Do we have to understand Bush to support or resist him?
I have been arguing that we must try to understand President Bush's policies, both foreign and domestic in one of two ways. Either he is the pawn of our economic elites out to make a buck, or he is a Christian Zionist who believes he must clean up around the house in preparation for the second coming of Jesus Christ.
Granted we may want to characterize the President as having no principles at all except the desire to take advantage of the situation at the moment for his own personal benefit. This would not be accurate, on my view, because it would ignore the fact that he instigates policies that do benefit economic elites. He does act in ways which one would expect of a religious zealot. The question is, which best describes the story about his policies, why these, why now?
There were a few comments directed to my argument that Bush's policies toward our war in Iraq and domestic security suggest he's the zealot. One from qrswave argued that we didn't have to understand Bush. All we must do is stop him.
I have to say this response sounds bizarre. I understand that it may be a sign of frustration based on the fact that we have evidence that Bush is preparing for an attack on Iran involving nuclear weapons. I can see qrswave thinking that we know enough about what Bush is doing in order to see we have to stop him and the thugs who work for him before they get us involved in a fight we cannot win or get out of.
I can see qrswave thinking that understanding takes time and effort that we do not have at the moment. However, since we write on this blog, and on others, we are not in a position to do anything more than make an argument. I am supposing that neither the Joint Chiefs nor Congress wait upon what we write here before they decide what they will do with the next edict from the President. I can imagine qrswave wanting what we argue here to make those in a position to do something constructive to stop the madness before someone gets hurt. But, even if they did, we have to provide a really good argument.
I don't think qrswave hears what he's saying: We don't have to understand him (Bush), we just have to stop him. Does he think the Joint Chiefs will refuse to carry out an order from the President when they see that it is illegal or ultimately wrong? I doubt they would refuse any order since they are currently punishing junior grade officers and regular soldiers for refusing to fight in what they believe is an illegal and immoral war in Iraq. Does qrswave imagine Congress will deny the President anything? Congress is not in a position to do anything practical. What the President does today or in any present moment cannot even be reviewed before the deeds that commit us to irreparable ghastliness are done and long since regretted. They do not believe there is anything wrong in invading these countries, in principle. Congress thinks that the President has to go along with Congress, but anything the Congress supports, cannot possibly be wrong.
Part of my argument is that we have to understand the story behind Bush's policies. We can't without understanding them put up any kind of effective resistance. I say this because it may be thought that we could stop him without understanding. In a sense, we stopped Hitler without understanding him. The idea here is that we didn't wait around in order to develop an acceptable account of what Hitler and his Nazi Party were doing and why before we put a stop to it. We stopped Hitler in the sense that we destroyed his armies in the field. We killed off his supporters. We killed him.
Even though we were able to kill Hitler physically, and win the war, in that sense, there is another sense in which we did not stop Hitler. There is a sense in which Hitler won the war. Hitler advocated a certain way of assuring the survival and comfort of one's fellow countrymen. He advocated the use of force and the idea that no one is able to determine what's in one's interest except ones self or those at risk with you. Together, Hitler would be lead to agree with our President who proclaimed, if you are not with us, you are one with the terrorists.
Even though Hitler failed in applying his lesson in his own case, everyone since who's responsible for the survival and comfort of their own people have adopted Hitler's program for themselves. Proof of this claim comes from the fact that the United States is now stealing valuables and killing resisters in Afghanistan, Iraq and soon Iran.
Hitlerism is an infectious malady of thinking which cannot be stopped by merely killing the people who agree with it. It requires our understanding what exactly makes it so attractive that anyone who is anyone goes along with it.
Hence, my question about what makes Bush tick.
I don't see that stopping Bush himself this week will be enough. We could make Bush go away this week and next week find the Vice President doing the same. We may get rid of Cheney, and find that any politician in a position to do anything promotes the same "solutions."
It may sound like I am promoting the same "Institutional" account of politics advocated by Chomsky where our actually doing something about the bad things that occur has to wait for our first coming to an understanding of how to change the institutions, so that there's significant change, instead of just the changing of the figureheads that mouth the words.
