spooky sense by garfucius

teflon obama?.. garfucius is coming back!..

2009-08-26T13:56:00.003+03:00

hussein obama seems to be the democratic latter day version of a teflon president. it seems to me after two thirds of a year, he is less capable of doing things right than letting right things drop in the right spots by themselves.

still three and change years ahead but i wager he's gonna be re-elected only if the reps do a "kerry" on him; i.e., return the favor democrats did to dubya in '04 by nominating an obvious loser. republicans should come up with a bu-lin from somewhere, combining he best of bush & palin.

hussein makes a great media magnet but where world affairs are concerned, clinton's billy still looks like the real ringer... i mean hillary clinton's of course...

see, it's taking time but...

garfucius is coming back!

yo! ho! and beware... garfucius is coming back!

2009-08-23T13:22:00.002+03:00

garfucius is ready too shake the dust off the soles of his feet and return to the trek and the quest... to spread the virtues of outrageousness.

for instance... have you noticed how similar the political functions of imam ghazali and kung-fu-tzu (better known as confucius) have been?

soon on this blog!..

coincidence? or the wisdom of folly?

2009-01-31T13:34:00.003+02:00

while turkey is engrossed in a heated and obnoxious debate over tayyib efendi's davos walkout on pres. shimon peres and how diplomatically unbecoming and philistine (1) his behavior is - though also endearing touncouth, sycophantic, aggrieved and outraged hordes of losers; i came accross an article by prof. alexander nazaryan (2) about how wine could be a resource in classical times to help moot suchpubliic and potentially embarrassing outbursts as from both pres. peres andp.m. tayyib efendi.

nazaryan writes, according to james davidson (3) in the wealthier households of athens (4), "men of stature" would engage in lively debate, as bowls of wine were "dispensed under the careful watch of a symposiarch (a sort of strict toastmaster)... " as depicted in plato’s “symposium” where socrates and his friends, "still hung over from the previous night’s carousing, decide on an evening of light drinking". temperance pays off: in the ensuing discussion, they summon an overarching vision of love that has endured in the western imagination for more than two millennia" (5).

but then, as the japanese say, no rules in love or war...

enter alkibiadis in the symposium, young and handsome. he "drunkenly tries to cozy up to the older socrates", with "no patience for his prurient come-ons and intimations". alkibiadis was eventually subdued; only to be pursued by a group of boozy revelers bursting in. then “there was noise everywhere, and everyone started drinking in no particular order,” grumps a plaintive plato, the voice of moderation. according to the philosopher, the party ended unceremoniously because thus the "love of drink overpowered love of truth". so much for the platonic version of "in vino veritas"...

however, maybe "alithea" (6) is less in what wine does (or in plato's pro-temperance case, does not) makes us say than in what it makes us do: for, thus spake homeros through odysseus of ithaka :

(wine) sets the wisest man to sing at the top of his lungs,
laugh like a fool – it drives the man to dancing…it even
tempts him to blurt out stories better never told.

nazaryan, referring to the immortal e. r. (eric robertson but he always used his initials only) dodds remarks "for the greeks, a measure of irrationality in the dionyssiac form of wine drinking checked the (absolute) rule of reason".

garfucius tends to differ slightly: if you are a child or an amante of the aegean, you realize how rationality is but a mere method to maintain sanity over the beauty proceeding from that sea and the life she nurtures. one has to experience the urge to dissolve in, maybe sacrifice one's soul and being to her eternal light and glamor, in order to comprehend what a burden sanity is in tthe face of sheer, unadulterated beauty... how it arises from that consuming passion the aegean instills in her lovers and bestows you with the persona, so you can act upon her stage... wine is not fluvial in that manner; it is the vessel, the holy grail, from which through sense and ratio, you may drink the joy that defines the life that is her, and keeps you floating on a ship like odysseus the unwary explorer - that ship is called rationality and it won't sail with sobriety.

that is why, "in vino, veritas", as is wisdom in folly.

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(1) no need to intend a pun, it is there...
(2) "the tipsy hero", nyt, january 30, 2009. i do not know if mr. nazaryan is a professor at some college but i use the title in its generic sense, as teacher.
(3) courtesans & fishcakes: the consuming passions of classical athens
(4) probably no less in ephesus or bergamon or korinthos either...
(5) love is dual natured, it is both ephemeral and eternal andd therefore a bridge between those two worlds - just as is philosophy. for the purposes of this post, so is wine...
(6) truth

hussein's 100 hours

2009-01-25T18:34:00.002+02:00

it is an american custom to cut a president some slack in the first 100 days of office before judging him too harshly.

with barack hussein obama though, it seems it took less than 100 hours in the oval office to establish himself an image as a decent leader for the u.s. and the world. even the israeli cease- fire in gaza and subsequent troop withdrawals, although with no direct and overt prompting on the part of obama's administation, apparently is written to his credit. his resolute closure of gitmo (2), determined atttempts to grapple the economic slump, even the spectacular inauguration party have evidently endeared him to a larger public than merely his contituents.

obama is not a landslide victor. he won a clear but not so overwhelming election majority. still, the confidence vested in him was spared even from bill clinton (1). the world practically expects hussein to set everything awry right again, as if he wields a magic wand. and the way he started, it is almost as if he does and he can.

as a matter of fact, if he plays it right, most "problems" plaguing america on a global scale require not much more than good leadership initiative, based mainly on good ideas that can render mutual beneficiarism a fine option. in other cases, that carrot just has to be tied to a stick "big" enough to allow for "soft speaking"; i.e., leadership with a firm hand that is not miserly when tipping. it is a fact that eight years of dubya cost too much in terms of american credibility and authority that must be restored. yet, hussein's first 100 hours have been encouraging and promising for the initiatory steps he can take in almost any direction, in the first 100 days.

probably since fdr, no president has had to carry such a load as obama, where every move he makes can affect the fate of all people in the world. at least he looks like he is light on his feet, if weighed down by the burden.

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(1) even in pre-monica times!
(2) instant leaked stories that released gitmo detainees flock with al kaida are an active indicator that obama's move is right. if the comings and goings to that ghost organization were really monitored so vigorously, those who join it should already have joined the ranks of ghosts or at least turncoats. the smell in the first 100 hours may thus raise the spectre of the hope that the paranoia clique in washington may be losing its grip on shaping reality.

if might makes right...

2009-01-20T17:32:00.003+02:00

there is a comment on the post "gaza and the evil of choice" below.

the comment by mr. khazen calls to mind a few issues that i should rather clarify: first, i do not believe in "terrorism". acts that are construed by political pundits as terrorism are either one form or another of war or acts that constitute a crime, a felony. the two rather meld, actually, for war in itself is the biggest and wholesale crime... albeit, without a punishment to speak of (1).

if the premise in any situation, case, problem, dilemma whatever is that "might makes right" and battle is the way to might, every phenomenon has to be judged by that criterion.

the kernel of "might", though, lies beyond a mere physical (military, diplomacy, police, arsenal, intelligence, etc.) strength to coerce. might is also an abstract capacity to influence outcomes by influencing the way people feel, think, live and experience the world - science is might. art is might. aesthetics is might. a deliciou cuisisne is might. a beautiful woman is might. anything that expands and enriches the possible field of human experience, what existential/phenomenologist jargon records as "noemasis" is might.

israel is a legitimate political entity. in terms of "pure", muscular might, israel is right. it has won three all-out wars against arab powers that at least on paper, were incomparably stronger. it has waged another and longer war against the belligerency of the plo and yassir arafat. it has successfully maneuvered to devoid the philistines of the support of arabs through clever usage of diplomatic opportunities (2). when the going got rough, it was usually the israeli forces that came on top from clashes, even beirut in 2007 is scantly classifiable as a definitive defeat.

israel has committed atrocious acts during these wars but the effect of those crimes have largely evaporated inside the greater crime, the war - not because people are vilely pro-israel but because a stupid interpretation of history accords a totally unreasonable dose of totally undeserved legitimacy to war.

the philistines, on the other hand, have constantly lost in the battlefields. they also have committed atrocious deeds which are an inevitable, even natural collateral of war. they have also committed atrocious deeds which are not any inevitable or natural collateral of war against uninvolved parties. therefore, their atrocities are remembered as "philistine terrorism". that made pariahs of the philistines for decades, not because they were constant losers, not because their diplomacy was incompetent (3) but because the philistines and their supporters failed to convince the world of their non-violent might since, if anything, they had too little to contribute to the welfare and well being of humanity in general.

