believing they who have lead us into the depths of dark confusion are the very ones to lead us all into prosperity. we've followed them into cutting down the woods to let the light shine in and warm our bodies over the cold winter nights. darkness only intensifies the terror of a terrified people, so we replace the scary woodlands with tall buildings, street lights, all night diners for factory workers who work the graveyard shift. we don't care to see the milky way at night because that reminds us how truly small and insignificant we are. we accept that our purpose in life is in our bank accounts, not in how we live this gift of life. so, we live in a barn where nature cannot harm us. the concrete jungle so separates our species form the natural habitat that we've lost touch with and respect for human nature. we've learned to mistrust our own instincts. well, the generation now growing (7 billion in a few months) may face the stark reality that the barn has burned down and rebuilding supplies run low. o gosh, we're in for some brutal times, but as the illusion of security in a most uncivil warrior world fades, the only option for survival left will be to regain our primate social nature and trust our instincts for survival and preservation of the species and quit following the ego-centric, drunk on power, leaders. they're no smarter than the rest of us.
Or:
Q: how far can you walk into the woods?
A: half way, because then you're walking out. Unless, of course, you're walking-- or being led-- in circles.
If a line of trees fell in the woods and formed a circle: would men circle the circle?
HUMMINGBIRD: I mean you no disrespect, but do you really think the portrait you painted comprises the whole of "humanity"? A lot of people fight, struggle, and take action to make a difference. A lot of people SEE another way. Elites control the media, they sanction the textbooks public schools may use, they count the election votes, they use the media to control minds and create appetites (where there were none), they establish their own body of "experts" to tell weak-minded persons what to believe... but MILLIONS have turned away from these machinations, and millions more see through them. Quite a few more millions take drugs to cope, as they're not yet strong enough, or aware enough to imagine another way.
Please... watch the use of the all-encompassing premise of WE. Humanity is a very broad tapestry composed of numerous threads, and they do NOT all conform to the imagery (or characterization) that you offered.
Siouxrose,
I mean you no disrespect, but maybe he was using "we" to avoid saying "you" or
"they", because he knows HE's not to blame but doesn't want to be confrontationable. People get really upset with me all the time because I usually refuse to use such overpolite and passive aggressive rhetorical techniques. In fact, the last time we talked, you took offense for exactly that.
I thought hummingbird's post was quite articulate and more insightful than most posts here. (Not that that's criticism either, because most posters here are far more knowledgeable and intelligent than the average USan.)
Uh-oh, we're in deep trouble for sure.
we are not lost...we are simply refusing to see where we are...
big difference...
to see where we are in Afghanistan would require one to actually acknowledge the huge amount of heroin being generated from there, every day...
to avoid this issue leaves one as I stated above: intentionally ignorant...
intentionally...so stop acting confused, stop analysing the war, stop yelling about what Congress should do...
the war is bullshit, Congress is bullshit, the feigned confusion is bullshit...
everything is before one to be seen, if one wishes to see...
violent criminals of various races are conspiring to run our world to their mutual advantage, and no vote will ever change that...
you are only alive because they haven't killed you yet...
they are killing you now, and have been, slowly, for some time, although the pace is quickening as of late, due to technological advance...
the ability to kill selectively, instantly, from remote locations, lies just ahead...
the planet is dying, which will force everyone into actions they would prefer to put off forever...
we can no longer avoid the truth...our behaviors have brought the living world to the brink of global death...
we must completely alter our way of life, or perish...
we may well have to fight to the death to make such changes...
fight to live, or wait to die?
could we simply agree to change? say, on September 22, 2012?
save alot of bloodshed?
DUBET: As a "Green Man" I applaud you for telling the truth here... Earth Mother definitely took aim at Washington, and I think it was a GREAT omen that she sent her message just when the courageous folks were protesting the insidious pipeline that (accorrding to James Hansen) would be a 'game over' number for mankind.
The world would be a better place if instead of so many calls to modernity, based on an arid distaste for, and distancing from nature's landscapes, more people got naked, got high, and did their sexual things...
" could we simply agree to change? say, on September 22, 2012"?
Boy do i agree but where is the 3rd party lead buy Feingold, Sanders, Kucinich anf some of the few progressive candidates who lost last fall Grayson)?
It is time a progressive party of America emerges ans submits a progressive program.
Helas a chance to win means money, media coverage and that the media informs the public on the kind of data in this article by inviting this author over and over. It means free independent media; just the opposite of what we have.
Yet revolutions can happen : look at Tunisia and Egypt, perhaps Syria and soon lybia.
Would the French and the Italians comer to the rescue to free Americans?
Perhaps they should....
Maybe we should form our own campaign committee here...debate our selection and get the vote out ourselves by word of mouth...just an idea:)
I have 6 new ducks on my homestead. They were fine in the brooder shed but when moved outside started to panic and run into the farthest corner and pile up on each other every time someone approached. One has been injured already in the fray. I’m doing what I can to heal them but it’s not working so far. As with my more human clients, well, Heraclitus and others were right: character is destiny. The ducks panic, run, and survive every time I walk into the area I call Duckheim. They therefore conclude, in those cute but small heads of theirs, that they survived BECAUSE they panicked and ran, and not despite. It worked so they repeat it, even intensify it over time. Their conclusions are skewed by the same misinterpretation of reality that caused their problem in the first place. It’s a tough cycle to break, whether the clients are ducks or tea partiers. Or, to a greater or lesser degree, the entire civilized human population.
