Say-So

The KDT (Kupieckie Domy Towarowe) or in loose translation - Merchants’ Shopping Center in the heart of Warsaw is history. Its closure registered in international headlines due to a formidable resistance of the tenant merchants against the incoming bailiffs and private guard. Polish media described the events as a “battle of a magnitude unseen since 1989″. Indeed, the images of the struggle were reminiscent of the heydays of Solidarity back when it was still a trade union free of political aspirations. The retailers of KDT barricaded themselves inside the halls and fought to preserve 2000 jobs the loss of which is estimated to impact 8000 people.

Mainstream news sources delivered a brief and sensationalistic account of the recent chain of events. Tear gas, stone throwing, water blasts and beatings caused injuries to roughly 100 people. The leaders of KDT partnership had been negotiating with the city regarding their status as occupants of prime real estate for years. As a result of last round of failed talks, current mayor of Warsaw (the post is also commonly known as the presidency of the city) - Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz - refused to renew the lease in January 2009. The occupants of KDT ran their business illegally since, and were informed of the time and date of eviction. Warsaw’s municipal government claims that the tenants unlawfully refused to vacate the building. The organizers of the opposition will be criminally charged and held accountable for property damage.

Sympathizers on the side of the city portray the merchants as obstructionist, self centered and greedy, their lengthy, assertive negotiations as seeking special consideration. The KDT hall, which was a makeshift shopping center and not a “bazaar” as it is too often called, was constructed in 2001 to replace an open air market of free standing metal stands popularly nicknamed “jaws”. Made of sheets of corrugated metal it was always intended to be a temporary solution until the permanent shopping center was built in its stead. Ten years ago that temporary shelter, (while its aesthetic was questioned) was considered to be a face lift, certainly an improvement over the free standing stalls. It is now thought of as an eyesore by the increasing numbers of the ever more sophisticated Varsovians.

What took place on the streets of Warsaw, and what many fail to recognize and appropriately name - is sadly a story seen many times before all around the globe - the dispossession of poorly organized segments of population by a neoliberal government looking out for the interests of big business. The impressive resistance mounted by the merchants is a testimony to their weakness, not strength. Their unique situation comprised of a combination of cultural diversity entirely new in Polish society along with their ambiguous class definition made it difficult to align themselves politically and seek protective backing. That same set of circumstances made them vulnerable to exploitation by self serving politicians. It is that lack of political representation that drove the KDT partnership towards desperate and violent measures according to Agata Czarnacka author of an opinion published at the left wing political commentary website krytykapolityczna.pl. Hers is a knowledgeable and compassionate account of everything not mentioned anywhere else about the KDT Warsaw crisis. The essay titled “Bloody Riots Among the Middle Class” deserves a full translation, here I hope to do her justice by summing up some of her more poignant points. (original in Polish).

Ms. Czarnacka recounts that back in 1999 when the KDT partnership was founded under the Civic Platform mandated Warsaw presidency - an average KDT merchant was a model CP voter, a hard working, entrepreneurial, self-made individualist. Under the rival Law and Justice mayorship in 2005, promises of a 30 year lease and a newly built proper locale were made no doubt in order to woo the relevant voters in the face of looming elections. The merchants’ egos were stroked, and expectations set high. When Ms. Gronkiewicz-Waltz became the mayor in 2006, she was faced with significant degree of posturing and tactical vying for most advantageous outcome by the KDT representatives - a result of prior negotiations under a different government. As recently as a few months ago, in summer 2009, the merchants were being courted by both the Democratic Left Alliance and by the Democratic Party.

Most interestingly, the author brings to light the curiously nationalist image that the KDT has forged, branding itself as a “Polish place to shop” in direct opposition to the supposedly Jewish Golden Terraces across the street. This postulated image is all the more jarring if one has indeed had the opportunity to visit or shop at KDT. It was by far more ethnically diverse than the average cross section of the Polish population, with many merchants having come from the middle east or the far east. The Asian, and the most numerous among them - the Vietnamese diaspora, are generally marginalized in the Polish society to the point of invisibility.

Add to the mix the unclear and ill defined class standing and unsurprisingly the situation becomes noxious. The article mentions that the neoliberal practices in Poland forced significant chunks of population into self employment and created a new sector of society which could typically be defined as middle class entrepreneurs but without the backbone capital usually associated with it. The ambivalent character of the new Polish proletariat disallows the application of Western social conventions, since according to Ms. Czarnacka the “working class” (which serves as a counterpart to the “middle class”), has been eliminated from existence. To which, I will add alas - in theory perhaps, but not in practice.

When Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz assumed the city presidency, the plans for the prime spot occupied by the KDT changed and along with it, turned the fortune of the lessee retailers. A shopping area is still part of the proposal for the development of the greater stretch of Parade Square, but its crown jewel will be a Museum of Modern Arts. On the first glance it is a lofty idea and a fitting design for exploitation of the most desirable real estate in the country. It is also a skillful public relations measure convincing the public that the presence of provincial merchants trading with cheap Asian goods is a tarnishing anathema to the image of Warsaw as a thriving European capital.

It is mid 2009 and the KDT has been liquidated. The construction of the museum and the adjacent shopping center will not start till 2011, if at all. It is worthwhile mentioning that the merchants have collected and payed 16 million PLN for the 700 stands and now vacant KDT hall. Adding insult to injury, the city of Warsaw made the new proposed retail area “available” to the KDT merchants - at a rental market price (140 EU/m2 per month). To put things in perspective, presently, the EUR-PLN exchange is 1-4, while minimum wage is less than 1300 PLN monthly. Since, very predictably (and I dare to say premeditatedly) it was well beyond reach of the KDT partnership, the city earmarked alternative locations to which the retailers could move. All of them turned out to be on the peripheries of the city. Under pressure from the KDT negotiators, the city representatives offered up a few central areas one of which, near Okopowa street was finally agreed upon, for the price of 41 mln PLN. Embittered merchants claim that the agreement never came to fruition because the city negotiators at the last minute raised the price to 65 mln PLN. Moreover, the city boasted offering 200 merchant stands without auction on first come first served basis for those who voluntarily renounced their KDT spots. On closer scrutiny - 200 spots when 700 are needed - is not a gesture of rapprochement but a divisive tactic aiming to split and weaken the KDT opposition.

Despite the facts seriously calling into question the attitude and the goodwill of the city in respect to KDT, the Polish public opinion is divided. To some, the disobeying of law, rioting and disorder are in themselves transgressions worthy of condemnation. The expurgation by the city of “bazaar” vendors is fully supported. The KDT merchants were considered to have had plenty of notice. They ought to have taken care of themselves and secured alternative sources of income. They are fully to blame for their own demise.

Others, criticize the nationalist tendencies and the demagogic tactics (such as presence of children in the barricaded hall) used by the organizers of the KDT, their unwillingness to compromise, the misdirection of efforts away from securing employment and instead focusing on achieving political victory (original article in Polish). Ironically, alongside the supporters of the municipal government, this view holds the KDT leaders unilaterally responsible for the riots, violence and personal injuries.

The majority holds a compromising view - splitting the blame and accusing both parties of absence of goodwill and inability to reach an agreement. It is seemingly a sensible stance going amiss on one crucial point - that of inequitable negotiations and all too evident class oppression.

Only a minority sided with the victims of Tuesday’s eviction. They chanted and marched, protested, waved flags and taunted the police which was called in on behalf of the city to help overpower the unexpectedly strong opposition. The singing of the national anthem, the chanting of the name of “Solidarity” and banners with nationalist slogans were evocative of the great struggle for freedom of the 1980s. The methods used in protests clearly have not changed in the last 20 years, but Poland has. According to a 2002 census roughly 1.23% declared “other” as nationality (ie. other than Polish, Silesian, German, Belorussian, Ukrainian, Roma etc.) and 2.03% did not declare any. Who are the 1.25 mln people living in Poland who choose to call themselves “other” or not to identify themselves at all? Where were the racial minorities who also had a stake in the fight over KDT during riots? How do they feel about slogans such as “KDT - good because it is Polish”?

The populist Law and Justice party a close rival of the Civic Platform in the past, is already feeding off Ms. Gronkiewicz-Waltz’s failure to handle the crisis. Naturally, their criticism is politically motivated and reactionary. It is conceivable however that they will be able to recapture the imagination of the Polish electorate in the face of increasingly more visible fallout of liberal economics. The lack of sensitivity that Poles exhibit towards minorities may turn, under heavy nationalistic rule into something much, much, worse.

Sometime ago, following an interview with Dr. Christina Romer, the chairman of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers on Meet the Press I haphazardly listed the figurative and real wars waged in this country in the last 100 years which is to say, only last 4 generations:

The War on Journalism, the War on Christmas, the War on Terror, the War in Iraq, the War in Afghanistan, the Kosovo War, the Persian Gulf War, the military invasions of Panama, Grenada and Bay of Pigs, the War on Drugs, the War on Poverty, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, WWII, WWI, Philippine-American War .

Without a pause or a blink and with the benevolent smile of a good-natured aunt, Dr. Romer agreed with Warren Buffet’s dooming diagnosis. In a day, what was known as an economic crisis is now referred to as “economic-war”. In her chirpy, upbeat voice punctuated by assertive nods, she called the chain of desperate government measures to halt an utter collapse of the economic order as we know it - “a wonderful battle”.