to every arab novelist, at least a hundred jews prevail; to each doctor, maybe thousands, same for artists, rocket physicists, playwrites, captains, football players, orchestra conductors etc.,
etc.

and humor. the israeli and jews in general are quite capable of turning self mockery into universal comedy - which is an extension of an ability to be critically introspective. not much in that department can be said in praise of arabs or more generally, muslims either.

to sum, israel won all the military battles - and possibly the war, too-; it also gained a place in people's minds that accords them the land they live on. whether it is promised or not is a moot debate, it is a land that they won. so go the spoils of war.

similarly, the world recognized the philistines' right to their own land and state and did a lot to pressure israel to acknowledge that right, as well.

with hamas, though, they decided to gamble on that gain and lost again. first, they lost their unity, now their credibility. except the obvious suspects, even those most critical of israel hardly utter a word in support of hamas (4). to it goes none of the sympathy extended to victims.

personally, i am adamantly anti-hamas and anti-iran. that does not make me particularly pro-israeli. but given the choice between a philosophy represented by the former of venerating death and destruction and by israel of a life far more worth enjoying; i cast my ballot along with a world that is capable of thinking as well as feeling.

my heart, too, goes to the innocent, the helpless, the destitute of gaza and their misery. however, my sympathy can achieve too little; too deep are the roots of hate and loathing that allows hamas and its likes their bloody playgrounds, for even a chimerical philistine victory to obliterate.

that leaves me one option: to reason. and i do not believe that my line of reasoning is faultier than that of hamas and its supporters, who still have nothing to advocate but war and seek victory in the havoc they have caused their fellow philistines.

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(1) sort of makes "war crimes" an oxymoron, right? the best that humanity, even in "modern" times, could come up was blame atrocities on vanquished commanders; thus but adding to the false legitimacy of the original and generic atrocity.
(2) israel's main tactical failure so far, is allowing the philistines to divide between fatah and hamas, allowing the latter a margin of legitimacy in the region's affairs as iran's lackey.
(3) the sole arab diplomatic victory is the 1973 oil embargo which only backfired and in essence, the embargo was another form of sable rattling. as a matter of fact, any political progress the arabian side has made since 1967 is the consequence of western and essentially american initiatives to resolve the middle east issue.
(4) one rare and vocal advocate of hamas, turkey's premier tayyib efendi seems to have lost considerable sympathy at home and abroad and is likely to face america's cold shoulder in upcoming political or financial deals.

qou vadimus?

2009-01-16T13:43:00.002+02:00

(please read or browse through the precedent post as well)

some obvious points that nevertheless might require a little belaboring:

* the arab and muslim world has reached a bifurcation. theirs is no longer an expedient choice between the warring cliques of philistines. the arab and muslim world now has to choose between israel, no less, and the militant factions/states that currently rally behind hamas [or hizbullah, or islamic jihad or al kaida (1) at some time or other]. the real choice lies deeper than that, of course. israel is the representative of modernity.

* there is no way the divide of philistines will heal in the near future. the abbasi half will receive more of what is getting, while gaza will be allowed to sink back into poverty and misery, less because of israel than that it suits hamas better. after cease-fire, there will be a flood of relief material into the strip, which hamas and its administering officers will usurp, abuse, waste or steal; leaving the populace sick and hungry again.

* the divide among arabs is not transitory. in another age, say, the late 20th century, it could have been manipulated into an all-out armed confrontation among the cliques, similar to iraq's invasion of kuwait, that would result in even more effective subjugation to the west, of the sort saudi arabia has gone under after kuwait. no such threat today although that does not mean unity, concord and consent are closer to the arab world.

* the arab divide is mainly representative of the position the sides adopt vis-a-vis modernity and its outcasts. the "moderate" arab-muslim world has managed to progress (regress?) into more wealth and less modernity (2) in the last half decade, thanks to dubious dubya on his way out. so, they can hardly be an essential component or a deciding agent in the modern camp they must adhere to. there, of course, is no likelihood of throwing their stock in with hamas alias iran. in all cases iran is too great a threat and all their viable assets are invested in the west anyway. furthermore, oil is not drinkable or edible. you have to sell it if it is to do any good..

* as a corollary, do not put much stock in qatar's gambit to adopt a role as slightly pro-hamas-because-it-is-from-palestine spokesman in the middle east. it is adversely influenced by iran's proximity and dubai's rise to prominence without even any oil to speak of. it has to tread carefully. tit comes to tat, qatar has to cling to the west, no choice!

* for that matter, algerian and libyan support for hamas is more rhetoric than brawn. negligible.

* as can be expected, syria still is the forerunning advocate of the hamas - irani position (if you discount tayyib efendi, rosy and co., who, supposedly in the name of islamic solidarity are a step short of declaring war on israel!..). with iran's fortunes down though, and syria the only nation in the world whose wealth is stagnant for decades, bashar assad can be said to be mainly blowing smoke. once the clouds clear and he can maintain a face saving defiance, he will again welcome talks with israel.

* even among the so called militant arabs, there will never be a common position that goes beyond rhetorical condemnation of israel and unavailing international moves, say in the u.n. whatever resolution or joint declaration comes forth will simply re-chew the 40-odd year old spiel against israeli occupation. the doha arab summit and similar future meetings are and will be to an extent, to blow some wind off iran's sails after all.

* the non-modern moderate arabs are not necessarily anti-modern. so once dubya goes out and hussein obama begins to wring them into a more malleable shape, they will have to issue political changes and buy their place into some modern fora. they will also have to finance palestine into a moderate existence, until israeli favors to the zone can be accepted and open up a chance of coexistence again. keep in mind though, that is solely at the discretion of israel.

* soon, before or around hussein's 21 january inauguration, there will be cease fire. israel will not of course, have been able to eradicate all origins of paramilitary action against it but is likely to have established some channels of control for the aftermath of its occupation. the military ends will have to be at least 80 percent realized before truce if the incursion is to serve any goal.

* now laugh if you will but "true" relief to gaza can only be managed effectively and at least partly supplied by israel. it should be remembered how israeli jobs helped feed palestine for years until the epidemic of human bombs began. israel has the largest stake in a fairly satisfied gaza public, more in providing their satisfaction right now. however, to do that with hamas entrenched there is impossible. gazai philistines are therefore doomed to more suffering in the hands (also because) of their leaders.

* negotiations will begin. israel's main concern is the militant arabs' and iran's rejection of its right to existence. even if the anti-israeli authorities of hamas etc. officially concede that, militant outlaw bands they feed and support will not fold in. in that case, israel will seek other guarantees from other sources.

* israel has to and probably will ensure the cooperation of some moderate arabs with clout, at least of egypt in guaranteeing its borders and security against hamas and the like. for instance, the gaza border will have to be policed by egypt against contraband likely to be used against israel. obama's currently rampant popularity will help that.

* the sad fact is that hamas has no real case to argue at the time except dead children. heart breaking as it is, that position will practically be a matter of the past as soon as negotiations open. sooner or later, it will be forced to accept the major conditions israel advances, not without open or secret pressure from its newly vocal allies as qatar for example. however, a pacifistic and passive hamas is a dead duck. it will be disrobed even of its rhetoric of "murdered children and bereaved mothers". worse, the funds channeled to it for buying arms will not be flowing as generously for food and medicine. the people of gaza will be taken care of by the west, instead. hamas will either escalate its aggressive discourse and "terrorist" acts or fade away.

* unless the iranians are so fond of stoning women who are supposed to be adulteresses and therefore vote in mahmoud ahmadinajad again, expect changes in that direction after dubya.

* whatever happens, a deep gash will separate the modern world from its fringes, both physicallly and mentally. even turkey, closest in all aspects to the west, has already forfeited its chance of joining the eu prefering to harp on its islamic orientations, for instance. the arabs will be kept proximal but happy enough (2).

* time has come for the world to change speech habits as well. the politically correct will have to fade and give way to harsh realities exchanged in feverish but non-violent communication. tolerance that grew rank with indifference is likely to alter a course toward productive clash to reach better consensus and taking responsibility for the other. and that might be the only way to bridge the m odern - non modern gap.

