Disappeared News

World History Unfolding II

by Johan Galtung, 7 Feb 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service

From West Maui, Hawai’i

What a week! And we have no idea how many weeks are ahead of us!! We only know that the process cannot be reversed, and we can watch on CNN+ one reason why.

That lack of understanding, picking the wrong discourses.  Nobody will deny that political repressions into the grotesque and economic distortion causing great misery are basic.  But the autocrats unmasked are also puppets at work, which should attract attention to the puppeteering in the USA and Israel.

Israel, evidently in total panic at the structure they believed to be relatively solid, based on Camp David “peace” treaty and a peace “process” is more honest.  Their concerns, from the supply of gas from Egypt, via deep concerns whether a new Egypt will “cooperate” keeping Gaza isolated, blocking the tunnels, via asking the USA to see to it that the peace treaty will remain intact, to offering Omar Suleiman, the notorious vice president (of vices indeed!) of Egypt, head of the secret services since 1993 (the mukhabarat), from 1995 organizing the torture of the victims of rendition by the US, services to keep Egypt stable.  To raising the question of a possible reoccupation of Sinai to secure the “southern front” (of Israel, the newly appointed head of the Israel “defense” forces being a northern front specialist).  To question fundamentals of the Israel construction: see Ha’aretz.

In the meantime the USA is playing who knows what game or double triple games, maybe pushing Obama up front for his favorite “change” rhetoric, slowly indicating that Mubarak’s expertise may be needed for the transition.  In the meantime probably cooperating with Israel, see all of the above.

Evidently they were all taken by surprise.  So were the media, and the public at large.  Two empires at work: a world empire peaking in Washington and a regional in Jerusalem.  How can anybody be surprised that there could be some resistance and not only in the shape of “terrorist” action?

Answer: because imperialism does not enter as analytical category.  Question: why?  Answer: because it is a complex category, with economic, political and cultural elements backed up by military action, establishing a center in the Periphery countries, rewarding them well with Camp David bribery money, turning the eye when they loot their own people, demanding political loyalty in return, exporting their culture under such labels as modernity and democracy, always ready to send the marines when needed, sending the CIA-Mossad sharks before that, as warning.  4-5 brain cells are needed.

Instead of having a closer look at this holistic construction evaluating its fragility when exposed to inevitable counter-forces (always a part of holism that dialectic perspective), they resort to some kind of intellectual infantilism, focusing on minor factors in the chain of events, like the social media–facebook, twitter or internet in general and “the Al Jazeera factor”–as if people have not been able to make revolts like the American, the French and the Russian by word of mouth and chains of communication before that. But holism-dialectics is not at home in US intellectualism, they probably smack of New Age and marxism for those who have heard those words, and not of, say, the Chinese cultural comparative advantage over the West with its aristotelianism-cartesianism and deductive pyramids, theories (of course, a good formula would be both-and, and more). Hence they will only make piecemeal changes before the whole thing collapses, including sending the marines.

This is written on Superbowl Day 2011, in Dallas, Texas, where snowfall–obviously terrorist–is threatening the stadium and that sacred time and place.  Maybe the USA should focus on such events rather than messing up the lives of so many countries and peoples.  They do it well and take great pleasure doing so, like they manage the life of the rich and the super-rich in West Maui, for instance.

But instead of that, President Obama’s State of the Union speech had competition on very traditional lines as its theme.  Why not focus on improving the USA, competing with itself, winning over yesterday, yesteryear, September 2008 with a deeper analysis and practice?   Competition in education, research and infrastructure–the point is not to beat other countries on these three.  The point in a democracy would be to serve the people.  There will be no improvement in education anyhow with idiotizing TV being the major guide to the world–admittedly now with the better part of the Internet as a competitor.  How can a child learn with parents focused on TV, and no books available?  How can there be real re-search, opening new perspectives, when so much is in the service of today’s business?  Is the point about infra-structure to have faster trains than others?–looks like the USA now wants to join that game, or to open all kinds of facilities including access to land for alternative, more cooperative ways of running the basic economy, the economy serving the basic needs of the most needy?  Healthcare for instance, that dense network of polyclinics equipped for the most common diseases of the highest possible number of with generic medicines–not waiting for the prices to go even further up when the health insurance reform makes the government pay?

Harping on old imperial themes, no deep cuts for the military, no gun control, will not help.  Nor will closing one’s eyes to reality. Nor, indeed, using too few brain cells at the same time.

The USA is deeply challenged.  We hope for a deeper response.

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Permalink posted by Larry @ 2/06/2011 03:47:00 PM