There is hardly any difference at all between lost and refusing to be found. If we were only conscious it wouldn’t be so, but the gap between conscious and un is huge in Homo civitas and that makes all the difference. Or rather, all the sameness. There’s a comic strip about San Francisco politics by Don Asmussen called “Bad Reporter” with the subheading "The lies behind the truth, and the truth behind those lies that are behind that truth." Evil and stupidity turn out to be the same thing. Are we lost or are we pretending we’re lost to hide the fact that we feel so lost and don’t know what to do about it, or do we think we’re lost because we’re unconsciously afraid to face the fact that we’re so completely and hopelessly lost we don’t even realize we’re lost because we don’t know the world outside the center of the forest exists? Or…?
We would do better by withdrawing and dropping the money from planes.
Empire = $$$$$$$$, slavery or death.
... except for the top people health club farm
The international oligarchy contests the spoils of imperialist wars. If American New World Order oligarchs don't glom these resources, others will.
Direct democracy
Here's my dilemma, maybe it's yours too.
One the one hand I think, this is insanity. The global elite are playing games that cost lives. Why can't the sheeple wake up to what's happening?!
On the other hand I think, geez people are such sheeple, they don't even know when something will benefit them, they continue to act against their own best interests. (And I'm not just thinking of the teabaggers of the world.)
Could it be possible that global resources are in fact nearly gone, that global climate change is worse than we thought, and therefore the global elite, however crazy it looks to those of us who don't have access to "the whole picture", are in fact acting in a way that will eventually benefit the world?
I know it's crazy, and maybe I've been watching the movie 2012 too much. But honestly, when I look around I see people, good hearted wonderful people maybe, but people who literally can't form a coherent thought, couldn't reason themselves out of a paper bag. Let's put it this way, and I know this sounds elitist, but I'd put the human civilizations IQ at about 60. Over time it'll climb but that's where we seem to be at right now. Would YOU trust an individual with an IQ of 60 to fully take care of themselves in a city rampant with danger? I wouldn't.
And then again like I said, maybe I just watch too many end of the world movies.
Kane Jeeves asks: "Could it be possible that...the global elite, however crazy it looks to those of us who don't have access to "the whole picture", are in fact acting in a way that will eventually benefit the world?"
Is it possible Jeffery Dahmer was actually trying to help the victims he tortured to death and ate?
Ok, funny response, how cute. Now how about a thoughtful one. And believe me, I didn't mean my post to be rhetorical, like some troll. Just asking for some serious discussion around the point.
Two problems I see with your hypothesis. First, it is ahistorical. There is plenty of evidence not only of how power elites act but how they got to where they are. Second, there has been a systematic "dumbing down" of the citizenry. Even if we assume the dumbing down is simply the result of social forces, it is clearly encouraged by corporate/consumer institutions, for example the US Chamber of Commerce and Advertising Council, not to mention the whole mainstream/media political culture.
I'm afraid it's as bad as it seems.
Mr. Koehler concludes with:
" In how many spots on the planet does dominant political power represent anything but itself, in tandem with the worst of our instincts, our fear and our rage?"
First, this describes the Mars rules ethos I often rail against.
Second, given the truth of its premise, how then do we use the word WE to define U.S. foreign policy? If a majority is not behind what's underway, why is the word WE attached to suggest a consensus (or compliance) where there is none?
And lastly, that 911 thing... Serious writers, at the least, should mention that there was never a fair investigation done; and therefore the perpetrators must be regarded merely as alleged masterminds, given the dearth of evidence.
How many young people vote?
How many care?
How many read this kind of article to know what's going on?
How many think their future depends on politics and that political awareness is necessary?
With an average of 8 hours a day in front of TV, computer, on cell phones or video games (a world record !) how much time is devoted to culture and civics.
At least 1 h/day should be devoted to history and current events' analysis (not TV distortion of facts in 2 min segments)
" We’re lost because our actions churn up problems infinitely worse than the ones we set out to solve. We’re lost because we are so morally compromised we have to keep piling on more of the same — more troops, more missiles, more carnage — in order to avoid facing our consciences."
And this same logic applies to our economic system as well only it's--- more bailouts, more austerity, more debt--- in order to avoid facing our consequences. The only difference is that our economic chickens are coming home to roost with more immediacy than will these catastrophic military ones.
The US is like a pusher, now that you need things that we have to offer (think weapons), what do you have that we might want (think all your resources), just sign here and we have you forever (think be there forever).
Lest Koehler's message be lost, and with it any flicker of hope, we - you and I - need to shine a spotlight on the Strategic Partnership Declaration before it is signed.
Empire: "A Political-Unit having an extensive Territory, or comprising a number of Territories, or Nations, and Ruled by a single Supreme Authority."
Colony: "A Region politically controlled by a distant Country; a Dependency."
Imperial: "Ruling over extensive Territories, or over Colonies, or Dependencies; Imperial Nations."