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(1) just as a reminder, the attack on the twin towers on 9-11 was popularly celebrated in many arab countries as a victory over sionists and their allies. governments quickly banned such festivities for fear of worsening their world image and relations with washington. however, the number of newborn boys named osama exploded. if that is not public support for al kaida...
(2) which is not synonymous with owning or being able to afford most expensive modern toys, gadgets and weaponry or even modern factories, as is the custom in the middle east.
(3) more to come on this.

gaza and the evil of choice

2009-01-15T12:48:00.005+02:00

we are probably about to enter the last week of "true" fighting, re israel's incursion into the gaza strip. some observations:

* there is no war in human history where civilian casualties are nil. therefore, there cannot be a humane war, whether you sign agreements in geneva or go sailing in genoa.

* life is not fair or humane either. what we call fair, just, legitimate, legal, moral etc. are all constructs that proceed from covenants that somehow enable the species to live together. otherwise, the homo sapiens sapiens is even more savage toward its own than coyotes or sharks or any creature for that matter, with the exception in very exceptional situations, of rats.

* a fair, humane, just life is not a prerogative of being born a neonate of the homo sapiens. it is a privilege accorded to the individual who conforms to certain and ceritified standards of genetics and behavior we usually refer as "culture". such privilege has been extended to the greatest number of homo sapiens only in two stages of history:

1- the very mythical "golden age" that adorns every folklore from hellas to scandia. the tale is that, once heroism ruled and everyone was happy. then, heroes took over and of course, gold turned to lead.

2- the so-called age of modernity, that i (in the wake of a group of historians) believe, emerged first in the hellenic lands of antiquity and re-sprouted some five centuries ago in europe to encompass other eurogenic cultures as well. modernity, simply, is the proportional logic of mathematics applied to all covenants of collective living. the modern covenant is basically described (1) by choice, freedoms, equality, competition, merit and the rule of law. privileges are shaved off and staved off. the individual, every individual can become the master of his fate - should he so choose - and free to act as he wills within the covenant (2).

thus, equality of all before the law affords the individual a chance to establish a fair, just, equitable collective ambience for life. despite its monotonous, impassionate, impartial objectivity that is mortally impersonal; modernity, then, becomes the privilege for the individuals that benefit from it - but only to the extent the individual can become the custodian of modern privileges and also the guardian of his "rights". thereby, the demos becomes the ruling force if not the agent. modernity is impossible without democracy.

* more important, democracy is not possible without a demos, i.e., a population sufficiently aware of its rights and their universality, i.e., applicability to everyone.

* in that light, the "war" in gaza is not a skirmish between the israeli and philistines any longer.
it is a clash representing a 500 year conflict between the modern and the non or anti modern. whatever heinous fate happens to the befall poor, innocent children of gaza, and other "uninvolved" civilians, they are the "collateral damage" in a battle that is cleaving a peremptory gash among known forms of social existence, or covenants.

* the immediate sides in this last battle are children whose parents can ask why and demand remedies if their children are murdered by foreign or friendly fire, on one hand. on the other are children whose fathers obey some ulterior authority that thrives on the bodies of children; and whose mothers perforce, obey their fathers.

* if the statement above sounds too harsh, some food for thought: why do tv cameras keep showing pictures of devastated children (and women) dug from under the rubble and next to them, yelling and frolicking and politicking men (i.e., males) who seem to be digging them out but do not have a speck of dust on their clothes? sort of makes one wonder if there were no room for the poor kids in the obviously safe shelters those men were hiding while the bombs fell?

* the human animal (as many others) is wired for compassion and empathy in order to survive. therefore, our hearts bleed for the children and other (presumed) innocents of gaza. yet, conscience is only a failsafe biological instrument for social adaptation that functions as a last resort, at the kill point. boncultural species (3) are generally capable of developing behavioral patterns and communication systems that check them from pushing animosities to the kill point, where members of the tribe are threatened with death. therefore, our hearts should have bled before, when it was still possible to prevent israel from jumping into gaza. for instance, when hamas bombs were beating ashkelon?.. they should have already bled when the notoriously brutal and bloody hamas was opted as the power to rule palestine. instead, we opted to hide behind that westphalian fallacy of "respect for sovereignty"; a.k.a., "let the snake that won't bite me devour its own offspring". hamas was elected as a savior (sic.) to replace the corrupt, evil, partisan and incompetent governments of the "charismatic hero" yasir arafat (and his more incompetent successor abbas) that coule secure no advantages for the philistines at least since 1988-1989. or else, they should start bleeding when idiots all over the world expected hamas to achieve anything other than what it was always doing; the same atrocities that prompted israel to bomb and enter gaza. if they did not bear leaving the children of gaza to the mercy of dubya the dubious who declared ariel "the butcher" sharon "a man of peace", our hearts should be bleeding when ehud barak fell into the grave arafat dug for him and help the hero of philistines forfend bill clinton's peace initiative on his valedictory days as president. and our bleeding hearts should keep in mind that these represent only a few of the occasions when something could be done to save palestine's kids from the bombs before they even fell. yes, the human animal is wired for compassion and empathy but conscience comes second to and complements intelligence. and intelligence demands solutions against bombs at times of peace, not when children are being torn to shreds while they are being used as human shields and propaganda fodder by their "fathers". it must be remembered that the "modern" covenant is superior only because the parties to it, i.e., the demos, i.e., every individual benefiting from it, has the right and the duty to inquire how that covenant is put into practice.

* unfortunately, the situation in palestine has reached such a fulcrum that any move by the "modern" collective, universal (at least global) mind can do little to encompass all its suffering children. hamas has made sure that the divide it has engineered severes at least one part of the philistines from a modern future in the foreseeable time. whatever relief may be "awarded" will befall those arabs and philistines that side up with the modern world, although they have scantly any chance of becoming a part of it.

* let me repeat: once one is on the war path, there is no good any more. all is evil. whatever the cause, there can simply be no "just" war; it is a bankruptcy of reason. at that point, the equation is simplistically simple: live or die... unless one is holding that balance in his hand, there can be no pretense of sympathizing or empathizing with either side. what we do, with our bleeding or flapping hearts, is to vest our own interests and ideas behind a pseudo-philosophical ideological position and watch. watch like we are do the super bowl, the world cup finale, k-1 championship or the formula-1. only, there is blood in this game. we watch like latter day romans ogling gladiators who tear each other apart.
and we turn our heads to avoid the coup de fin, after turning our thumbs down.

* and today, please note that, as we are watching israel trying to beat the crap out of hamas, we are also watching the world divide between two worlds: one that uses and nourishes israel as its spearhead, bound to seek peace for its own security and prosperity, albeit only by the logic of its self-centered and egoistic modern covenant... and that for which violence is a main solution to problems at any level, from the personal and familial to the political and international... a world of societies that can be distinguished by their budgets which allot far more resources for defense and weapons and political abuse than education, health and justice combined. societies that rally de-individualized hordes currently supporting hamas as part of their own jihad.

* a "miracle" occurred last week in iran, the primary supporter of hamas of the gaza philistines, whose dead children we have been mourning vicariously for three weeks: an "adulteress" (?!?) condemned to death by stoning, wriggled herself free of the whole-in-the-ground she was buried in. she was then "pardoned", according to the islamic sharia. two more of her fellow women were hardly as lucky. they died in pain and terror. oh, yes, the violently anti-modern mullahcracy of iran administers a dose of drugs to lessen the convict's suffering during the stoning - for "humane" considerations.

* as for stoning itself, it is obviously the most "public" of executions. unlike the cruel rituals of the needle in the u.s., even the beheadings in saudia, which are done by specialized persons or crews, in "rajm" or stoning, the executioner is the public (4). can you imaginne yourself administering the death of one of your neighbors?

* the hamas understanding of justice and law and politics, decided by a thwarted interpretation of religious dogma that mainly serves to feed existent unshakeable power structures throughout the society, corresponds almost exactly with that in iran.

* true, hamas's sins should not justify the death of children. not even when they are used as shields and propaganda fodder by their fathers!.. but unless that sick, macabre, death-oriented mentality is brought down, to allow life-for-all to flourish -maybe-, the fathers' sins are likely to visit on their children... no matter how many or how profusely our hearts may bleed for them.

