Taking Sides

I had a great conversation with a friend the other day that focused on many things, but one of them was the foreign policies of the Obama administration and his predecessors. I  have discussed this subject on this blog before, but there are many subjects which have gone uncovered. This is also related to many of the subjects discussed by the new Zeitgeist movie which I will discuss after this post, and to the last post on Islamism and Egypt which I wrote last week.

If you have not had a chance to watch this video from my last post, please do, it may help to elucidate the arguments which follow. Or it may be better to watch it after reading this piece. Either way, take 20 minutes out of your day and watch it (caution to those with reaction to moderate to strong images of violence and some language)--

http://www.vbs.tv/watch/vbs-news/vbs-news-presents-taliban-in-pakistan-full-length

So, if only because the subject continues to come up, in the face of what is going on in Egypt and what has been going on in Afghanistan for almost 10 years, I thought it might be useful to some readers to see a short essay I put together (loosely as un-blog-related work), and then revised, responding to a famous piece by Wendell Berry written shortly after 9/11. I very much encourage you to take some time out and read Berry's somewhat brief article before continuing on to the rest of this piece. Mine is not remotely brief.


http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/214/



For those of you just skimming or ignoring- again, not recommended- let's go over what Berry is talking about really quick. Wendell Berry's essay delves into 2 principle points.

First, referring to our (the world's) international economic interactions, based on a Western Capitalist model,  he discusses the argument that our global system of free trade, built upon the growth of prosperity (which is) dependent upon the permanence of technological innovation, frantic consumption, and world marketing of the system, and the presence of global security to ensure it... is unsustainable. Dangerous even, for it favors growth over all other things, including people, especially those in countries which are forced to grow (sure, pun intended) dependent upon this system.

Berry points out that this global system is a breeding ground for inequality on an international and local scale because nations tend to support their own self interest regardless of the expense to other nations since there is little incentive in our world trade system for a nation, corporation, or individual to restrain greedy hands backed by raw power. Of course this "power" I refer to is the hard power (military) that sometimes must accompany soft power negotiations across the world; it is the reason we have a vast network of bases across the world-- to safeguard the "peace" of the global system of trade.


With me so far?

This argument is augmented by Berry's second point, mainly that such a global system can and should be confronted with an alternative. This alternative, to Berry, is Peaceableness, and it follows in the footsteps of the great non-violent, compassionate, compromising, and educated leaders of our time. Peaceableness starts with sustainability and information/education, demands restraint, and aspires to a higher moral calling. This goes beyond overarching policy considerations to Berry, and is reliant on an essential transformation of attitudes that penetrates down to the communal and individual level.


Ok, here is the commentary.


Regarding the first section- and I would argue that Berry is saying this, but not explicitly enough- it would have been really helpful if Berry had pointed more clearly to the link between the free-trade system that we enforce across the world- encumbering other cultures different from our own with a liberalism for which they had not prepared themselves nor necessarily requested- and the attacks upon our country on 9/11.

When I use "liberalism", (and now we wander somewhat questionably into the territory of Neoliberalism, but this represents too much to examine here) I mean two different philosophies in the "Western" sense, first (hereafter considered philosophy 1) referring to attitudes of Laissez-Faire economics and protection of persons with regard to their rights to property, and second (philosophy 2) to domestic and international movements for equal treatment under respective laws for differing social groups, classes, races, sexes, genders, etc, ostensibly for the purpose of allowing all humans to have the capacity to have access to the first philosophy. In a word, both of these perspectives are concerned with what we call "freedom" but perhaps "individualism" is a better fit-- ironically the first philosophy, using overtures of the second, seems to create foreign policies which end up looking very much like subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle Social Darwinism, which often runs contrary to substantial progress for the second philosophy. But now we are too far into the finer points.

It seems inconceivable that other peoples might reject our version of social progress- liberalism as described above-, but a progress forced upon any people is at serious risk for being one much maligned. It is not unlikely that given time all peoples may yet come upon some version of the same "progress" we have attained, meaning economic and social opportunity for all people. Let me give an example.

For a long time we have used the Taliban's treatment of women in Afghanistan as a specific reason why we must not allow them to come back into power, that is if the charges of supporting Al-Qaeda don't do it for you. We may decry the Taliban for it's treatment of women, but will installing a government that protects women's rights change the hearts and minds of the people? Is it impossible that allowing them to come to the same realization on their own may be better? Or worse, that their culture is not wrong for being different?

