TERRORISM, US POLICY & the UN

A clear definition of terrorism and its multifaceted causes was notably absent from any political and media discourse before and since 9/11. Noam Chomsky pointed out that only the Wall Street Journal, to its great credit, took the time and effort immediately after 9/11 to find out why there is such militant opposition to U.S. policy in the Muslim world. One of the State Department's responses was to hire a PR person from New York to intensify "public diplomacy" (U.S. propaganda) as a means of lessening opposition toward U.S. policies around the world. That person left her job within a relatively short period, after realizing the impossibility of the  task. Not only had the Bush administration obfuscated the term "terrorism" to the degree that it is very broad and generic encompassing all unconventional forms of opposition to U.S. policies, but the administration allowed authoritarian regimes around the world to define "terrorism" as they see fit, as long as they back the  U.S. Does this sound like the Cold War when we backed dictators in the name of "fighting Communism?" Before the Democrat convention, former president Jimmy Carter held an international conference in Atlanta GA on this issue, and he explained to the press after the conference that he was stunned to hear from activists of various countries that human rights workers, UN personnel, intellectuals questioning tyrannical methods used by the state against its citizens, and any opponent of a regime can and has been labeled "terrorist" in some countries. Such a maximalist definition that encompasses all opposition to a regime trivializes the issue. This is especially important in the light of the bloodbath that took place in Russia with the Chechnya rebels and hostages. Do people who strive for self-determination and face the conventional forces of a powerful government have the right to fight back, or do they submit to tyranny? Just as the UN decided on a definition of Human Rights, Racism, Genocide, Apartheid, Ethnic Cleansing, etc. it is time that the UN revisit the issue of "terrorism" and provide the appropriate mechanism by which such a discussion must take place and then voted on by the General Assembly. Input from leading scholars with varying views, NGOs, politicians, church leaders, etc. will be significant in providing input to the UN's definition of the term, after outlining its complex root causes. Then the UN has agreed to a set of resolutions and sanctions. This does not mean that "terrorism" will be defeated as long as the state remains an instrument of oppression. But short of a multilateral UN-sanctioned approach, every authoritarian regime around the world, and even pluralistic societies like the U.S., will use the pretext of "terrorism" to unleash repression against their citizens who demand certain legitimate rights for minorities, workers, women, political opponents, etc. While people want safety and security, they also want to have their rights protected and do not wish to live in garrison states. US citizens and in each country will have to decide the degree to which they are willing to sacrifice their rights to live in an open society and willing to tolerate a Leviathan state.

TERRORISM & THE STATE (Jon Kofas - Greece)