* obviously, we are forced to taking sides in an antinomy where all choices are determined by evil. it is no longer a question of "which or what is more (or less) evil"; because that way of looking at phenomena inadvertently introduces some ground to argue by some sick logic the justice of war, which is moot by its nature. the antinomy here is the-all-evil-choice of which evil can lead to more good eventually. whether being so expedient (or rough-hewn reasonable) with matters literally of life and death agrees with our bleeding hearts, i am afraid, will be the determinant of how longer they will go on bleeding.

* so please, be true to your selves. be sincere to your minds and intellect as well as your feelings and compassion; they seldom are contradictory in essence. put all your values, beliefs, wishes, interests, concerns etc. before you. and choose your side. let your hearts bleed but just let your hearts be guided by your intellect, if you really are intent on stopping all the bleeding.

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(1) note the verb of choice please, not "determine" even "define". modernity, as a perfectly dialectical historical event, evolves with its perceived opposites but still is the mainstay of social existence. as every covenant, mathematics has its innate contradictions. the great philosopher - mathematician kurt gödel has excellently undermined its foundations only to re-assess and re-assert its supremacy as a tool for thought and tool of thought. same goes for modernity. its power is less in its absolute truth but its flexibility to devoid its truth of thorns without deviating from its fundamental (mathematical) principles of functioning. whereas in other forms of thinking and organization, such principles, whenever and if they exist outside dogmas, are ever subject to whim and are rather decidious by nature.
(2) living within the covenant does not necesarily mean in obedience or even acquiescence of it, except that every human act is relegated to its content relevant to the covenant.
(3) the accepted term for species that can form effective complex social organizations dependent on certain norms and communicatioon patterns is "eucultural", part greek, part latin. since i have a personal aversion to the inter-lingual bastardization of terms, i have latinized it totally.
(4) there may be some irony in this: rajm is originallly a jewish mode of execution, so is the custom of making adultery a capital crime. needless to say, no jewish society practices it. neither do christians, after jesus said "let who is sinless throw the first stone".

seven points of wisdom (re the palestine situation)

2009-01-07T12:47:00.003+02:00

fact one: israel will not back off from its offensive before george "dubya" bush is out of the white house, bar an almost impossible capitulation from hamas.
fact two: hamas is virtually dead.
true, it is pictured as a victimized hero of the philistines under israeli fire but it already fell far short of hezbollah of lebanon in representing and protecting the interests of its cohorts and backers. unlike hezbollah, hamas only won the elections because the fatah clique was unbearably incompetent and corrupt and simply unbearable. however, little changed for the better in gaza since, except hamas got more despotic.
fact three: a divided palestine can stand no chance at all and it is divided beyond repair as long as hamas has any mandate at all, in or out of gaza. philistines are tarnished with that third world bane that bans them from seeking their interests in confrontation and conflict, rather than competition.
fact four: a true, i.e., effective and workable reunion of philistines is less likely than an accomodation between palestinians (1) and israel. fatahi palestine has nothing to offer the gazai - whereas, once the hamas mentality is suppressed, as it can not be eradicated, plenty of jobs and means of livelihood are likely to be available within israel; a far more effective promise and cure than the dubious yields of incessant intra-philistine politicking and bickering.
fact five: reading all accounts of so called "israeli atrocities against gaza's civilians", in most cases if not in each case, some hunted philistine can be discerned hiding among his family members, under a wife's skirts or a baby's crib - more often than not, using that location as a "trench" to fight against israeli soldiers, therefore practically "inviting" havoc on those beside him. according to hamas ideology, that constitutes "martyrdom". civilians are not ttrained or experienced in guerilla warfare, therefore, they are expendable as propaganda material in order to promote the anti-sionist cause.
fact six: currently, civilian philistine casualties, especially the children, are fodder for the hamas propaganda machine but not for long in all probability. the outlook and rationale of hamas spokesmen toward the rockets they deliberately fire on israeli territories where no military targets exist, is that they have killed "so few civilians", while israeli forces destroy wholesale. in the hamas weltanschauung, human life is valued only by numbers and is problematic only after so many deaths occur.
as passions subside and some logic begins to rear its ugly head in the way people of the world concieve the events in gaza, the utterly vile psychosis revealed in the hamas view is bound to be recognized, turning the psychological and emotional tide, if not toward israel, away from the palestinians, condemning them to further isolation and destituiton.
hamas claims that the last episode of war and violence in gaza was caused not by their indiscriminate rocket fire on israeli civilians but by "israeli occupation". assuming that to be right, the occupation of 1967 was the result of a spectacular israeli victory at the end of a war that lasted only six days, which was started by a united arab front that overwhelmingly outnumbered jewish forces. the "occupation" was the consequence of a response in self defense and gaza itself was "won" from egypt in the six-days-war. the same applies if hamas, true to its absurd philosophy that israel's existence should be terminated, is refering to the 1948 war.
fact seven: this is the last chance for israel to pave the way to some form of permanent peace. not only does its own weal is dependent on it, but also continued disruption between it and any form of islamic political entities will reverberate through the entire eurasian region.
in this war, israel is the "frontiersman", the pioneer, the vanguard in the clash between modern civilization and non-modern or counter-modern political (2) systems; or under pain of over-simplification; between cultures that venerate life and cultures of death and opiates - from opium derivatives to religious fanaticism. since all-out combat, a readiness and willingness to die and kill are weapons true to the latter, it will not suffice for israel to vanquish hamas in combat.
the real enemy is the poverty, the backwardness, the suffering, the wretchedness that has plagued philistines in the last century.
and it has to be israel's ultimate target, endeavor and mission to overcome that scourge of its primary neighbors. the best defense force against hamas is not the rather capable israeli army but palestinians looking forward to a feasible future of welfare, peace and harmony.

-----
(*) i say palestinians because it is now practically impossible to speak of a "palestinian authority", if it ever existed outside the personal charisma of the late yasir arafat
(***) i use "political" in reference to the helenic polis, signifying any and all aspects of social life therein.

e for an i

2008-12-19T13:45:00.002+02:00

my dear american fellows, or my dear fellows in america.

now that barrack hussein is priming for the top job, he declared setting as priority extricating the troops from ıraq and concentrating on settling afghanistan first.

this requires, more than any military measure, some kind of political solution that inevitably has to be based on some cultural interaction, communication and understanding with the iraqi - even if the so-logical-that-seems-to-be-inevitable-tripartition-of-iraq becomes actual.

unfortunately, my dear fellows are long in the armaments division but two decades after the initial clash and after a half decade of invasion, still seem alarmingly and pathetically short in understanding and accomodating the iraqi mind and culture.

eventual conciliation can come less from (attempted) subjugation than reaching out and establishing a conjunction of interests.

my dear fellows in america, including those in the media industries and holywood, could do something very simple and easy, in respect to getting accross to iraq (which, incidentally, means far and hard to reach) and the iraqi.

they can stop pronouncing iraq as eye-rock, which in some dialects at least, can associate with not-so-nice words, from what i hear.

the local and correct anglicized pronounciation of iraq would be "e-rock". and with far little emphasis on the "e" - closer to something like 'rock than e-mail for instance.

believe me fellows, you do not have to delve or dive, it pays even if you merely try to peek into the culture of a country you are foreign to, much less one whose soil you have occupied.

believe me fellows, i learnt that from watching the hatred garnered by the "ugly american" fat cat tourists of the 60's, who demanded shopkeepers this side of the atlantic "how much is that in real money?"

not hard is it? an i for an e for sympathy? might also even get you some sweet mint tea on the side...

crisis? but whose crisis? not harley davidson's, surely...