May I pause here for some additional potentially (though by no means intentionally) inflammatory dialogue?

I say the following things in good faith, making a comparison which is probably unfair, but I beleive helps to explain my point to an American audience; please be patient.

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Before you shake your head at this relativism that I am positing, consider some of the implications of, say, desegregation in our own country. Especially in the South, but in many parts of this country, Blacks were in a terrible position, oppressed, poor, and with little voice a century after the abolition of slavery. Some in America suggested that without the government intervening and forcing desegregation, nothing could be done about equality. But nothing happened; those in power did not act, fearing repercussions from an equally fearful electorate. Then, over the course of a decade and more, the groundswell that represented the many facets of the Civil Rights struggle forced the hand of authorities, and the desegregation process began. It was only after Americans forced themselves to come face to face with the racism in the country, that change began to occur, and this self realization was done largely at the grassroots level, not otherwise imposed. Some may argue that we should have stepped in sooner to stop such an oppression, and if the federal government had acted to impose these rules, it would have ended Black suffering sooner. But I think it took waiting for Americans to realize it themselves, for it to, unfortunately, get almost to the breaking point that allowed public opinion to go strongly for civil rights, that prevented even more very serious violence or even a race war. Because much of Black suffering was/is from the institutions, and those institutions are made up of people- change the institution all you want, and the people may never change their minds, or even act out against being forced, but allow social pressure to change the people's minds? And suddenly overt racism of the kind 50 years ago is virtually extinguished in this country. In my opinion it is also why the changes have lasted, without a strong backlash.



Let us suppose another example.  There is a school district in the rural Deep South which now must integrate by federal order. Is it better to force them to desegregate, or is it better to let them watch the rest of the nation shame them into not falling "behind the times"? Some will argue that without the federal order, the school will never desegregate, and that the federal order forces the change to occur faster and just as authentically. My essential argument, and yes this does come from my own observations about the world, and some relativism, is that the school district will decide to desegregate on its own over time, when the people who elect such a board realize what social, financial, infrastructural, moral, and associational benefits they are missing out on by continuing its policies. It is slower, and possibly involves more suffering (although in the long run this is up for debate) but it is probably much more genuine, and very likely reflects genuine attitude changes at the individual level. In the meantime the rest of us outside of the district get to reexamine our own attitudes and truly question whether our systems are more effective than the "other's" at achieving the goals of our own liberalism.

I acknowledge and recognize the validity of the other side of the argument for the subject above; do not think I am attempting to reduce in any way a situation of potent complexity. But my argument does gain strength when it is more closely applied to the analogy of foreign policy, fair or unfair as an analogy as it may have been. See, now imagine that the conflict isn't even domestic. It is thousands of miles away in a place where the culture hardly resembles ours, the languages are many and complex, and the expense of implementing overhead, top-down reforms is nearly prohibitive. Can we afford not to wait for an Afghani groundswell as we have seen in Egypt?
_____________________________________________________


Now that I've dealt with that aside, (if it frustrated you, please drop it and continue along in good faith with me) let us return to the argument at hand. The real truth regarding our attitudes about the Taliban in Afghanistan (again, here we return to Berry's main argument) is that philosophy #2 is not the main reason why American military forces are engaged over there.


Because although social progress is sometimes a byproduct of our economic interaction with other countries, it is not the primary reason we desire interaction, rather we seek resources, oil primarily, and while we seek these resources for the mutual benefit of both nations, we do so only as long as the benefit to our nation is greater. What I mean is, we are willing to aid Saudi Arabia in building infrastructure, but we also do have strong influence on who controls access to their oil (and its prices). We do not engage in equal business transactions; this is impossible because we wield much more political and economic influence than most countries with which we deal. And we ensure this state of being through our 'hard power', the global police of which Berry speaks, and this police enforces our economic law, our philosophical perspective, and our cultural preferences, regardless of disagreements locals may bring. After all they are rarely in a position to disagree, and will accept any help they can get to pull themselves up out of poverty, even at the price of what we would call their "freedom".