Mass killings in the form of state-sanctioned warfare have always carried a sense of glory, virtue, and honor, although the end result is mass destruction. By contrast, individual acts of political violence, including political acts the state labels "terrorism", imbue the general public with extreme fear, categorical condemnation, and demands for severe punishment of the 'criminals' behind the random acts of political violence. In the first three days of November 2010, a number of low-tech, low level mail-bombs targeting various embassies and political offices in Athens, as well as French President Sarkozy, German Chancellor Merkel and Prime Minister Berlusconi caused concern in EU and US about a wave of terrorism that comes after mass strikes and demonstrations in Athens, Paris, and various other European cities. These developments come about a week after the package bombs from Yemen to the US. Greek police are working with EU and US anti-terrorism experts to uncover the organization behind the wave of mail bombings designed more for maximum publicity and stirring authorities into a state of panic. The random pattern of postal bombs discovered so far are 14, included countries as diverse as Bulgaria, Mexico, Chile, Russia, Switzerland, Germany, Netherlands, and Belgium does not provide clear clues about the political and ideological purpose of the group behind the operations. The two young men under arrest, described as amateurs by police, and those on the list of suspects are allegedly anarchists (Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire). Living in well-to-do middle class suburbs of Athens and having connections to other anarchist groups, Cells of Fire appears to follow in the footsteps of older organizations that used violence against 'establishment targets' to send a political message and raise social awareness in an age of widespread political apathy. Greece has a history of such random bombings and political assassinations linked to the infamous November 17th organization that emerged out of resistance to the Junta in the early 1970s. The bombings taking place a few days before local elections that the PASOK regime has tried to make into a referendum on the current IMF-EU austerity measures, and after Germany proposed that any EU member (like Greece) failing to observe the Maastricht Treaty rules regarding budgetary deficits above 3% of GDP annually would suffer fines as well as lose EU voting rights. Considering that Germany accounts for 30% of Eurozone's GDP, and it has resolved to alter the original EU integration model from interdependent into a patron-client model that the US has been practicing with Latin America, there is a sense in Greece and other EU members that weaker European countries will not only be marginalized economically but they will also sacrifice their national sovereignty and be reduced into semi-colonies of northwest Europe. In short, Europe of the 21st century future will be more like Europe of the 19th century past. The striking realization on the part of people in the weaker economies of the EU (Southern and Eastern Europe) that they are in fact reduced  into a lower status (peripheral or Third World-like) while theoretically they are equal with the Europeans of northwest Europe accounts for the extreme anger that manifests itself in political violence by a mere handful of people driven by disparate ideological, political, psychological factors to take justice into their own hands and send a message to the world. But is there a link between the immense financial, economic, and social problems of Greece and the recent bombings? That the young anarchists carrying out these acts are amateurs, acting independently of other organizations, as far as police are aware so far, trying to attract attention is beyond dispute. Ultimately, the question is who benefits from these mail bombings and who is harmed. Without engaging in a lengthy analysis of 'the ethics of terrorism', analysis that can be approached from different ideological perspectives, the bottom line is that terrorism in any form always benefits the political, economic, and social status quo. Moreover, terrorism is fundamentally an expression of desperation, fear, and fatalism but always with immediate massive publicity that captures public attention. Historically, terrorism has never accomplished the goal of social justice that it ostensibly intended by using 'unconventional warfare'. This is because the state and established institutions targeted by terrorist organizations is far more powerful instrument of violence on a sustained basis than any individual organization. The state mobilizes public support for itself and institutions it protects, while the majority of the population falls in line with the state that presents itself as 'protector' of public interest. Angela Merkel has already called for the US and EU to tighten 'security gaps', and Greece was forced to cancel all outgoing mail for at least 48 hours. The clear winners of the Greek mail-bombs are not the labor unions whose rank-and-file is suffering deep cuts so that welfare capitalism can continue to thrive; nor has the leftist political opposition anything to gain from political violence. Leftists are merely crying out against the IMF-EU austerity measures crippling the majority of the population and likely to keep it weak for the entire decade with lower living standards and loss of hope for the future of their children. Political violence (terrorism) as a form of protest against the establishment will be on the rise not just in Greece, but in many parts of Europe and the world for many years, and not just in the Middle East that the US has on its radar for its own geopolitical, ideological and political reasons. In the age of widespread apathy among the masses throughout the world, and against the background of a political economy serving a small percentage of the population concentrated in a few countries to the detriment of the vast majority of people and nations, in an age when the dynamics for social revolution are absent, terrorism - acts of political violence against the state, which represents a political, economic, and social system of injustice - is inevitable. As futile as terrorism may be in accomplishing the stated goals of social, economic, and political justice, the political economy as it is today not just in Greece but throughout the world feeds and promotes terrorism that actually strengthens the political and economic elites and helps to preserve the social order. Terrorism helps to keep the public living in fear, asking for more authoritarian-like measures, and willing to sacrifice human rights in return of the 'safety and security' that the state promises. Terrorism helps to keep people in conformity mode, it keeps labors unions and other social activists more docile, it prevents social mobilization against the status quo, and it elevates the 'benevolent' image and status of the political and financial elites.