In the midst of the War on Terror, the unfinished War on Drugs, with physical military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan (presently spilling into Pakistan), the thoughtlessness with which the American press turns “war” into an American meme is off-putting. Adding to my sense of unease is the full list of United States military history which on a close examination showcases that not a single decade has gone by without America being at war abroad and in its early days at home or more accurately, what became its home turf following armed assault and engagement.

The terminology of “war” as applied in an attempt to solve the nation’s social problems, was first introduced by Lyndon B. Johnson who declared War on Poverty in 1964. As president, he was also responsible for escalating the Vietnam conflict into a full fledged war following the events in the Gulf of Tonkin. Since, emblematic wars of all kind appear to be springing about as a matter of fact. Richard Nixon, no doubt wanting to replicate the initial support and momentum of the War on Poverty, applied the term to War on Drugs in 1969. The War on Terror initiated by president G. W. Bush after September 11th 2001 is another one without a foreseeable end. Eight years after the destruction of the World Trade Center terrorist attacks have been taking place across Africa, the middle East, south west Asia, Europe and Russia and it is now generally accepted that terrorism cannot be contained or fought with traditional military tactics; 40 years since the War on Drugs - illicit substances of abuse and the related crime have not disappeared from the United States, instead in its escalation, the problem of drug trafficking north and gun trafficking south has brought the neighboring country of Mexico to its knees and bloated the US prison population beyond sustainability; 45 years since the War on Poverty - still anywhere between 12%-17% of Americans struggle to feed their families in a country of plenty which boasts the world’s highest GDP .

Yet time and time again, whenever progress in any one of America’s ongoing wars is assessed, a trite and predictable question echoes in the media - “Are we winning?” It is interesting to note, that the only generally acknowledged defeat in the continuous string of America’s historical military battles, is Vietnam. Culturally, in line with the national delusion of grandeur and the idea of American Exceptionalism it appears that a lack of success - is not perceived as an outright failure. Perhaps this is the reason why president G. W. Bush could insist for years that American troops were making progress in Iraq. As long as the boots stayed on the ground and the country did not pulverize itself in sectarian struggle - American occupying forces “did not lose” and therefore by simpleton’s logic - were winning.

The United State’s propensity towards war is well documented by great scholars like Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky and Chalmers Johnson . Their combined books and essays on the topics of permanent war economy, the military industrial complex and Pax Americana speak loud and clear. The pervasive and gratuitous usage of “war” as a metaphor for struggle underscores what I believe is a deeply entrenched American phenomenon not dated, but recurring and highlighted daily in the headlines. Most recent such examples hot off the press are from Local New Jersey News: Morris County contest wages war on waistlines and the Delta Democrat Times: Relay for Life helps fund war on cancer.

The receptiveness with which the US citizenry rallies towards a cause and rolls up their sleeves in order to tackle challenges head on is admirable. It is reminiscent of the early days of the Republic and the somewhat mutated but very well alive spirit of Go West Young Man. Sadly the effects of expansionist settlement on native population were always neglected in the fervor of nationalist pride and “can do” sentiment. American history was and to this day still is written by the hands of white men, in the past conquerors and colonizers, men who adhered to the idea of Manifest Destiny and in recent history those who subscribe to the doctrine of Interventionism. The colloquial acceptance of “war” in all its possible permutations in the American speech and comfort with which the public accepts and never critically rejects this formal abuse point to the fact that “war” is more than an issue of foreign policy, it is in fact a national state of mind and a widespread common mentality.

The walloping “once in a century” tsunami of sub-prime mortgage defaults, financial institution collapses and inter-bank lending freezes has swept eastward, rising tall in the United States, gushing forth and toppling the economies of Iceland, Ukraine and Hungary and unhorsing the economies of the EU. The fallout is felt world wide in the form of wildly oscillating currency prices and erratic stock market performances.

At the epicenter of the “submarine quake” triggering the destructive wave - in the United States - the long term and steady deregulation of financial markets which started under the Reagan administration, continued through three Bush terms (George H.W and George W.) and the Clinton years, along with the faulty economic ideology abode by Alan Greenspan was fatally joined in a “menage a trois” by the loosening of the borrowing criteria. The resulting, unbridled growth culminated in the dot-com bubble. With barely 2 year respite the US housing bubble began rising.

Now that the burst of this latest mass delusion is finally history after years of circulating warnings of which perhaps the most famous is the term - Irrational Exuberance - fingers are being pointed back at the man who curiously coined that phrase, the 1987-2006 Chairman of Federal Reserve - Alan Greenspan. Perhaps rightfully so. He held one of the most important economic policy-making jobs in America 19 years out of the last 25 which when looking at the Inflation adjusted S&P 500, 1925-Present were marked by insatiable and unprecedented stock market boom thwarting all previous highs in American economic history.