I do feel that Chomsky is right that if we don't address the arguments for why leaders are violent, or rely on stealth, deception, fear, and intimidation, in order to accomplish their goals, as though they are the institutions in which our leaders operate, we cannot effectivel;y oppose the corruption that these leaders represent. Chomsky tells us that you can't just remove a bad CEO, thinking things will get better, because another CEO will come in and do the very same things because the institutions are set up to demand these bad things of their CEO's.
People like Bush in charge of countries, like ours, use force to accomplish their goals because the arguments that drive them expect them to use force.
In Bush's case, however, I'm saying the arguments are not just about how the use of force will assure the survival and comfort of his backers. Bush is, instead, a Christian Zionist who believes that the world is run like a wild west town, where people commonly use force, violence, stealth, and deception in the normal course of doing business. This is a true and regrettable fact about life everywhere, according to their understanding of the Christian account of things. However, instead of leaving things there, they believe that it is their duty to resist the forces of evil and do so in support of the efforts Jesus will make when he returns.
The business about invading countries, killing people, stealing things, and the gutting of our country's Constitutional protections, is not out of greed. It is about, instead, finally coming out against those forces of evil which they imagine Jesus will oppose when he returns.
Another response to my argument about Bush being a Christian Zionist was the claim that Bush and his allies in Christian Zionism aren't really Christians. These critics argue that Jesus advocated peacemaking, whereas, Bush is a warmonger. Therefore, because they aren't following the teachings of Jesus that would make us peacemakers, these Christian Zionists really aren't Christians.
If I were inclined to agree that Jesus is who these Christians say he is, then it would be important to me to wait to see who wins this argument. There are two seemingly implacable positions. First, the critics of Christian Zionism argue as I have put it above, Bush isn't really a Christian, whatever else he is, because he is a warmonger. The advocates of this position might go on to argue that Bush hypocritically dupes his supporters with this hokey Christian story, but is really in the business of pocketing ill gotten gains for his real backers in the economic elites. Second, the Christian Zionists themselves argue that their critics are the kind of Christians who have compromised their principles with evil for so long and to such an extent that they no longer see that they are supporting the very things that Jesus opposes. They are so afraid of conflict that they are willing to let evil win the hearts, minds, and souls of people everywhere. If they were really Christians, they would stand up to those who advocate evil, even if that would cause violent conflicts.
If I were inclined to agree that we needed to answer the question posed here about what makes a real Christian, and what does Jesus really expect of us, then this debate would be important. However, I think both sides in this dispute believe something that I do not. They think that our salvation from the efforts of powerful violent people, such as we all are on their view, must come from some kind of hero who will give us a second chance in our next life, who will intervene sometimes in the lives of our loved ones, if we're really really good, and shows us what true knowledge and values are in a world that has neither.
I do not think we need such a hero. We do not need the proverbial God in a flying chariot to whisk the worthy ones away to safety. We are now faced with the possibility of nuclear war caused by our own hands, where I include Bush in this "we." We should not believe that we must proceed along a path to such a war, or continue on a path that has induced us to cause other wars and the suffering of countless numbers of people, because we think our actions are not in our hands and yet, by the grace of some powerful God, a hero will save us from ourselves.
Why should we think we will be saved from a certain self destruction by some hero, when this predicament is brought about by our own hands? One should think that as God helps those who help themselves, he/she would go along with the destruction of those who would destroy themselves.
Anyone who's been paying attention to my argument will not be surprised that I believe the traditional understanding of Jesus as a Socratic Hero, where, on that view, Jesus provides us with the knowledge and values that he has because he understands our true situation, and is in the position of having set things up the way they are, is a creature of the Socratic account of metaphysical reality. On Socrates view, there would be a God, or Gods, if our lives are like the lives of his cave dwellers.
It would be no surprise, furthermore, for me to argue that this Allegory is just Plato's attempt to work out the implications of Socrates main claim about reason, knowledge and values. That is, Socrates believes that reason is a matter of logical argument. Knowledge and values are, too, matters of logical argument. It is the adoption of this claim and being comfortable with its implications that makes the ideas of being a pawn to economic elites out for a buck, or Christian Zionists cleaning house before their visitor arrive, seem so compelling.