Austerity Measures and Politics (Jon Kofas, Greece)

Posted on November 4th, 2010

 Austerity measures are designed to engender monetary stability and fight monetary inflation by reducing public spending and invariably consumption. The same measures can and have been used to inject fiscal discipline into what could be an out of control spending regime that allows for the public sector to absorb capital away from the private sector, thereby choking off private initiative. The IMF made “austerity measures” famous or infamous, depending on one’s viewpoint, during the 1950s in Latin America (Chile was the first test case) and throughout the rest of the “underdeveloped world” later when IMF, backed by the World Bank that only offered development loans on condition IMF austerity came first, demanded currency devaluation, budgetary cuts combined with reductions in credit regime, cuts in public sector jobs, wages and benefits, along with lower taxes for foreign investment, hikes in indirect taxes and public services such as utilities. The immediate impact of austerity is a stronger currency that helps fight monetary inflation and strengthens finance capital and the export sector that becomes the basis for stimulating growth. At the same time, there is a drop in GDP growth, deteriorating terms of trade, higher unemployment, lower living standards, temporary spike in price inflation accompanied by slow growth, especially on the part of small businesses that lack the financial strength to withstand the austerity cycle that could last several years.

Do austerity measures accomplish their publicly stated goal of restoring monetary stability and achieving external equilibrium? Absolutely, on a short-term basis, but at an enormous social cost. Austerity measures are invariably for countries that are not part of reserve currency regimes–Greece in 2010 was an unprecedented case. Central banks, which coordinate monetary policy with the IMF, have some power to either control monetary inflation or stimulate growth through a liberal monetary policy that allows more money and easy credit at the cost of monetary inflation that is invariably followed by price inflation. There have been cases, of course in advanced capitalist countries, where low growth is accompanied by inflation (the stagflation phenomenon) that dates to the Nixon era. In such cases, it takes some years for central bank monetary policy to work itself through the system. Even then, there are exceptions, as we have seen in Japan where central bank intervention has not been sufficient to stimulate export growth or alter the dynamic in an economy so interdependent with the rest of the world, or to combat other undervalued currencies like the Chinese yuan with which it is competing regionally. In short, for G-20 economies, monetary coordination which implies fiscal and trade coordination, works better than central bank intervention. This is exactly what the G-20 tried to achieve last month in Seoul, South Korea. The opposite course of austerity is for the government to stimulate growth by printing money as governments have been doing in the past couple of years, thereby precipitating very high gold and precious metals prices. Because the financial system needed saving by the public sector, governments printed too much money and that will mean a spike in commodity prices once the recession ends and shortages become apparent. Currently, borrowing is very cheap and that is one reason that US corporations are borrowing while sitting on more than $1 trillion of cash instead of investing it. Fed buying fixed-income assets has ephemerally boosted stock markets throughout the world, just as Japan’s did when they made similar moves. But such a stimulus only lasts a day or two, unless it is accompanied by other stimulative measures. Fed buying bonds will not reduce unemployment, it will not stop foreclosures, and it will not stimulate an economy that is approximately $14.5 trillion. Although I am delighted that the Fed made the obvious political move to buy bonds a day after the Democrats suffered a defeat in the House, this act by itself is not a long-term solution. On the other hand, IMF-style austerity for the US is completely out of the question, for it will precipitate global economic crisis deeper by choking off growth at home. The Bretton Woods system never intended for austerity measures to be imposed on the US, but on debtor countries; which of course the US is but is it also the world’s largest economy with the most widely circulated reserve currency. So, we come to the essence of the question: what is the solution for economic growth under the market system today? The answer depends on the political and social criteria that one espouses much more than it does on any economic principles. In my view, cyclical crises in the market system are inevitable, no matter what central banks do with monetary policy to mitigate their impact, no matter what government does with fiscal policy to lessen the pain on the majority of the people.

U.S. Foreign Policy and the World Federation of Trade Unions, 1944–1948 (Jon V. Kofas)

Tea Party: Politics and Class Interests (Jon Kofas, Greece)