A self described Libertarian-Republican, a friend and admirer of Ayn Rand who contributed to her non-fiction book Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal, Greenspan admitted in a congressional hearing in October that his free-market anti-regulation ideology was flawed. At the 1996 Annual Dinner lecture of the AEI sounding quite confused and uncertain, he nevertheless thought that it was possible for “financial asset bubble” to be detached from the “real economy”:

But how do we know when irrational exuberance has unduly escalated asset values, which then become subject to unexpected and prolonged contractions as they have in Japan over the past decade? And how do we factor that assessment into monetary policy? We as central bankers need not be concerned if a collapsing financial asset bubble does not threaten to impair the real economy, its production, jobs, and price stability. Indeed, the sharp stock market break of 1987 had few negative consequences for the economy. But we should not underestimate or become complacent about the complexity of the interactions of asset markets and the economy. Thus, evaluating shifts in balance sheets generally, and in asset prices particularly, must be an integral part of the development of monetary policy.

Such mix of sophisticated thinking and naivete is explainable only through one other quite uniquely human but terrifying capacity: faith. Faith in market fundamentalism in this case. It was therefore possible for Greenspan to set forth monetary policies which premeditated or not engineered the housing bubble, possibly to cushion the post dot-com correction and snatch the US economy off the brink of looming 2001-2002 recession. Whether the aggressive and prolonged cut of interest rates was motivated by twisted neo-conservative patriotism in the face of “post 9/11 world”, greed or naivete, is a matter of perspective. What is certain however, is that along with President Bush’s infamous calls “to shop” as part of the civilian sacrifice required at the time of war (”the war on terror”, the war in Afghanistan and the Iraq war), the interest rate cuts were measures to kick-start the American economy at all costs. The bulk of the cost it appears now, was transferred to the overextended borrower who was actively enticed and encouraged to consume beyond his/her means in order to keep the US economy churning.

Catherine Rampell, the author of “How Long Before the Market Bottoms?” which embeds Robert Shiller’s Inflation adjusted S&P 500 graph, summarizes her post by saying:

After the Great Depression, it took 29 years — until 1958 — for the market to reach its pre-Depression, inflation-adjusted peak. After the 1970s recession, it took 24 years — until 1992 — for the market to make a full “recovery” by the same measure. So no matter whether you start from the recent 2007 peak, or from the market’s absolute inflation-adjusted peak during the tech bubble in 2000, we may still have at least a decade to go before full “recovery.”

It rings true, against voices who speak of one, three or even 5 year recovery. Economists describe the depth and breadth of the oncoming recession in terms of alphabet letters V, U, W, or L. The Wall Street Journal (via The Conscience of a Liberal) ironically predicts the “the W recession” to follow the M shape of the preceding boom.

Robert Shiller who’s S&P 500 historical chart provides such strong visual to the present day crisis, is an economist and a Professor of Economics at Yale University as well as a best selling author of “Irrational Exuberance” which was updated and re-released in 2006 and barely off the press “The Subprime Solution“. The Irrational Exuberance book review states:

Shiller amasses impressive evidence to support his argument that the recent housing market boom bears many similarities to the stock market bubble of the late 1990s, and may eventually be followed by declining home prices for years to come. After stocks plummeted when the bubble burst in 2000, investors moved their money into housing. This precipitated the inflated real estate prices not only in America but around the world, Shiller maintains. Hence, irrational exuberance did not disappear—it merely reappeared in other settings.

He studies investor confidence indexes and is one of the key scholars in the field of Behavioral Economics.

Behavioral finance highlights certain inefficiencies and among these inefficiencies are underreactions or overreactions to information, as causes of market trends and in extreme cases of bubbles and crashes). Such misreactions have been attributed to limited investor attention, overconfidence / overoptimism, and mimicry (herding instinct) and noise trading.

The ongoing global economic calamity, deemed the worst since the Great Depression, is a case in point.
The investors’ reactions to the government’s attempts to contain and control the crisis are arbitrary and volatile. The insights of the economists tackling the Subprime Mortgage Crisis/Credit Crisis, most likely go as deep as the studies ran or aknowledged by Improbable Research that is to say they are obvious, unusable and often absurdly funny. The slap on the forehead - “duh” effect - of hind sight into the recent economic events, in a moment of dark humor seemed not very different from the conclusions reached by the 2008 lg Nobel Prize for Physics winners, Dorian Raymer of the Ocean Observatories Initiative at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Douglas Smith of the University of California, San Diego who mathematically proved that heaps of string or hair or almost anything else will inevitably tangle themselves up in knots.