2008-10-23T11:08:00.004+03:00

the american economic system is geared to suck even the smallest savings back into its mill through its articulate and complex arrangements of the banking and finance sector. it relies on obtaining cheap money from the populce by way of bankers, which then is invested in supposedly lucrative enterprises.

unlike europe, where a tradition of landlording is historical and historic heritage, there are few opportunitiies for the american moneyed and rich classes to roll in luxury on a rentiér model of what financiers term "pure profit". you cannot buy a flat on park avenue for instance, let it to someone and laze around in malibu squandering the rent away. taxes, costs, overheads, over- burdens etc. will leave you poorer than a pauper.

if you are a beach bum type like me, the only way you can beat the system is invest enough capital in the securities and exchanges market to get you by and to cross your fingers hoping it will not come down crashing with all your debauchery and dreams too - in the 1987 "crisis", which indeed was an earthquake in the american finance system that served to funnel capital toward the cheaper labor markets of asia, an ex-executive on an easy circumnavigation with his wife had to return stateside to get a well paying job for a couple years, so he would not have to sell their yacht (then moored in bodrum) because all their savings had gone gown the drain. well, the quirks and snags of "impure" profit. a french rentiér would be much less shaken.

since americans could not rationally buy houses or other real estate in order to draw an easy income from, realty turned into a field of speculation in the heydays of finacier-ism of the 90's and early 21st century - as opposed to the monetarism of the 80s and early 90s. houses, etc. construction is usually profitable, it launders money well and real estate is truly the rarest good available, so there is always a profit margin that cyclically becomes exaggerated.

thus, buying and selling real estate made money, even with mortgages, i.e., money that is only on paper. the loose finances anchored to america's inbound economy with limited profit margins grabbed the milkier mortgage system like a bonanza, instead of seeking outlets within the universal global market.

real estate and mortgage practically operated on the same level of "money that was not there, virtual money" (1). money that produced some inverted form of pure profit that was denied to the much more honest and controllable endeavor of landlordship.

now that the whole mortgage dream-system is dead, papers report, the demand for skilled labor has already increased - since the last year of bill clinton or thereabouts, unskilled, cheap workers were in demand, signifying the plight of real, unproductive, uncompetitive, un-global american economy.

production economy is back, or waiting to make a come-back, even in america.

since the current "crisis" was a composite result of a failing and unyieldy inbound, introvert "national" economy, talking for the future of production in america should mean a more competitive american presence in the world, as opposed to a more domineering and bullying old fashioned hegemon in military fatigues.

look where harley davidson have come in the last five years or so... from a slumberous style and technology belonging in mid-20th century that caused the legendary machines to be called "hardly-ableson", to once more a world wide magnet for motorcycle freaks (2).

so this is not really a crisis for harley. it is still "crisis? what crisis?" for enterprises and sectors and businesses and what not that can behave as universally as harley did.

and now that the "crisis" blew up the money on paper, we're talking real money. american savings will now most likely go to banks and finance markets that have the world as their playing field. as a very large, indeed, the largest part of that world, american economy will ingest a good deal of such savings made at home and elsewhere, perhaps even in turkey. international, trans-border mergers and a de-nationalization of the most volatile, versatile and fluent element of economics, "capital" will have to dictate a new world order, too, where the nation state, if it wants a say in things will also somehow de-nationalize.

in question is a new world order that dubya and his cohorts could not and will not understand. luckily for america and the entire globe, with mccain on an apparent slide -thanks a lot to sarah palin - the republican anachronism seems to be fading in both its present and promised forms. a couple more weeks and hussein barack obama, it seems, will ascend the world's political throne.

he is lucky... he comes forward at a turn where things, unless clipped by some sick and parochial mentality typified in the dubya regime, have only up as a way to go
(3).

--------
(1) if what we were taught in macro economics is true, there can be no "money that is noot there" (money used here to signify general resources that may be converted into capital). economy does not tolerate any hiatus and simply fills it in. as it turns out, the states, the bane and brunt of the capitalist system, had the funds and were sleeping on them! however, since they need it to finance wars, armies and a huge bureaucratic apparatus ever ready to cook even further ills, the seeming hiatus may still be filled also by elements even worse than governments, like those headquartered in medellin or the afghan-pakistan border.
(2) present company begs to be excluded... i still favor italian élan and styling and bmw engineering, although my previous "wouldn't be caught dead riding a hardly-ableson" attitude is now of the past... i appreciate and welcome the transformation of harley and hope it is a harbinger of other american industries and services - which will have to turn global in ownership, too.
(3) that's why i supported hillary and would love to see a clinton in the coming democratic administration. once this stage is passed, any flaws in the foundations-in-the-laying of the renovated world-system can only lead to more devastating tremors in its structure. a world-weary, street-savvy u.s. administration would become a blessinng for the world. joe biden is simply not up to standard and hussein is too green behind the ears. i only hope his passing over hillary was not the sum of a petty grudge left over from the campaigns.

crisis? what crisis?

2008-10-11T13:12:00.005+03:00

the world is in a dire financial crisis that, according to some experts at least, threatens to turn economic. well, thanks to that crisis, we, the general public and a not-so-few number of specialists now at last have remembered, if not realized that "financial" and "economic" may be mutually inclusive but not identical.

crisis? big deal! it is a fact established since karl marx that capitalism thrives on crises. immanuel wallerstein, the late andre gunder frank, their crony giovanni arrighi and many others have been harping on how crises alter economic events and structures for no less than 40 years. each crisis, which they summarily define as a (set of) condition(s) that disrupt(s) the balance of capitalist socio-economic structures, forcing them to transform in order to adapt and self-sustain.

the crash of 1929 ended with state-wide economies integrated more or less on national levels, only to serve the inter-nationalization of capitalism as a worldwide system in the post war era. in 1970, the system came of age, as the dollar-gold parity was abandoned. meantime, the accumulated wealth was more generously spread to the consumer classes. the effects of the 1973 oil embargo and subsequent waves of inflation necessitated and hastened an end to keynesian economics. in the 1980s, monetarism operated more or less to unite a world economy about a financial orbit, calling to favor two hitherto secret gods of capitalism, productivity and competitivity. hence, the crisis of the late 80s, with which (if i were an economist, i would claim because of which) the soviet, or rather the state-as-economy system collapsed irrecoverably.
the world economy became more consolidated and associated around capitalist mechanisms than ever.

smaller scale crises continued on a course toward globalization as capitalist production on the trail of profit through productivity and competitivity, discovered the new slave labor throves of the pacific rim and eventually, chindia. the market crashes of 1987 and 1997 ended up with the supremacy and preponderance of a finance-economy that triggered world scale production and consumption.

money was freed! regardless of what nation-state printed it, money became a world citizen. the most fluid element of economics, money, was now globalized as nothing previous.

capitalism, which had ever had to suffer from state apparati since its emergence, was now clearing itself of national bounds, too although that could cause significant suffering for "national" economies. finance determined the fate of the world economy and economies in general.

money made money. and when money made money,it also made money not in evidence. so, everyone got rich. at least, on paper.

when capitalism was more dependent on goods production rather than financing its (re?)productive system, it nevertheless needed to be territorially based, locally established, supported, sometimes protected, even defended against physical outside attacks. the states provided that "service" for a "fee"; i.e., prospering national economies or political élites, depending on how a specific country was run. always, however, a politicallly conducive balance was always struck between the power wielded by the bureaucratic-apparatus and captains of economy.

how public welfare extended to lower classes developing into consumers was also a function of that balance. whereas increased welfare returned almost automatically to the system by way of consumer spending, the state meddling with or in the economy in any form could often become a bothersome, profligate burden; frittering away good resources in a bottomless pit of counter-productive political priorities.

it was this margin of license and power of the state/bureaucracy that enjoyed some influence on political-economy that prompted the structuralist marxists of the 1980s, louis althusser, nikos poulantzas, étienne balibar etc. to propose a "relative autonomy of the state from the ruling (capitalist) classes".

actually, that autonomy was always there. all states in the world are at best, relics from eras where the power vested in them was exclusive to only a few. by definition, if a state exists at all, it has a form of power in reserve that is exclusive only to those who run it. just look what the federal government of dubya's u.s.a. came up with from its deeper recesses to reppress the citizen with, in the name of fighting "terrorism".

neither do nation states belong as powers in global capitalist economy. america is the largest single source of global economical activity, with its huge armory of floating capital, technology, enterpreneurship, knowledge and expertize, etc... its global presence outweighs any rivals. still, in the words of investment analyst and entrepreneur dr. marc faber, "the rebate the federal government issues to beat the crisis can only be kept at home if it is spent on prostitutes and beer, since these are the only products still produced in u.s.".