The question I posed about Bush supposes that we've adopted Plato's account of reality. Our commitment to the way that Socrates and Plato understand the world provides us with our main avenues of explaining Bush. That is, you either see things like the cave dwellers do, seeing all accomplishment as the working out of force of various kinds, or you see things from the point of view of those cave dwellers who have committed themselves to the teachings of what they believe to be a Socratic Hero who's come to them from outside their cave of a world.
One of the points of my argument involving this business of Socrates is to point out that stopping Bush by using force cannot effectively stop him. It can only perpetuate the idea that if you really want to get something done you have to resort to violence, stealth, deception, and so forth. It can only carry on the Socratic and Hitlerian claim that force works and swords are more powerful than words.
We are now faced with the prospect that our own leaders are about to nuke millions of innocent people. We consequently face an uncertain and possibly bleak future in order to pay for this crime. Karma and everything. What can we do to stop this madness before someone gets hurt?
We may not be able to stop this particular case of madness. There is no reason to think that our self-destruction will be averted merely because some few of us understand what we have done. We often do things we later regret. I'm thinking there are forces now at work that are too powerful to stop.
However, instead of waiting around for some hero to appear, we need to develop what we can to save ourselves, a good argument that changes Bush's mind.
You are a very patient man, Steven !
Where to begin?
You make some excellent points - but, then you miss the point. Although, you came close.
I say we don't have time to understand him - because we don't.
This is an EMERGENCY.
The immediate and most vital tasks at hand is to understand OURSELVES and to SURVIVE.
You are right that destroying Hitler did not destroy evil. But, you seem to be ignoring or presupposing that Hitler was the worst of two evils, when in fact HE WAS NOT. Hitler was actually mild-mannered by comparison to the evil that straddled the globe in his wake.
The real culprit SURVIVED. And before those little zionist creepy crawlies (as Ellendra likes to call them) come out of the woodwork to cry anti-semitism, let me be clear. THE REAL CULPRIT IS NOT HUMAN, though it has its fair share of willing accomplices (traitors) from humanity on earth.
You advocate that we understand Bush in order to persuade him and others like him to cease and desist.
(A) There's no time for that.
(B) It won't work.
His world and their world does not include us.
We are the obstacle to their new world order.
This is a struggle to survive.
In a sense, there are only two REALITIES from which human beings must choose.
The first is a Godless one (of cave dwellers), where only the strongest survive, in effect, TO SHAPE THEIR OWN REALITY.
In this merciless world, anything goes. People who believe in Camp X lie, steal, cheat, and basically do anything and everything to get ahead - including but not limited to - dropping nuclear bombs on tens of millions of innocent people and demolishing hundred story towers with people in them.
In this camp, you'll be surprised to find people who claim to believe in God, when it's painfully obvious by their conduct that they believe only in power and control.
The second is a God centered universe, where a benevolent Creator blesses humanity with knowledge of Him and guides us to seek his Glory for our own personal salvation.
In this camp, you will be surprised to find people who do NOT believe in God, but believe with their very fiber that living in peace and tranquility with their neighbors and with the earth is the only JUST way. They just don't know how to justify it.
People who prefer this version of reality - either out of fear or love of God, or just because it's nicer - tread lightly upon the earth. They conduct themselves modestly, generously, and with love and mercy for their fellow human being.
The trouble is, although their ideologies are incompatible, people from camp X and camp Y live on the same planet.
In order for people from camp X to "secure the realm," they feel "compelled" to subjugate or annihilate anyone who stands in their way, which includes people from camp Y, since they are unwilling to watch quietly as their fellow human beings are slaughtered or enslaved en masse.
So, there you have it.
People in camp X will do anything to keep people in camp Y divided or distracted among themselves, as they pick them off, one by one.
This includes dividing them by race, by faith, by political party, even by degrees of tolerance - you name it. Anything to keep them bickering among themselves while camp X-ers are busy securing the realm.
For people from camp X, the only REALITY is the one they 'create' for themselves.
The real culprit is not a human being or even many of them. (It is not an alien species either, as quasimodo might suggest)
It is an ideology, it is Nihilism, it is in a spiritual sense, even "the devil".
It is the belief, that your personal interests are more important than life and dignity of anybody else.
Hitler´s evil derrived from this kind of belief system.
It was the philosophy of Nietzsche.
He stated: God is dead.