It is well known that a jostled string tends to become knotted; yet the factors governing the “spontaneous” formation of various knots are unclear. We performed experiments in which a string was tumbled inside a box and found that complex knots often form within seconds. We used mathematical knot theory to analyze the knots. Above a critical string length, the probability P of knotting at first increased sharply with length but then saturated below 100%. This behavior differs from that of mathematical self-avoiding random walks, where P has been proven to approach 100%.

The political discussion in America in the last three weeks throughout the Democratic and Republican conventions and thereafter has been riveting. The 2008 presidential elections are called “historical”, “critical” and “change-bringing” by both parties. Seven weeks before the elections and despite the hop-scotching poll results the stance of the Republican party is clearly defensive indicating that this time it is the Democratic candidate who is endowed not only with progressive ideas and inclusive attitudes but also with likability, charm and charisma, the very qualities which remembering past elections, seem to matter more to voters than intelligence of a candidate and his knowledge of domestic or international issues. John McCain’s campaign oafishly emulates the Democratic party successes by hijacking Hillary Clinton’s achievement in mobilizing women’s support in the Democratic primary elections and putting forth Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice Presidentential choice. Both Hillary Clinton in the primaries and John McCain in his nomination acceptance speech blatantly stole Barack Obama’s slogan of campaigning for “change” and thus perhaps inadvertently admitted that it is He who has the upper hand. Most surprisingly, in a knee jerk reaction that was placing Sarah Palin’s name on the Republican ticket, McCain’s campaign relinquished their most widely trumpeted argument against Barack Obama’s candidacy - his youth and relatively short serving time as a Senator. In a great departure from his campaign mantra of “country first” McCain has made a strategic choice by picking the very conservative Palin as his running mate and put the needs of his electoral campaign ahead of those of the country. This “cut to measure” approach appears to be a true trademark of McCain’s 2008 presidential tender. The so called “man of principles” and a “maverick” recanted his position on most every single issue he held. The list is only too long.

On tax cuts (CNN Money, February 19 2008)

McCain now advocates extending the Bush tax cuts that he twice voted against.

On waterboarding (Dallas News, Mar 12, 2008):

McCain has been unequivocal in stating his conviction that waterboarding is torture, and is illegal. He also traded on his public reputation for probity on this question to lay into his GOP presidential opponents who were anything short of forthrightly condemning waterboarding. He even said in that debate that the Army Field Manual ought to be the standard, and said he doesn’t understand how anybody could want an American to torture. So now he comes out to vote against a bill that would actually have banned waterboarding. How does he justify it? With what strikes me as incomprehensible legalism. Seriously, can someone please explain how McCain’s rationale makes sense? Because I’m not seeing it. I think he’s flip-flopping — and on an issue that he’s not given any of his opponents any wiggle room on.

On aid to some mortgage holders (The New York Times, April 11, 2008):

Mr. McCain, an Arizona Republican, had been painted as uncaring by Democrats, and drew murmurs of concern from some Republicans, after a speech in California last month in which he cautioned that “it is not the duty of government to bail out and reward those who act irresponsibly, whether they are big banks or small borrowers,” and noted that the crisis had been brought on by both lenders and borrowers.Since then, he has gone out of his way to try to signal that he understands that times are tough and that people are hurting. His speech in Brooklyn — which is to be followed by what aides are billing as a major economic address next week — was a shift in tone (…)

On domestic spying (Wired BlogNetwork, June 03, 2008):

McCain’s new position plainly contradicts statements he made in a December 20, 2007 interview with the Boston Globe where he implicitly criticized Bush’s five-year secret end-run around the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. “I think that presidents have the obligation to obey and enforce laws that are passed by Congress and signed into law by the president, no matter what the situation is,” McCain said. The Globe’s Charlie Savage pushed further, asking , “So is that a no, in other words, federal statute trumps inherent power in that case, warrantless surveillance?” To which McCain answered, “I don’t think the president has the right to disobey any law.” McCain’s embrace of extrajudicial domestic wiretapping is effectively a bounce-back from Fish’s comments, made at the Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference in Connecticut last month.

On offshore oil drilling (Washington Post, June 17, 2008):

“We must embark on a national mission to eliminate our dependence on foreign oil,” McCain told reporters yesterday. In a speech today, he plans to add that “we have untapped oil reserves of at least 21 billion barrels in the United States. But a broad federal moratorium stands in the way of energy exploration and production. . . . It is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions.” McCain’s announcement is a reversal of the position he took in his 2000 presidential campaign and a break with environmental activists (…)

On immigration (CNN Politics, July 16, 2008):

n 2005, he angered some in his party when he and Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy unsuccessfully pushed for a comprehensive immigration overhaul bill that included a path to citizenship. His sponsorship of the legislation angered some conservatives and nearly derailed his presidential campaign in 2007. But at a Republican debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in January, McCain was asked whether he would still vote for his original measure. “No, I would not … because we know what the situation is today … that people want the borders secured first,” he said, prompting accusations that he had flip-flopped.