despite the innegligible accuracy of this economic gallows humor, still, in this age of globalization, even globality, two thirds of american economy is basically national: its processes and methods are introverted, inbound. it is comparatively unproductive and uncompetitive in the markets the world over.

it is true that the said two third almost equals to the total output of the rest of the world and represents extreme power - however, it is powerful only stateside and compared to its true "global" potential, parochial in nature and mentality.

when money started making money, naturally, the largest economy in the world offering the highest profit potential attracted the biggest share of the real and "virtual" profits. naturally, the wealth not only spread around, through consumption and savings, it returned to the money market and boosted its profits.
few other fields of investment in the "real" economy were as inviting, since speculation always pays high dividends if it pays at all, and the finance market was swollen to twice its actual capacity with speculative money that was not there...

real estate emerged as a favorite area of speculation for the virtual economy of the virtual money market. to the small consumer with little money, buying realty with mortgages felt good, both as a means of economic security and because he thought he could finally realize his dreams. real estate was also a quick money maker for the virtual "investor". however, profitable as it may be, real estate is hardly "real" productive enterprise. in the old days, money allotted to realty and land development was dubbed "placement" rather than investment; because it returned little to the economy except some speculative "swollen" money.

then again, a house in malibu or palm beach is hardly a globally competitive item on the market, beyond a certain limit. and however exproportionately its price may be blown, the baloon bursts when the global forces of a world economy summon limited resources to hard core, economic activity on a global scale, where the key to survival is competitiveness.

so this crisis is likely to end up mainly as a potential disaster for two categories of players in the worldwide theater of economy: all non-global, un-competitive, backward, inbound, introverted economies, including the local or transnational finance sectors that vested fortunes in them; and states that count on such economies in order to retain their nationally-defined political interest structures and boundaries may be expected to bear the vrunt and maybe fold - iceland provides a fine example.

this is a crisis that, in order to end without the world bursting somehow in flames, has to establish the few but essential rules of capitalism universally: free flow of resources, rationalization of capital and production activity, no or very limited government regulation coupled with relentless control of compliance with principles, unhampered competition, supported by a universally valid democracy - not only in the home grounds of capitalism but anywhere that is part of the world market. after all, freedom and democracy have costs of their own, which bids unfair competition, should "countries" in chindia not also pay them as most have so far eluded.

a lot depends on how the huge dinosaurs in america will or can respond to the challenge of globalization, as far as global welfare and prosperity are concerned. if all the resources the government allocates for them are spent to restructure the existing system; that is money down the drain. if even half of the colossal home-oriented american economy can turn globally efficient with that infusion, the world cannot help but become collectively richer.

possible? yes but difficult. expect plenty of mergers and acquisitions. plan on the concentration of capital to be invested in production-efficient high technology in goods and services to be marketed worldwide. could you imagine chrysler and gm becoming one firm in the 80s? expect to hear more american brands putting their stamps on universally available products as also euro-american collaboration spirals upward. expect chindia (especially the number one slave labor economy of the cosmos, china) to slow down and watch them get immersed in their "aggravating" internal political problems - then, not so soon but in due time, see how their "citizens" arise as a new middle class of consumers with liberal demands.

also see states losing their "national" billions and sinking their authority in their effort to save "national" savings in the internationally owned, terribly globalized greedy banking sector.

wait for new supra-national forms of organization within which "the nation state" hopes to prolong its current mode of existence. bow to the sarkkozys and merkels and berlusconis of this world -thank god dubya is outbound- and especially gordons, whose incompetence and intransigence simply caused recent crises to deepen.

oh, and oil... watch as russia pretends to bare its teeth and gnarl as its petrol revenues surge and slump beyond its control. check how it has to spend petrodollars for political adventures that turn out to be minor repetitioons of the afghan disaster. wonder why those adventures unfailingly end up dealing the "west" the better hand. laugh as chavez makes more of a clown of himself as the best example of his kind, the nationalist charlatan, getting certainly not himself but his nation poorer.

then say your prayer for the poor, because poverty is not one globally viable commodity and in the global economics, as jesus of nazareth said "shall be taken from he who hath not and be given to he who hath".

put on the 'tramp album and listen to "crsis? what crisis?". there is still fun in life.

not necessarily so sweet somethings

2008-09-10T23:52:00.001+03:00

wait, and time is what is not coming.

sense and you are what is there.

if there is nothing at all,

what are you waiting for?

for, what is there to come to?

a counter-comment on irishness

2008-07-13T10:30:00.003+03:00

just a short counter comment to nilus below:

naturally, we don't know each other. so, let me make my position clear - i am definitely an irish lover!.. especially where the the english (as opposing pole) are concerned. an enigma of history and geograpphy for me is, what in the sake of a full pint of guiness, a thoroughly mediterranean people are doing in a cold northern sea - albeit, in one of its hotter spots... to boot, with (alas!) the english as neighbors? must be a big sin they are atoning for from another cosmos!

anyway, nilus rightly points out to the fact that relinquishing sovereignty needs to be voted for by those who supposedly hold it in their hands.

do i recall any referenda when € 40 billion were channeled into ireland in the last decade - which amounts to an influx of over € 10 thousand per capita, including infants and toddlers as well as our lads and lasses?

i read a very wise observation somewhere once long ago; i think it was ross mcdonald, the detective thrilller writer who said "money is never free... like every commodity, it has to be paid for".

ireland simply refused to pay for the money it got.

you don't call that brutus, you can call it only freeloading. freeloading something that is never free. often, the biller comes back to chip off its dues from what you call your sovereignty.

believe me, i knoow from experience...

irish crap

2008-06-21T13:11:00.003+03:00

the irish are known for their ability to create a problem to every solution. probably, that is why, for years, they kept killing each other over a silly (seemingly) sectarian difference.

now they managed to screw up the by-pass to france's egoistical and egotisitical and ethnocentric rejection of the eu constitution a few years back and clipped the lisbon deal, sealing the unity of the continent...

in other words, they have gone and defacated into the tank where the drinking water accumulates. crapulent with what equals as cause to malt whiskey and warm beer in cases of collective national mass dementia, they took a mephitic crap into europe's surge as the world's sole civilized power, armed with logic and wisdom, instead of various armories to be used either to kill and maim or to threaten.

look who championed ireland's great victory over the union of europe: a businessman that has made a fortune over trade with the u.s., whose competitive advantages might not stand an opening up of the european market.

sound familiar? look at the french farmers, italian fanientes, greek freeloaders, turkish football hooligans, danish and other trade unionists - everyone who thrives, and usuallly thrives for free, as long as the "national" economies are defended by "national boundaries" takes a political crap oon the union. in other words, economies where various sectors of the society suck like leeches on the rest, and productive units that have achieved some global level of competitivity are the defenders of strong(er)national entities against the eu (*). of course, ever leading them, is great britain, her majesty's governments' usual all-time global blooodsucking, imperial opportunism.

now, the political off-shoot, ireland that owes no less to the union than greece for becoming a country to reckon with, stabs it in the back like brutus.

add to that the political parasites who suck on the national state, that long-obsolete instrument of power and usurpation, elevated and propagated as semi-sacred, solely because it is the parochial classes' means of distributing as well as obtaining kudos off the backs of the productive and efficient classes.

is it a coincidence that all hard-line, hard-core nationalists all over the world are also the most dedicated to erect and protect walls around their borders agains the onslaught of globality? for instance, are not the anti-abortion irish catholics among the most militant anti-europeans? or turkey's semi edentulated and de-clawed grey wolves?

notice also the tone of the american journals openly or secretly gloating over the blow the european project was dealt by ireland's rejection of lisbon treaty? especially those publications that promote and watch over american economic interests like hawks?

i always believed that britain and ireland should be kept out of the european union; their "isolationist" island mentality will never ever let them integrate properly with the actually and historically boundariless continent. problem: in practice, they cannot be kicked out and unless the lisbon deal passes through, they cannot really opt out either.