And since philosophy 1 comes intrinsically and intractably connected to philosophy 2, the policies involving both are practiced in a way that is dependent on this unequal relationship between countries, and leads inevitably to domination of the other, because we have decided that they involve inferior philosophies and inferior economies. Because these other ideas possibly threaten to rob us of the freedom to use our own liberalism to make the world safe for our opportunism, which has suddenly become a violation of our rights.

This is what "they" (sadly government officials oftentimes) mean when they say that the "Terrorists" hate your "freedom". They probably do hate that we have given ourselves the opportunity to live our lives in freedom because, with the permanently consumerist system we have enacted, it seems we must always exploit other countries for this lifestyle they hate us for. And if we run into trouble, our military is powerful enough to be used as a bargaining chip to help negotiations slide our way in many circumstances.


Ok, but let's ask this question. Let's say the system changed, Berry is now World Premier, wouldn't these enemies of ours still hate us regardless? Don't they want to impose themselves on us? Let's say we were to withdraw from all global 'entanglements' -one of Ron Paul's favorite terms- wouldn't we still invite attack because we are still a beacon of domestic freedom, and these enemies despise freedom, they oppose it on a philosophical and theological level, right? Plus, they attacked us; regardless of the world trade system, it's too late to change their minds, and meanwhile how did it suddenly become unreasonable for us to punish those who kill innocent people! We have a lesson to teach here. We'll put a boot in your ass, it's the American way. 


In this way our language regarding 9/11 is a confusing mixture of vengeful emotional rhetoric and noble defense, this part somewhat grounded in logic, of the cultural mores that define millions of people in "the West". But it seems that Berry and I both agree that both of these are a form of national self righteousness; they require one way to be right (ours) and another way to be wrong, speaking always in dichotomies- sometimes if only because God is on our "side". I ask the next question seriously, and I request that it be taken so. Need there be sides? Because as I see it, all people are just negotiating for a better life in the best way they know how. Many of us negotiate in violence or quietly support such negotiations with our taxes or votes or views and then become surprised when violence is turned back upon us. If we saw all people as people rather than representations of ideologies or sides we might be able to find solutions tailored to individual needs and comprehension of individual compulsion and drive.


Perhaps we like to comfort ourselves with this supposition of dichotomies, that we must fight the physical presence of the ideology which groups like the Taliban and Al-Qaeda espouse in order to protect ourselves from these ideas, but to me this brings into play Berry's second point. Such a supposition is a distraction from what is truly at stake, and education can resolve this point. In fact, I wish fervently that everyone would read some of the publications put forth by Osama bin Laden and sympathetic groups to his cause, to learn exactly what it is that they desire. We would learn that quite often the large majority of what they point to is transgressions caused by our occupation/destruction of what they view as their homeland and people, our exploitation of their resources, or our support of countries which do the same. It is a disturbingly logical case. They are giving us the recipe for their own dissolution. After all, do you think significant support of groups like Al-Qaeda would continue if our liberal global systems and our destructive policing of those systems couldn't be used as a recruiting tool? Because the other smaller parts of their rhetoric which reek of the same national, moral, and religious self righteousness that Berry and I so dislike seems so much weaker without the substance of our great transgressions used for justification. Think on this.

What if... Is is possible that they are speaking out in the only way they know how, the only way they feel the world will listen, in this global society where hard power dominates, and capitalism quashes the voice of the poor and disadvantaged? What would that say about us? What would happen to us if we dared to take the higher road and offer first to extend the olive branch instead of attack, to recognize some of their demands as legitimate, even to apologize when we feel an apology would make us weak, or when we feel after being attacked ourselves that they couldn't possibly deserve to have US apologize to THEM- THEY that killed innocents before our very eyes- but what if we did it anyway, because that was how we wanted to show our strength?

Could we be forgiven for the times we've taken the lives of innocents too? Would so many countries see an opening in our weakness to take an eye for an eye? Would the world turn against us then? Or at the very least, could the world's people possibly hate us more for such an act of patience and compassion than one of revenge and moral imperiousness?

I ask: Would we have everything to lose, or everything to gain?

What paths will Egyptians tread now?

For more background on this from PL vs: look here. Or for a good recap/summation from CNN, here.