On timetable for withdrawal from Iraq (FirstRead MSNBC, July 25, 2008):

In an interview on CNN today — which the DNC is passing around — McCain said that withdrawal from Iraq in 16 months is “a pretty good timetable.” That answer came when McCain was asked about Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki’s earlier claim to Der Spiegel that Obama’s 16-month plan “would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes.”Of course, McCain did stress that such a withdrawal would “have to be based on conditions on the ground.” But calling 16 months a “good timetable” is something McCain hasn’t said before — and probably never would have said a week ago.

On affirmative action (ABC News, July 27, 2008):

McCain has long opposed quotas but his new support for ending affirmative action programs which stop short of quotas puts him at odds not only with Democratic rival Barack Obama but also with the Arizona senator’s own views in 1998.

The persistent rightward drift on most of the above issues has put McCain more in line with the canonical position of his party. The nomination of ultra conservative running mate has cemented the support of the initially lukewarm Republican base towards his candidacy for president. The poll ratings have surged. It is clear that nonconformism and individualism have no place in the GOP cosmology - it is partisan loyalty even if dishonest - that scores marks.

Sarah Palin has been called a “Rovian pick” and her RNC podium appearance - a “Rovian speech”. Karl Rove who advises John McCain’s campaign, unlike Machiavelli, did not lay down his views, principles or doctrine explicitly in writing, hence the “ian” suffix (Rov-ian) creating an adjective is a misnomer. Much has been written about Karl Rove however and his demagogic tactics. What comes across at the first glance as Palin’s weakness as a VP candidate, her small town roots and lack of governing experience, he saw as an asset. It wasn’t her wisdom, prior accomplishments nor the ability to gather bi-partisan support. On the contrary, it is the lack of thereof, her being a small town mayor, a plain talking hockey mom, a mother of pregnant and unwed teenage daughter and a parent of a child with Down’s syndrome that excited the Republican party proponents.

Jonathan Haidt an associate professor of psychology at the University of Virginia in a recent, fascinating article “What Makes People Vote Republican?” speaks of “ingroup/loyalty” as one of five values which are particularly important to social conservatives who constitute the Republican party base. He describes it as one “involving mechanisms that evolved during the long human history of tribalism”. His formal dissertation confirms what is patent to any keen observing eye, that the “Hockey moms 4 Palin” phenomenon is an expression of partisan unity based on identity, not policy. It is the same reason for which sport fans celebrate while shouting “we won” without having set a foot on a playing field.

Loyalty based on identity rather than social and political issues can be observed on the Democrats’ side as well with Blacks united
behind Barack Obama and Women rallied behind Hillary Clinton when the two opposed each other in the Democratic primaries. They are both accomplished, brilliant and exceptional individuals however, who also happen to be one “a woman” and the other “a black man”. In light of their popularity among their respective fan camps - Palin’s addition to the McCain ticket glares flatly and transparently like a patch of worn out fabric. She is to rake in the votes of working women who struggle with raising children and sustaining a traditional family unit. She is the “everyman” heroine and the Republican party tool.

During my 5 week absence from the United States between April 19th and May 30th, I led a largely self absorbed life in Buenos Aires, taking in the local reality, learning about Argentina’s political and economic challenges of the moment, bonding and assimilating. During that time, when my attention was turned away, the American media buzzed (and I seem to have caught the tail end off it upon my return) with articles and interviews with Fareed Zakaria. Within matter of weeks he appeared on Charlie Rose, The Daily Show and was a speaker at the New Yorker Conference.

Zakaria was a guest on The Daily Show for the first time shortly after the nefarious events of 9/11, in October 2001. As the editor of Newsweek magazine he talked about Islamic fundamentalism and why the regimes of the middle east provide such fertile ground for dangerous anti-American sentiments. He explained in brief and simplified manner what his Newsweek article - Why They Hate US thoroughly and knowledgeably laid out in a masterstroke of irrefutable logic. In that article he dismissed the simpleton’s notion promoted by president H.W. Bush, his administration and the supporting media, that America was hated for its “way of life” in which wealth and freedom are staple. He went on to analyze and explain how historical events of the last 30 years, economical predicaments and cultural particularities of the region, have conglomerated to shape the anti-American attitude of an increasing number of young middle eastern men, the attitude which gained mass and exploded into the forefront of American consciousness with two planes demolishing the World Trade Towers, and a third crashing short of its Pentagon target, killing thousands.