------
(*) the eurocrats, the not-reallly-or-probably-so-necessary-evil in the european machinery is also probably to blame for the aversion it causes, turning into the bigger brother of the continent. ironically though, the rejection(s) of lisbon will empower them more for they are the onnes who eventually will work out a functioning constitution encompassing all.

oil prices down

2008-06-06T16:54:00.004+03:00

i wrote the following post on may 28 and published it in the wrong blog. i noticed my mistake today, after i read that suv owners in america are now hard pressed to sell their dear vehicles...

you see? oil is a commodity, whose fate has to be decided by the economy, as all other commodities. other silly measures -except finding alternative, renewable energy sources-, like war or political intervention, for instance, only help make its prices more un-economical!

here is the post:

***
weeelll... mesdames et monsieurs, i ain't no economist and i sure ain't no finance genius, if any genius at all. i only got eyes to see and a mind to think... i've been busting my chops yelling "oil is a commodity, its price can't keep going only up and up. anytyhing, including war, that causes its price to over-boost is a waste because unless you can drink it, prices go down again when nobody buys it" (*)...

just after america's first major holiday weekend, memorial day, per barrel oil prices fell below $127, furthering a decline borne on a growing sense that record-high costs have cut demand for gasoline and other fuels. ap says americans are driving less because of "bloated prices", while a report informs that compared to last year, vehicle miles on u.s. roads fell by 4.3 percent (11 billion miles). the dollar's gain against the yen and euro also helped reduce oil prices because investments undertaken as a hedge against inflation did not favor oil, although conjonctural opportunities such as a temporary drop in world production could have been tempting.

the best (also the worst) thing about capitalism is that, its virtues and vices tend to balance each other at the expense of those with no power to decide, rather than the virtuous or the vile, who mostly are the same anyway.

so please, think again before you claim that the u.s. is in iraq for any reason but political stupidity, and certainly not for oil. blood in petroleum makes it too expensive to be competitive.

competitiveness? in case you forgot, it is as much a genuine key to capitalism as free enterprise, private property and functioning civil liberties.

-----------
(*) permit me a little gloating please. i am one of the few that have harped on the intellectual hazards of oil fetishism in global political-economy analyses.

democracy without democrats? balooooooney!..

2008-06-06T15:50:00.003+03:00

tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co. are in deep, murky waters now, emitting a sewery smell.

they had it coming, they knew they had it coming, at least, they should know it would be coming and therefore they deserve to drown.

look at the old posts by garfucius - the short mental and intellectual capacity, the ethnocentricism and almost autistic assumptions of self righteousness, the revanchist looting of the state bureaucracy and the misuse of the power embedded there, half-bottom faith in democracy, and the obstinate - because repeatedly proven disastrous - conviction that a majority of the popular vote is licence for near-tyrannical arbitrariness.

on the day the turkish court of constitution banned the turban, women's head gear that has become a symbol of religiously tinted or tainted political sympathies, some papers carried the story of two teenagers in love, who were harassed, attacked, mauled by the citizens of sakarya; and arrested, no less, by the police for nothing else than embracing each other in public.

good thing they were not stoned to death!

let's face it. in 2002, tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co. won because there was no alternative that offered a promise. in 2007, they came back with a handsome majority mainly because they still had no alternative, except the archaic policitical dementia the republicans and the nationalists spewed forth. so, in one aspect at least, the popularity of the akp is less due to its own preferability than the comparative repulsiveness of the others.

add to that the success stories and elegies sung about tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co...

their accomplishments in politics (passing more liberal laws, the eu packages etc.), economics (lower inflation, more world-oriented approaches etc.) or elsewhere (taking steps to reduce bureaucracy, etc.) were invariably guided, if not chart plotted, by the european union, u.s. advisors and the imf. where success is concerned, tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co. were only as successful as the airline pilot who flew the aircraft perfectly as long as it was on auto, and headed to a deadly crash as soon as he began flying manually.

as of 2005, tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co. did scant few, if anything, to be put down in their favor. especiallly since last year's elections, the bearing turned further downward, while an intolerant, partisan view of all affairs in all walks of society, pervaded every niche of life - as witnessed by the incident of the almost-lynched-teenagers.

so much for a democracy championed by non-democrats. and so much for a democracy without democrats.

regarding the future of turkey, it is not an issue of whether the constitutional court's decision is legal, fair and right or whether the turban decision is the harbinger of akp's eventual closure. the problem is that the court has had to try a political party, is likely to come up with a ruling closing it down that just might not feel right; and that the party in the judges' sights is not really innocent either, at least for an equal population to that which has invested its faith in it.

the problem is that, nothing seems right and everything seems wrong.

and for the same reason: still, as in 2002, there is not an inkling of a political resistance to tayyib efendi, rosy-rosary and co., to lead them in a direction where at least some semblance of right can be extracted for the two divided masses currently hiding behind their particular wrongs.

effective resistance to the political authority is exclusively limited to the military and the judiciary whose exclusive domain of power, it should be doubted, may be growing smaller.

the people of turkey voted the 1982 constitution in by 92 percent, and have been wearing it like a noose around their necks since.

the question is, offered the same draft, how many today would not vote for it again? a few generations after 1982, turkey's democracy is hostage to a political system that can only survive as long as it raises as few democrats as possible.

big, blasphemous words with philosopher's testimony

2008-06-05T18:48:00.002+03:00

philogeny and ontogeny cross evolutionary paths at the point of ennui – it is boredom with all status quo that gives rise to all bon-cultural ventures and exciting mutations. as friedrich nietzche said: "only the most acute and active animals are capable of boredom. a theme for a great poet would be god’s boredom on the seventh day of creation."

blasphemic breezes

2008-06-05T18:45:00.001+03:00

enigma is the best inspiration to souls in search of a faith. because they believe themselves to have found, most faithful are boring.

more blasphemy

2008-06-05T18:42:00.000+03:00

the greatest prophet on earth can give men no more than a watchword. and the comedy is that, the vaguer the watchword, the greater is the prophet!

garfucius's blasphemous ideas

2008-06-05T18:40:00.000+03:00

the homily “one picture is worth a thousand words”, denotes, at best, a gross inability to abstract from the eidetic.

exiles at home

2008-05-26T15:38:00.003+03:00

how many times did you wake up to find someone beside you, whom you wanted to awaken, too?

it is easy to live solitude, hard to know it. and when silence becomes a shout, it is because it could not whisper to you, or because you could not hear it when it did!

i and my generation are the losers in a war we were never old enough to fight. most of our lives was spent in preparation for it; yet, just when we were about ready, we had to explain to ourselves, why we ought to fight it, why war should be the way to the ends we were taught were universally ours.

we either religiously took to the old teachings; or as religiously rejected them and more religiously sought new ones. the most confused amongst us, we made disbelief our cause. we diebelieved so piously, we evaporated existentially; so that it may not be fair to speak of us with the pronoun we or they.

we lost.

ours was a generation audacious enough to question all values taken for granted - and sometimes, even to re-define them, which needed far more courage. we turned love into an experience instead of an utopia or lust. "democracy" finds a meaning now, because young women were burning their bras in the late 60s. freedom became a palpable word because it was a title in jimi hendrix's first posthumous album. even when our motives were not always honest and pure, we honestly chased the truth. we wanted to know. we re-wrote the rules of knowledge.

why, then, though we seemed to be so right, did we lose? maybe, because we questioned, also, the meaning(s) and the value of winning? how many success stories between 50 and 60 today are really proud of whom they have turned out to be, in comparison to whom they hoped to become? how many of this generation recognize anything in today's world, of the world they once thought possible?

we lost, not because we went wrong, took the wrong turn, twist, road, fall, whatever into the world we denied. we lost because at that point, our loss felt certain. it was the only certainty that hit us and facing certainty, we stopped doubting denying. we stopped asking questions and the wind dropped out of our kites. one by one, we started to accept; so that gradually, each of us caved in (*).

that makes us the only generation in modern history, left with nothing to truly believe in. that is why too many fanatics, in every walk from politics, to business, to religion emerged from "our" ranks: because action is the fool's way of convincing himself what he is doing is right!

exiles at home! wherever we are, we are home... but home is nowhere!

if one believes in fighting, one need not believe in what he fights for. we fought without that belief. we were probably the only generation that saw the futility in fighting for fighting's sake.

we believed in peace... but without the ability to find a novel way to learn and teach it. in our ignorance, we made the fatal mistake. we took to the ways we had already diagnosed as wrong at the beginning: fighting and preaching, thus shoving truths down ours and everyone's throats.

the victors always take something of the vanquished. i do not know who the victors were in our case. our war was, at least we believed, for everyone. so, when we lost, our opponents did, too. i think, instead of taking something from us, whomever vanquished us left something with us: their fight, against which we had waged our war.