I am sure that some of even the most staunch conservatives in this country, those that advocate stability and security over democracy for our world partners, could not help but smile at the inspiring events today in Egypt. It has largely been since the Vietnam War and Civil Rights Protests that we have seen such non-violent demonstrations in our own country for political change, and it is difficult not to find success like what has occurred in Egypt today uplifting.

Hosni Mubarak, greeted by an overwhelming protest movement culminating with great intensity today in several cities across Egypt, has officially resigned his post as President of Egypt, fleeing with his family from the Capital.

The announcement was made by his Vice President, Omar Suleiman, in what has been described as a terse minute-long concession. Power will be handed over to the Egyptian Military (specifically a group of military leaders who make up the Supreme Council of the Armed forces) which has largely refused to take part action against or to protect the protesters.

Last night, Mubarak enraged protesters by appearing on television and refusing to resign, handing over only some of his powers to the Vice President. Some Egyptian leaders had hinted that the speech would signal Mubarak's resignation. When that wasn't what happened, the crowds felt further deceived. Earlier in the week, attention had turned away from Tahrir Square to worker strikes across the nation, but on Friday, new lifeblood had been pumped into the student and young-people driven protests because of the previous night's events.

And now, these demonstrations have turned into cheering, chanting crowds, shooting off fireworks and dancing in the streets. A few hours ago, even now, some streets were so full of people that they were entirely blocked off.


But what will happen to Egypt now? Can we expect things to return to normal? Or will instability spread? The world watches patiently, eagerly, wondering what example Egypt's new leaders will demonstrate. Perhaps the rest of the word's countries will show that they have learned something from this, and dare to illustrate some respectful restraint for a time before inevitably exercising their influence on Egypt's new affairs.


Meanwhile, Egyptian protesters, your tenacity has paid off. May your non-violence and passion be reflected in the policies and personnel of the new government. Now, we can only hope, Egypt is finally free. Let us also hope that America is willing to accept the real consequences of  Democracy in action, regardless of its benefit to our people, companies, or way of life.



Egyptians I raise my glass to you tonight. Your efforts remind us of the achievements humanity is capable of in the face of poverty, violence, and all adversity. Your rage compels us to reexamine our own actions and their many extensive consequences for the world. Your spirit inspires us to work for global change before the human condition pushes any population to such a breaking point. And finally, we wish you all good luck.

Quick Update on Sudan and Tunisia

I was exhausted after that long post yesterday (please DO check it out below) so one thing I didn't have a chance to talk about was the announcement on Monday of the results of the referendum held in Southern Sudan. Some of you are probably aware that, as a part of an agreement to have a ceasefire between the almost constantly fighting South and North in Sudan, it was agreed that a referendum would be held on whether or not the South would split from the North forming a brand new country. While North Sudan is largely Arabized and Muslim, South Sudan is more typical of Sub-Saharan Africa, so there were serious differences to overcome, especially when there were questions of implementing Sharia Law across the whole country, even to non-Muslims. Surprisingly, dictator (and North Sudanese) Umar Al-Bashir allowed the referendum to take place, and amazingly the results were almost 99% in favor of forming a new country. That kind of voting strength speaks volumes, especially because a lot of the voters, up to 85%, were illiterate and had to choose between an image of hands clasped or an image of a hand palm outward. The image of hands clasped, representing unity with Northern Sudan, only received 1.17% of the vote.

Unfortunately this vote has little to do with the Darfur conflict, which is complex in a different way (it's between two Muslim groups) and this conflict has not been affected by the vote (it is still a part of Northern Sudan).

For more on Sudan, go here: http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/02/07/sudan.referendum.results/index.html


The other thing I wanted to briefly mention is that we still haven't heard about the Tunisia revolution and its ongoing problems. In my last post I mentioned that Tunisia's revolution was quick and largely successful, which was only partially true. More clearly, violence is still an issue there, and the interim government is wading through dark waters at this time.

For more on Tunisia, I recommend this: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/02/20112892047655465.html


Enjoy!

Egypt, Islamism, and Questions of Revolution

Welcome back!

I hope none of you get that reference.

Thank you everyone for being patient with this blog, I hope that now that posting will resume, those of you who did follow it before will continue to follow it now. I have had my break from politics, and it was a good time for it, since very little happened in the world of politics outside of 2 major stories, the State of the Union, and the conflicts going on in Egypt now. But now it’s time to start again. I have devoted much time to the study of the Arab world as well as the Islamic world and I could not stay out of the discussions going on about Egypt. These events are too critical a tool for the use of exposing the major problems in US foreign policy. The post below is lengthy, and I debated breaking it up into parts, but I think I'd rather have it all out there and encourage you to take your time reading it.  