Fareed Zakaria’s latest book The Post American World is groundbreaking and equally as insightful. Mr Zakaria’s body of work encompasses many informative and enlightening essays, books and articles. “The Post American World” however is pivotal in potentially being capable of reflecting back to Americans how their country, their government and its policies are perceived in the global, international context. Just as an individual can benefit from a critical glance in a mirror, so can a nation. Zakaria’s book does America a favor by providing content which can be used as a reflective surface for our consideration. It helps to examine the quasi-mythological stature United State has risen to in the eyes of its patriot citizens as a result of the country’s role in the outcome of WWII and its unrivaled economic standing in decades following. The country found itself in an unprecedented position of being the world’s single dominant power after the collapse of the counterbalancing arch-nemesis - the Soviet Union in 1991. The imperial laurel crown seemed to have settled deeper onto the forehead of American body politic.

With the decline of communism, the currents of Globalization (at work for centuries, academically defined in the 60s and institutionalized in the 90s) were reinvigorated. They silently have been terra-forming the economic balance of power in the world. The United States today finds itself slightly caught unaware by unintended consequences of its own international economic policies. Since, flaunting of the “free market” is as typically American as holding high the standard of “democracy”. American companies have aggressively pursued new business opportunities opening up in China as the Soviet sphere of influence crumbled. Next came India. The access to massive cheap labor in both countries combined amounting to a third of our planet’s population proved irresistible. With help of foreign investment, China established itself as the producer of very affordable goods for export to the rest of the world and India as a hub of inexpensive information technology know-how. Both, as if to spite the critics of Globalization, have found their own respective international stronghold market niches which afford them economic influence and by extension political power from which they were excluded in the 20th century. Chinese and Indian rapid development are only two among a few others. Russia is rebounding. Brasil is the most recent new appendage to the list of large and fast growing countries.”The Rise of the Rest” is appropriately the subtitle of Fareed Zakaria’s book which aims to map out the position of the United States among nations in the light of the changes of the last decade. The book’s descriptions reads as follows:

This is not a book about the decline of America, but rather about the rise of everyone else.” So begins Fareed Zakaria’s important new work on the era we are now entering. Following on the success of his best-selling The Future of Freedom, Zakaria describes with equal prescience a world in which the United States will no longer dominate the global economy, orchestrate geopolitics, or overwhelm cultures. He sees the “rise of the rest”—the growth of countries like China, India, Brazil, Russia, and many others—as the great story of our time, and one that will reshape the world. The tallest buildings, biggest dams, largest-selling movies, and most advanced cell phones are all being built outside the United States. This economic growth is producing political confidence, national pride, and potentially international problems. How should the United States understand and thrive in this rapidly changing international climate? What does it mean to live in a truly global era? Zakaria answers these questions with his customary lucidity, insight, and imagination.

The un-American view - is a tough point to sell in USA and a difficult mindset to convey. Zakaria summarizes his ideas in The Future of American Power and offers a faint consoling statement to those who find it difficult to part with sitting at the helm of world affairs in The Rise of the Rest :

It’s true China is booming, Russia is growing more assertive, terrorism is a threat. But if America is losing the ability to dictate to this new world, it has not lost the ability to lead.

The new leadership role requires an inclusive world policy and a recognition of legitimate interests of other countries, a perspective clearly incomprehensible to the majority of American present day politicians. My intuition goes against Zakaria’s assertion that challenges the United Sates faces are mainly political and only to a small degree economic. The future he describes for America is in my opinion largely a theorem of best possible outcome. I see the decline of the country’s economic influence as a factor of its political girth. I find beauty in the following coincidental symmetry: the totalitarian regimes associated with communism were toppled from inside first by a native systemic creation - a workers’ union - the Solidarity, while the American imperial bubble was quietly punctured as the country was busy contemplating its own greatness by capitalism’s main driving process hungry for incessant growth and profit - the spread of free markets and Globalization, and its embodiment - the multinational corporation.

It is not the romantic fog blanketing the hills overlooking the San Francisco bay, or the cafe culture which in truly modernist Parisian way took root here with the Beat generation , nor is it the proximity to highly admired, world class, brilliant and resourceful community of the Silicon Valley . It isn’t the stunning coastal vistas, Victorian “painted ladies” or the murals in the Mission that have left a Cupid’s arrow irretrievably planted in the area of my heart marked by the letters “SF”.
The memory of fog horns breaking through the city’s monotonous traffic hum will forever flood my nervous system with serotonin, generating a pious experience rivaled only by soft snow fall on a winter Friday night in Montreal, when the city is illuminated and silenced while being tucked in by the copious white for the weekend.
The truly significant appreciation of San Francisco is embedded in me thanks to the city’s unrivaled GLBT community.