Posted on November 3rd, 2010

Does it make any sense for American millionaires to vehemently oppose Obama when the NASDAQ index has almost doubled since he took office? The irrational in human nature is confirmed in every aspect of endeavors from daily routines at work and home to political convictions. Rich or poor, people support political parties or movements that are close to their ideological (and in many cases mixed with religious) convictions, but contrary to their personal economic interests in some cases. This is true not only with wealthy leftists who support political parties that would raise taxes on upper income groups, but also on millionaires who oppose governments whose economic and fiscal policies have resulted in raising their incomes, as is true of Obama’s administration and the American wealthy class. Considering that Obama’s policies have helped to sustain an otherwise crippled financial system, that his administration’s policies have resulted in a dramatic rise of stock market averages combined with optimism about a more stable future, and a relatively stable dollar whose real value would be very low if it were not a reserve currency and Obama administration fiscal and monetary policies, it is difficult to explain multimillionaires and billionaires currently funding Tea Party candidates and gearing up for the next election. One explanation is that the very wealthy recognize that the Tea Party has become an effective instrument of energizing the popular classes that would otherwise be staying home or supporting the Democrats. The ultimate goal of big money behind Tea Party candidates is to co-opt the Tea Party into the Republican establishment and project the image to the general population that indeed the Tea Party is a genuine grass-roots movement. After the midterm election results, some political observers are optimistic that the Democrats have a chance to win in 2012, especially if Tea Party leader Sarah Palin runs for president. Palin has more negatives than positives among American voters, according to public opinion polls. Nevertheless, she believes that the mid-term election “refudiates” Democrats (her expression not mine), thus these current conditions pave the way for her to run for President in 2012.
But was the election result of November 2010 against Obama Democrats, or against the “political establishment”? Was it a vote for Tea Party or against Democrats who do not differ on substantive bread and butter issues from the Republicans? The American people have been conditioned to swing from one party to the other every election, except in cases where the economy and in some cases other significant issues such as national security has convinced them to keep the status quo. Although we may witness the Tea Party version of “Dumb & Dumber” (Palin) for president and (some cloned Tea Party version of Palin) as her running mate, it is very early to predict an Obama victory, especially if he does not lower unemployment and does not improve living standards. On numerous occasions I have written that Obama and the Democrats will move more center-right in order to win the presidential race of 2012. The Tea Party has now gained legitimacy and it will force the entire political arena to move to the right.

Greek Bankruptcy and National Sovereignty (Jon Kofas, Greece)