But first a note on future programming. I am under the impression that the next post will be from our elusive guest author, the Dr. Professor of Economics; I will try to ensure that we remain on schedule for an interesting fleshing out of our economic systems here in the US and issues regarding the deficit. I also have received a request to review the new Zeitgeist Movie and I fully intend to do so when I have 3 hours to devote to taking a critical eye to it. From what I’ve seen so far, it is much less conspiratorial than previous iterations, and is very careful to ground itself better in established wisdom. I fully recommend you check it out yourself when you have the time, or you can wait until I’ve examined its value. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z9WVZddH9w&feature=player_embedded

  

But back to the issue at hand. In light of the recent political turmoil in Tunisia and Egypt, and many other locations across the Arab world, I wanted to tie together a few things that may be of interest.

Most of you are familiar with what has been going on in Egypt, many of you may not know that the whole thing began in Tunisia where several weeks prior to Egypt, the “Jasmine Revolution” occurred. We didn’t hear so much about the Jasmine Revolution in America, but we are hearing about Egypt- this is for a few reasons. First, Tunisia’s population is 1/8 that of Egypt’s, it is not considered to be a “critical ally” for strategic or trade reasons, and the revolution that occurred there was rapid, virtually bloodless and successful. Egypt didn't play out the same way.

But here’s the background story. Tunisia had been ruled by a short series of dictators for a generation, the most recent of whom was Ben Ali. Like most of the Arab world today, the economic recession has caused a lot of poverty, and food prices in particular are quite inflated. So, the story goes, a young computer scientist, after failing to find a job in his field or any field, was forced, like many Tunisians, to sell food goods-evidently without a permit- on the street to make ends meet. Some officers of the Regime were trying to clear the streets of such vendors and “asked” him to leave. When the man refused, his goods were confiscated and, evidently lost and hopeless, he proceeded to set himself on fire.

This act of protest was the spark for massive demonstrations in support of the man and in support of removing Ben Ali. After a few tense days, Ben Ali fled the country and the Tunisians are now in the process of reforming their government with opposition members for the first time being allowed to involve themselves in the process.

Encouraged by what happened in Tunisia, protests erupted in various Arab countries, but on January 27 they crystallized in Egypt, when demonstrations probably exceeding 70,000 people broke through police lines and occupied Tahrir Square, a central location in the capital of Cairo. Mirror protests occurred in other major cities. This event was preceded by several acts of self immolation in Egypt in front of government buildings- this should give you an idea of how bad things have become there.

The President and dictator of Egypt is Hosni Mubarak; he’s been serving in Egyptian public office for 62 years now and he is in his eighties. The protesters want to happen to him what happened to Ben Ali, for him to leave and take his influence with him.

  

Last week the protesters were forced to fight off pro-Regime supporters, but after almost 2 days of street fighting, the protesters persevered, and they are still occupying Tahrir Square as of the writing of this post. This is an up-to-date article with good pictures: http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/02/07/egypt.protests/index.html

The primary discussions which have been going on in America regarding the occurrences in Egypt have been over whether or not to support the Mubarak Regime. A lot of military aid goes to Egypt in exchange for Mubarak’s cooperation on matters with Israel, which is the US’s primary and unbreakable ally in the region. But Egypt has also been a close partner regarding the United States’ prosecution of the War on Terror, allowing certain interrogations to take place on Egyptian soil which might be illegal in the US, and passing on useful intelligence data regarding the Arab world.

In general, fears of foreign policy experts are that although Mubarak’s Regime is a Dictatorship, it is better to leave in place a US-friendly government than one that is democratically elected but could be an ally of the “Islamists” or "Terrorists" (these terms sometimes used interchangeably). Critics have claimed that it is hypocrisy to promote democracy as an ideology, but support it in practice only when it suits the needs of US interests. Sadly, the United States government has had a history of supporting moderate dictatorships in order not to risk the formation of fundamentalist Islamist republics. I will debate whether this has been a successful strategy, and flesh out the term "Islamist", later. Given the chance to democratically control their fate, some voters in the Middle East have chosen Islamic Fundamentalist parties that support US definitions of terrorism rather than more secular parties backed by the United States.  