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(*) i still remember the day i first heard pink floyd's dark side of the moon (1973), their greatest chart success and the feeling of betrayal that pervaded all my senses. every note and nuance was full of answers instead of questions. it was as if one moon i sailed by had really turned all and forever dark.

reading a global coffee cup

2008-05-13T12:40:00.003+03:00

i keep writing (and preaching in classes) that in modern capitalism, oil is but another commodity; but an input in the production process. production without consumption is not only no profit, it is simply loss, so prices of products/commodities have to be regulated by the market, not on a government table.

oil wars are (and can be) waged only and only if the cost of war, blended with the cost of oil that is procured by means of that war is not prohibitive for the functioning of the cycle of production-consumption -profit-reproduction. in proper capitalism, the only indispensability is profit that preferably occurs in the far more controllable and predictable ambiance of freedoms and competition. therefore, no component of the whole production-consumption-profit-reproduction cycle, financing, raw materials etc., even oil can be allowed to take hostage the whole process. according to many authors, though, oil, especially when used as a political leverage by otherwise politically ineffectual world players, tends to upset economic balances.

hence:

a) oil needs to be replaced by other forms of energy. major oil companies and energy giants are already investing billions of dollars on alternative sources that are replenishable and also environmentally sound. a breakthrough is imminent (*).

b) the bulk of oil revenues from petroleum exporting countries are either politically squandered (mostly, if the government is anti-western and anti-u.s.) or invested in western businesses by oil sheikhs etc. this means that a drop in the popular consumption of oil is far more of an economical risk for producers than its prices falling. you cannot fetch a price for something that is virtually worthless.

c) by the same token, too expensive oil also means too expensive everything. it means people will simply consume less of everything and the whole global economic scheme will simply shrink, along with profits. in that case, those with only oil to sell, will suffer far more losses than the rest as they will have more need and less money for things that make their world go round.

c) in the shorter run (j. maynard keynes said "in the long run, we're all dead", anyway), panic boosts in per barrel prices of oil, are not impossible. many industries and economies are going to be affected and perhaps sink as a result. however, just like in practice, the recent mortgage crisis mainly helped weed out the uncompetitive, unyieldy volume of credits in the global (especially american) market, possible per-barrel-crises too, will eventually strengthen the structure of capitalist world economy; and subjugate the technologically less advanced and backward raw-material-vendors. countries and societies that tend to act like badly managed business enterprises and those who fail to manage the transition to competitiveness, will end up poorer or bankrupt. if they are oil exporters only, they will have even less of a control over their global fate.

d) those fallen powers will produce the rogue states of tomorrow.

this is a short read from the globe's coffee cup. for now though, stains do not waft the sweet smell of fresh coffee but the rank odor of crude.

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(*) i find no reason to succumb to the conspiracy theory that feasible alternatives are already developed but kept secret because economies are too geared to fossil fuel consumption. the world's primary energy is electric and it can be produced from many alternative sources without disrupting the petrol based industries though cutting oil prices down to logical levels.

china miracle and capitalism's levels of survival

2008-05-13T12:11:00.003+03:00

i never got to write much here about china, except hint occasionally that i do not succumb to the view that we are witnessing a chinese miracle. as a matter of fact, the official slave industry that is china, has already begun suffering from monkey wrenches breaking its basically foreign installed and managed economic machinery: labor intense production is not efficient and costs are rising as bankruptcies mount. manifacture is escaping town, to even more backward alleys as vietnam, maybe now after the deluge, to myanmar which the brits still call bhurma! (*)

that is capitalism for you... dickensian labor exploitiation of the 19th century turned slant-eye in the 21st... only to the limit it cannot be permitted any more to disrupt the overall (global, if you like) balance of the entire market by sapping free enterprise and competition. yes, capitalism thrives also on all the freedoms that make it function, all of which china lacks.

it is those freedoms that regulate the end-profit margins in the market. no jobless european or american is interested in buying cheap asian goods, not because of any philosophical or national or racil cause but simply because economics dictates that a jobless man cannot afford to buy too many things. therefore, like water in different elevations, capitalism seeks its own levels of survival.

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(*) hurray for the brits! i hate this postmodernist pseudo-anticolonialist, quasi- postcolonialist maneouver of changing country names to pretend "identity" and independence. all ex-colonies today are even more dependent on former conquerors, plus, almost all have also to kowtow to the u.s. on top of former sahibs. change of name is too facile for a change of fate, as minds and technics of ex-colonies are still dominated by rules of slavery. ditto, i also hate the campaign to change turkey's official international name to türkiye, for the reason that it reflects a colony mentality. it is also rude and impolite: the excuse for the proposed switch is that turkey is the english name of a bird and therefore, insulting to turks. the same bird, is called hindi in turkish, which means "indian"! yet, i fail to come accross any campaign in turkey to change its name to anything from hindi, which indians may equally percieve as debasing. typical to the colony mentality, neither such eymological knowledge, nor such sensitivity is expressed by the extremely touchy türkiye campaigners.

about comments

2008-05-13T11:43:00.002+03:00

i mostly publish any "sensible" comments that arrive to the blog. since deciding what is sensible inevitably involves some sort of censorship, i try to be as "tolerant" as possible. however, many of the recent ones i rejected were either pure gibberish, promising salvation when marduk hits the world, or had more expletives in them than explanation, or were simply "commercially" motivated.

i hesitated over whether i should publish or reject the comment from modern sanat ortamı declaring hillary as a horny mad dog and obama as a puppet with a cat's paw. i let it run...

i let it run because the comment reflects the parochial, introverted, potentially xenophobic and negationist philosophy typical of a) ex-leftists in underdeveloped societies; b) ex-misfits who now misfit their role as misfits.

there is a world out there that we once wanted to change and if at all, we could only do so fractionally. maybe we were wrong, maybe the people in the world we wanted to change who did not want the change were right.

whatever, people did not want change. people do not want change now either.

it simply means that whomever set off to change (at least some part of) the world have failed to offer a realistic possibility that a) they could or can; and b) the resultant world would or will be better.

therefore, cursing hillary or hussein will not make a difference.

***

metin commented that both democrat and republican candidates were from the legislative, with little executive accomplishment to their names. he is right...

he is right and that is why i supported hillary, because unofficially, she has been part of the executive in both arkansas and the white house as first lady. you do not even have to be (or have been) married to understand how a clever and ambitious woman can grasp and influence her man's occupation. and hillary is both clever and ambitious enough to garner some know how from bill's terms in office, which hussein lacks.

it may still be a close call but unless america is going mad, this will be a democrats' election - although senator mccain is certainly an improvement over dubya (no big deal, almost anybody would be).

we have an airborne spaceship that has run amok called the world, all we need is a minimally talented captain to land her back down on a tolerable course. i, personally at least, have no miraces left to expect.

there is a time to give up

2008-05-07T19:19:00.003+03:00

there is a time to give up... not to quit but to realize and admit enough is enough. it is now time for hillary to concede that she has lost the primaries to barack hussein and negotiate the possibilities of hitting the ballot box together, this time, she as candidate vice president.

the race went on as i expected, with almost every state that is linked to the world booting for hillary, while those americans who think detroit is still the center of the universe, supported hussein. it still remains a fact that, despite all his charm and persuasive campaigning at home, generally speaking, hussein is no less ignorant than dubya in conceptualizing, diagnozing and visualizing solutions to global affairs.

if it were at all possible to revert america to the yesteryears of isolationism, barrack hussein obama might have become a really good president. in today's world, obama is only as competitive as gaz guzzling chevrolet of the 50s, weighing three tons!

that is why hillary has to back down before all bridges between the rivals are cast off. from this point on, she has a responsibility to the entire world in cleaning as best the mess the u.s. has created under dubya, as it is a huge gamble to bet on hussein's capacity to manage such a gargantuan task. since hillary cannot become president, she has to play second fiddle to a president who may win the hearts of grass roots americans to all his liking while has few tricks to stimulate the minds of a weary world awaiting and hoping for at least what bill clinton once had to offer. the world is hardly concerned with what he did in the oral office, it has been suffering from clumsier versions thanks to bush's political performance in the last eight years.