Posted on November 1st, 2010

The most significant global depression before the Great Depression of the 1930s took place in the 1890s, and as expected it resulted in turmoil in poorer countries that were financially dependent on the rich nations. The “panic of 1893″ hit countries from the US to Russia very hard, and it was the era that gave birth to many radicals in Russia, China, Europe and the US. On 10 December 1893, Greek premier Harilaos Trikoupis stood before Parliament and announced official bankruptcy. After a frenzy of massive borrowing that European banks encouraged so that Greece could modernize its infrastructure so that it could attract more foreign investment, after a decade of Western economic expansion in the 1880s, the depression of the 1890s that plagued the US and Europe forced Greece into bankruptcy. Like the Ottoman Empire, China, Russia and many Latin American countries that had a very large foreign debt, Greece fell under tight financial control of the Great Powers. Like the Ottoman Empire, China, Latin American republics and to a certain degree Russia, Greece was a quasi-protectorate of Britain and France that represented the interests of bondholders and export interests. As to to be expected, Greece had very limited sovereignty. The idea that the country was a “democracy” was a goal to be achieved at some point in the future. In 2010 the situation in Greece is not very different than in the late 19th century. A number of economists and financial analysts speak of the possibility that Greece may still fall into bankruptcy. In reality, Greece is in bankruptcy managed by Brussels and the IMF. What brought Greece to this tragic state of affairs that it has lost its creditworthiness along with limited sovereignty it enjoyed? “It was quite obvious that one day Greece would have to face this kind of problem, and we knew that this problem would occur,” Eurogroup chief Jean-Claude Juncker explained during the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington in early October. According to Juncker, German and French officials along with European Central Bank chief Jean-Claude Trichet were well aware of “the perspectives of what was not at that time known as so-called Greek crisis…I could not go public with the knowledge that I had.” What did EU officials know? They knew that Greece was engaged in heavy deficit financing, that it was falsifying revenues and expenses, balance of payments deficits, plagued by widespread tax evasion and official corruption that involved domestic and foreign companies; that about one-third of the economy was “unofficial” (black market that included money laundering, off-shore operations, etc.), and that Goldman Sachs had engaged in swap deals to help Greece conceal its true deficits. Like rich nations, Greece continued raising its public debt until the global financial crisis hit home. Foreign bondholders demanded higher interest rates to extend more credit to service existing loans. Just as lenders demanded that poorer countries like Greece lower the ratio of debt to GDP, the economic slowdown entailed higher debt-to-GDP ratio and the inevitable cycle of more massive public borrowing to service existing obligations. After it borrowed $110 billion euros in 2010 (to service existing loans for the next two years), Greek debt-to-GDP ratio will be 150% by 2014. No matter how well the national economy performs in the next two years, Greece will not be in a position to service its debt after 2014. Meanwhile, billions will be made by bondholders in extra payments primarily at the expense of Greek workers and the middle class who are enduring lower living standards and higher costs for the privilege of keeping foreign bondholders and their governments managing the Greece debt crisis. Although there is surplus capital in the private sector of advanced capitalist countries, the IMF and G-7 governments insist that poorer countries (Greece is merely the poster child) must be forced to pay higher interest rates and thus decapitalized to strengthen Western finance capitalism. On 27 October 2010, it was reported that US corporations are hoarding one trillion dollars, using the money on mergers and acquisitions and repurchase of stock, instead of generating economic growth and lowering unemployment.
(http://finance.yahoo.com/news/US-Companies-Hoarding-Almost-nytimes-2141446680.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=1&asset=&ccode= )
Because no one believes that Greece will be able to service loans amounting to one-third of GDP annually, the only question is to roll over debt, to restructure a payments schedules, to forgive part of the debt, to extend the current IMF-EU program another three to five years as the IMF has informally suggested, pending final EU approval, or for Greece to walk away from the EU and declare an outright default. The answer of course is one that has been worked out already, namely managed bankruptcy under IMF-EU austerity and policy guidance. It is absurd to even suggest, as some prominent economists and financial analysts have been doing, that Greece may lapse into bankruptcy when it is already there and operating under an IMF-EU managed bankruptcy program. Because Greece is part of the eurozone, an official declaration of bankruptcy would be a reflection of the EU. Unlike Trikoupis who had the courage and integrity in 1893 to stand up before Parliament and declare bankruptcy and place the country under rigid foreign financial control, PASOK Premier George Papandreou employs meaningless “Socialist,” nationalist, and populist rhetoric to explain the “true state of affairs” in Greece. Beyond the very tragic issue of millions suffering lower living standards, a situation not very different for other countries from the north Balkans to Ireland, the question is to what degree is Greece (Ireland, Portugal, and other countries in similar situations) a sovereign country and to what degree do citizens have a voice in what the media and government tells them is a democratic process? Can a country so externally dependent as Greece enjoy democracy at the same level as a more affluent country like France or the US? But let us quickly reflect on democracy in France and US; to what degree does a worker or a middle class professional in France or the US feel that she/he is making a difference in the democratic process, and to what degree do citizens believe that it is large corporations determining the country’s economic destiny?

Politics and the Economics of Deception (Jon Kofas, Greece)