  

For example, in Palestine, when democratic elections were held, the people rejected the ruling moderate Fatah Party in favor of Hamas, a terrorist organization by US standards. In Iran, a popular revolution unseated the moderate and pro-West Shah in favor of a Theocracy ruled by the Ayatollahs. And in Lebanon right now there are struggles over whether or not Hezbollah, another terrorist organization according to the US Government, will dictate policy under their pick for Prime Minister.

Likewise in Egypt there are those who are concerned that were democratic elections to take place, Egypt might stop being so supportive of United States policy, or worse, become ruled by the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist and relatively conservative Islamic political movement. Fears of the Muslim Brotherhood have become so great that at least one media personality- and perhaps a few others on one particular network- is using this occasion to warn against the perils of a rising Islamist power bloc in the Middle East. Maybe centered in Ancient Babylon. 

But I say, so what if the Muslim Brotherhood ends up on top, as long as the elections were fair? If such an organization can provide for the people and support their needs as Mubarak has failed, why should we be so concerned? It will give the people of Egypt, even the world, a chance to see what positive impacts Islamism is capable of. But more importantly, it’s just not so likely that they will succeed. After all, while there have been examples of Islamism taking hold in some countries , there have been others where popular support falls a different way: look at Tunisia for instance, or the main body of protesters in Egypt. These people are secularists for the most part. And those who are not secularists, well who’s to say they shouldn’t also have a voice, after all, no political leader in Egypt has declared war on us yet! I think if people are allowed to realize their own potential through democracy, they will support moderation and peace, since this is the nature of people who are not pushed to war!

Let me give an example.

There are fears that Islam itself tends to support violence, but I see no basis to this claim. I want to be clear. Islam is not a peaceful religion. Islam is not a violent religion. People have used interpretations of the Islamic cultural sphere and Islamic texts to use violence on behalf of Islam. But when most public figures will tend to say “Islam is a peaceful religion” what they mean is that the overwhelming majority of those practicing Islam practice it in a way that promotes peace in the local community and often abroad. This is true of every religion, because human nature seeks stability and peace in order to live life in a fulfilling way.

Those who do not use religion for peace usually do so for two primary reasons. This is not to say that the 3^rd reason, what I’ll call “Fervent Ideology” (someone passionately believing in a social system that does not promote peace) is not ever a factor, but most of the time it is a result of the 1^st or 2^nd reason and does not spring up on its own.  The 1^st reason is that the ruling state incentivizes the violent use of religion. This was true of the Crusades. Or 2^nd, the peace, stability, and prosperity of a location is destabilized by poverty, religious or non-religious violence, famine, drought, overpopulation, prejudicial discrimination, and trampling of popularly perceived rights and freedoms, etc, and these destabilizations can be clearly and closely connected to an antagonist force against which religious violence can be turned (like a country, or the "West"). These two factors motivate the use of religion for means outside that of a peaceful society. BUT even given these two factors, the MAJORITY of the populace will always support peace and stability, regardless of poverty and state incentivization, etc.

You could argue that Egypt is destabilized and poor, and if the people representing the Muslim Brotherhood are elected they will sponsor religious violence-- these are all the precursors mentioned above! But I don't think this is likely if Egypt remains truly a democracy. Firstly because the Muslim Brotherhood is not necessarily a violent organization or one promoting violence, at least not openly if so, because it has historically promoted non-violence. And secondly, because the majority of people will seek stability, not violence; they will not tolerate a ruling party that trends too far from the center of the general popular view. This is what is happening in Lebanon. Yes, Hezbollah may gain some power through elections, but they are unlikely to advocate something truly unpopular with more than half the populace, like having Lebanon go to war with Israel, or implementing universal Sharia Law- and it's unlikely they'd have the political power to do so even if they wished. I think this will have to be the result of any ruling party in Egypt: relative peace and stability. There is no real benefit to Egyptians waging holy war when they can’t even put food on their table. Meanwhile, it is better for Egyptians to see the United States as supporting their democratic aims; in that case it is even possible, dare I say, for Egyptians to start liking the United States and truly work towards partnering with us of their own will. The longer it takes for the United States to jump on this bandwagon, the weaker the chance there will be for a true democracy, or partnership, to develop!