Then he put himself in his place saying, if God existed, than he, Nietzsche, was God.
Then he went crazy and ended in an asylum.
Slightly before that, Nietzsche pontificated about master- and slave ethics.
According to him "masters", the superior beings, stood above any ethic only "slaves" were subject to ethical norms.
Hitler put this thinking just on the level of "race", meaning that racial superior beings were the "masters" and did not have to treat "inferior races" according to the standards of ethics and law.
The new world order people went back again to the original Nietzsche with their philosophy Guru Leo Strauss.
They believe themselves to be superior individuals because of superior intelligence.
With this "superiority" they also believe, they stand above any common ethical principle, above any law and any
constitution.
Bush himself might or might not be a Christian Zionist.
It does not really matter, since he is no more than a puppet with very little influence. The people behind him, the political and financial elites, which pressure and hold his government are the real powers.
And they are no Christians and of course no Muslims, but no traditional Jews either.
They are either atheists or believers in some esoteric heresy, something which reinforces their notion, that they are special and stand above the human law.
And Steven, I do think, you underestimate us, when you think that we have no chance in stopping Bush and his crazys.
Of course you and I and qrswave cannot do it all alone.
But we are part of what is called "public opinion" and it looks as if something is shifting all over the world, even in the United States and Israel.
Politicians, intellectuals and media people are starting to speak out. These people have gotten the courage to do it, because they know they are not alone. They know about us, the many who will stand with them and behind them.
It might not be very long, until 9/11 will be officially ackowledged as inside job.
And then, the Empire of evil, the "new world order", will fall.
in the ironic position of having to destroy people in camp X - simply, in order to survive - even though they would rather just live and let live.
This miserable irony is compounded when people from camp X, who are habitual liars, twist this insufferable predicament to their advantage by labeling as 'terrorists' those from camp Y who are simply struggling to survive.
This, of course, fools some people in camp Y into thinking other people in camp Y are out to kill them, when in fact, they are after camp X-ers in disguise, in their midst.
So, how in bloody hell do you tell the difference - when it would appear that both are homicidal - between people in camp X, who started this madness and perpetuate it in order to get a leg up, and people in camp Y who are simply struggling to survive?!!
THAT is the most urgent task at hand for every human being:
Use all your cognitive powers to IDENTIFY THE ENEMY - camp X-ers.
Afterwhich, unfortunately, do what must be done - incapicitate them BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY - before they DESTROY US ALL.
Does that make sense?
The question, however, is, if this could be the most efficient tactic.
You know, that 9/11 was an inside job, do you?
It was done in order to push the world into an endless war.
The perpetrators believe, that this violence blamed on the Muslim peoples of the world, will get the west into the right frame of mind.
They wanted the minds of the people beset with fear and, resulting from this, hatred.
Every act of violence especially one in which innocent people, children die, plays in the hands of those instigators of world-war.
I do understand why Palestinians resist sometimes in violent manner.
The opression is too hard to bear.
But to me it seems that they can in no way win the war militarily. They just don´t have the means to it.
And every terrotist act is being used as a new justification for Israel to react with even more state-terrorism.
This is the reason, why Israel allways tried to provoke the Palestinians whenever Hamas and others had declared a seize fire or a wish for negotiatens.
Yes, I do believe Iran has the right to fight back, when the US or Israel attack.
And according to international law every occupied country has the right to fight the occupation with military means, if civilians are not deliberately targeted.
Vietnam and Lebanon have shown, that people fighting an occupation or invasion can defeat a militarily stronger enemy.
Palestine itself is a different manner, since the Israeli army lives there. They are no longer a small group of invaders, but backed up by a population of 5 million people.
The solution must be political and be brought with the help of the international community.
And there the public opinion counts. The more the Palestinians can present the case that they are the victims and the Israelis the guilty party, the more will be the international pressure on the Israelis.
The question of violence is not only a matter of mushy heart good feeling:
Why can´t we all get along with each other, it is also a matter of what strategy works better.
And in my opinion in most cases, the non-violent will work better.
And as I said, the minute, when it is official, that 9/11 was an inside job, that very minute, most of the worst camp X people can be arrested and tried in a court of law, even the money people, since it is not possible to hide and cover up every money trail.