Posted on October 28th, 2010
With two global wars and many more regional ones, with many recessions and a Great Deception, with mass education designed to provide a learned workforce for the public and private sector, and with mass communications, the 20th century has created a population cynical about societal institutions, especially political and economic; or is it that political and economic institutions of deception have created a cynical population riddled with anxieties and frustrated with a modern world successful at the material level for a minority of the people but failing humanity at every other level? The recent global recession ushered in declining living standards for the middle class and workers and also brought widespread frustration among the majority of the population, mostly in Western countries. Just as the 1920s, the decade of prosperity appeared to hold the promise of endless economic growth with the possibility of upward social mobility, proved that prosperity and upward mobility was limited to a small segment of the population, similarly the 1990s failed in its promise to deliver the miracle of sustainable middle class living standards for all generations to come.
At least, the prosperity decade of the 1920s and its pro-business politics, followed by the decade of depression ushered in structural changes that resulted in various social safety nets–social security and stronger trade unions with collective bargaining, greater state regulation of the predatory and high-risk finance sector, and the state as an agent of growth and protection for all classes. Today, almost three years after the recent global recession, the worst contraction since the 1930s, politicians, mostly among the G-7, have conveniently forgotten promises they made at the start of the crisis about launching more rigorous measures to regulate financial institutions so that there is no repeat of a similar crisis a few years down the road. Where are the rigid measures against multi-million dollar bonuses, salaries, and fraudulent corporate practices that were too large for governments not to bail them out? People see rewards for those responsible for the global financial crisis and punishment for the victims at the lower end of the social scale. At G-7 and G-20 meetings in the past year, the talk is mostly of how to coordinate better fiscal, monetary and trade policy. Of course, there have been some regulations designed to prevent the system from destroying itself, but they are very modest, despite the massive bailouts that financial institutions received and despite the sacrifices that governments asked and continue asking workers and the middle class to make. Evidence of widespread frustration with the status quo abounds, not by looking at public opinion polls, but observing how strikes and demonstrations whether in Paris, London, Madrid, etc. have no impact in convincing government to alter the course of chipping away at middle-class and working-class living standards in order to strengthen the “business as usual private sector,” especially finance capital that is clearly back in the driver’s seat driving government policy. People express political frustration in different forms–apathy among the most significant, usually combined greater self-indulgence, or some form of nihilism. Apathy actually furthers the interests of the financial and political elites that know a segment of the population is outside the opposition public zone. Mainstream media and institutions in general reinforce conformity, though to some degree they also reinforce apathy, but then present the apathetic individual as lacking positive personal character traits, thus deserving of the “bad politicians, bad institutions.” A segment of the population frustrated, mostly confused with the politics and economics of deception, gravitates to fringe political groups or parties, realizing that Republican or Democrat in the US, for example, or varieties of center-right, center, or center-left in Europe basically represent the same system that provides funding to their political campaigns. Critical intellectuals not on the payroll of an employer demanding conformity and self-censorship express frustration with the political establishment by trying to analyze the degree to which the system is subject to change, likely to remain stagnant, or perhaps beyond the realm of change for an indefinite period of time. Alain de Benoist’s well-stated: “Optimists learn English; Pessimists learn Chinese, Realists learn to use Kalashnikov” exemplifies very succinctly frustration by today’s intelligentsia critical of the status quo. Alain’s comment reminded me of Georges Sorel, Nikolai Chernyshevsky, or other pre-WWI intellectuals confronting seemingly insurmountable obstacles to social change. Millions of people demonstrated and rioted in Paris this month, but to no avail (before them millions of others in other European cities); only to be subjected to a system that will continue eroding their living standards, benefits, and social safety net as they know it, only for the sake of strengthening finance capital with no promise of a better tomorrow for the majority of the people in what we call “democracies” and take pride to defend them as ideal! The utility and intellectual value of learning Chinese or any other widely use language notwithstanding, is the solution to structural problems of a modern society becoming a linguist? What was the result of all these mass strikes, demonstrations and riots across Europe? Was there any change in policy, any change to the politics and economics of deception? On the contrary, more to come in the future, and perhaps much worse than what we have seen against the background of the global economic pie divided into more slices in an increasingly poly-centric world power structure. At the beginning of this century the world economic and military power structure appears more poly-centric than it has been since 1914, with power shifting from West to to the East, at least, power shared in an inter-dependent unified economic world-system separated by disparate regimes in nation-states linked by regional and international integration systems (economic and strategic). In short, the nation-state is a mere extension as is the economy of something larger, so what can the individual do, what can the French trade unions do, what can three million protesters do, what can ten million European protesters do to have a voice in government about their future against the reality that their nation is part of larger entities (NATO, EU, UN, WTO, etc.)? The dynamics of human identity have changed and become more complex today owing largely to the fact that transnational entities–corporations to government and non-government organizations–have continued to erode the role of the nation-state and the national institutions in which the “democratic process” is to work for all citizens. If society is an extension of an increasingly interdependent world with transnational institutions in the age of mass communications (and web), institutions outside the nation are enjoying more power than national ones where the democratic process presumably takes place; and if identity is forged from the individual’s interactions with society, then human identity either at the conscious or subconscious level is inexorably linked to the entire world. To some degree, this accounts for the sense of apathy, fatalism, nihilism of people who believe that while institutions are trying to convince the public that individual voice matters in a democracy, when in reality it means absolutely nothing.