Because right now the only image of the US that Egyptians have gotten is the “Made in the USA” engraving on the tear gas canisters fired on them by Mubarak’s police, according to an article I read recently. This picture says it all. 

My point, and where the irony lies, is here: it is precisely our insistence on supporting Regimes that trample democracy and help us exploit the natural wealth of others which is actually what is causing the kind of instability, poverty, and prejudice that is a perfect environment for Islamic fundamentalism and notions of religious violence to grow and spread. First and foremost in the mind of US policy makers are the strategic and economic interests of the global business of and people in the United States. Not the wellbeing of all those across the world. The disconnect seems to be that supporting the wellbeing of the world’s citizens seems to also be the thing that best and most efficiently serves the interests of US citizens. Wait. But why are we afraid of supporting the wellbeing of the world’s people then? Instead of explaining myself, I will let images tell the better story...

  

I strongly strongly encourage you to view this video about the Taliban in Pakistan, and you will catch my meaning. It’s under 20 minutes, but be prepared for some moderately intense images of violence and a little language.      

http://www.vbs.tv/watch/vbs-news/vbs-news-presents-taliban-in-pakistan-full-length

One thing I like about this video is that it hopefully helps people to understand that the Taliban is different than Al-Qaeda. That Islamic fundamentalists, or even supporters of Al-Qaeda, are not themselves Al-Qaeda.

So, if you will, let me finish with a few more clarifications. So, what is all of this stuff about Islamism? It seems that what many of us is afraid of is what has been described as an Islamist ideology that will unite the Islamic world against the “West” in a great violent renunciation of all the freedoms and progress that we enjoy. The word Islamist is thrown around a lot by the media and political figures, but I want to make one last point regarding our use of that word.

Islamist has been taken to mean different things depending on the context. Either it refers to “Islamic fundamentalist”, “Terrorist”, “Jihadist”, “favoring a violent overturn of a secular or pro-west government”, or “favoring the restoration of the historical Caliphate”.

Let me break this down really quickly. Only the last definition is truly correct; Islamists favor the uniting of the Islamic world or parts of the Islamic world under one religious and political rulership (called a Caliphate) that would help to dictate the unified interests of the Islamic world. This could mean one country or several. Historically the Islamic world has been united at various points and to various degrees in this way. One does not have to be, nor is likely to be a terrorist or a jihadist to be an Islamist. Nor does one necessarily favor fundamentalism or violence at all, in fact, some Islamists favor democratic reforms which would bring about such a unification. There are other definitions to Islamism, but this is what most people are trying to mean.

There are Islamists who favor the use of violence and violence against civilians to accomplish such reforms, and some who want the entire world to be united under this Caliphate so that Islam could unquestionably thrive; if it is necessary to articulate an "enemy" for the United States, please let it be these people, so described. Al-Qaeda almost certainly falls in this category.   

Islamists alone, though, are not our “enemy”. Remember, Islamism is an Islamic political and religious movement aimed at protecting the Islamic faith and the interests of those practicing it, and only a tiny portion of those favoring Islamism would likely go out and join something like Al-Qaeda given the opportunity.  

  

Moreover, Islamist is not the same as Islamic, though I’ve seen the mistake before; Islamic simply means one of the Muslim faith. The large majority of Muslims are not Islamist.  

And finally, I have used the words “Arab world” in this post. Not all Arabs are Muslims, and Arabs constitute a minority of practicing Muslims. Arabs are an ethnic group and in general they speak a Semitic language related to Hebrew, and this is the language of the Qur’an. It is disappointing when I hear the word “Arab” substituted for “Muslim”.  So when I say Arab world in this post, I mean North Africa and the Southwest Middle East. Primarily Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, the Arabian Peninsula, Jordan, Syria, Palestine, and Iraq. Neither Iran nor Afghanistan nor Pakistan are majority Arab countries.

Glad to get those extra things out of the way. Ask questions if you like. Post comments as you please. Seek more information on this subject if you desire it. And as always, thanks for reading!


::Update 9:15pm, I put the article out before I had made some very important edits, please ensure you are reading the most up-to-date copy of this post. Thanks!::