That strong realization became apparent on one of my usual weekend hunts for street photos last year, first at San Francisco Pride Celebration , and later in the summer at the annual San Francisco Love Fest , where besides the colorful costumes, loud music, alcohol in designated areas, brown bags otherwise, pot cakes and other substances unknown to me and for the most part illegal, the atmosphere was imbued with freedom of self expression in magnitude unprecedented anywhere else in the world. Amongst exhibitionists and fetishists of all possible denominations, were families; a family of two handsome Nordic looking men hand holding a 7 year old boy; a family consisting of two voluptuous black women closely watching over a brood of kids running around. It is at that moment when a transcendent recognition of universality of love as a human experience struck me. The queer and proud community of San Francisco is at the forefront of today’s continuing struggle for civil rights . The emancipation of women and African-Americans is history now, and though there is no national holiday commemorating the 19th amendment , Martin Luther King Day coincides every year with Roe V Wade anniversary, challenged in San Francisco by massive turn outs of anti-abortion activists from the surrounding country side.

This year, the pro-choice activists did more than counter protest. According to indybay.org , they organized a rally of their own. It was a meager gathering. A handful of a couple of hundred San Franciscans vs a healthy few thousand of pro-life attendees, mostly outsiders. I’d like to think that if the United States ever regressed to revoke the legality of women’s right to choose an abortion, the pro-choice attendees would match or outnumber the pro-lifers in head count. As is, the few Roe V Wade supporters, resorted to wonderfully creative tactics to make their voices heard over the repetitive mumblings of prayers of the anti abortion marchers. The “pro-choice” - “pro-life” issue is not isolated or pure in the agenda promoted by either side. Supporting the dichotomy is the massive behemoth of religion and its “anti-” on the opposing side. While the anti abortion slew led by men in long robes, paraded with crosses, Jesuses and images of the Virgin, the counter protesters waving metal coat hangers met them with home fashioned signs saying: “Better aborted than abandoned” and “May the fetus you save be gay”. I was strongly impressed with a very young lesbian couple leading a toddler by hand and carrying a younger baby in a back carrier. They sidelined the politically motivated religious procession along the Embarcadero stretch. At one point the more vocal woman of the couple burst out in random inharmonious vocalizations mimicking the religious chanting of the faithful followers. I thought it was brilliant. The contrast could not have been starker. Ultimately, there is a grand philosophical precipice between the two sides, that of “self-expression” vs. “self-suppression”. Belgian Le Soir in its eurotopics.net english translation speaking of Austrian army recruiting two Imams, used the word “obedience” referring to religious following. Perhaps it was just a slip of a tongue which sometimes plagues multilingual writers. I thought it was very accurate. While the 1000 Genome Project intends to examine and compare 1000 human samples from around the globe in order to help study disease, I hope that in not too far future, genetic sampling can help highlight other pivotal differences between people, such as what makes some of us indiscriminate, blind followers yearning to obey rigid hierarchical structures, and some of us free thinkers and iconoclasts yelling at the top of our lungs in uninhibited self expression.

“Persevering”, my coworker once described me. “Dogged” and “obsessive” I might add.

The post is again about Poland and what quickly becomes patent, my unresolved issues with the country of my birth. In the past year I have incited a few electronic discussions with my extended family on the topic of politics and the strong nationalistic, religious and conservative character of Poland in its current incarnation. On my recent visit we kept at it in person. Pointing out the negatives of laisse-faire market liberalism and the dangers inherent in strong nationalist and religious sentiments, I caught myself basing all my arguments on my daily living experience and current events in the United States. Both Poland and the USA are governed by right wing conservative parties, both are overwhelmingly Christian. It was only too inviting and too easy to make simpleminded comparisons.

I scoured Warsaw bookstores looking for an authentic overview of the most recent polish political history. I was searching for a local voice and a local perspective. For the most part however, I would find very little of interest, only the usual all too common display of John Paul II anthology and a litany of polish WWII victimhood. Ultimately, in a downtown Warsaw bookstore (hosting a gun shop! [my "liberal/latte sipping/San Francisco intellectual" bias bobs up in acknowledgment that Walmart and guns is lamentable but expected, yet a combination of bookstore and guns seems shockingly denatured]) I reached out for a book by David Ost.

—

It is now a few months since I paused that last thought, Poland kicked the ultra right wing coalition and elected a pro market government which differs from its predecessor by a hair, mainly in the international pro-European stance - a welcome change. I have since finished reading The Defeat of Solidarity . The irony of reading a book in Polish translation about the socio-economical and political processes in Poland written in English by an American professor of political science, is noteworthy. I suspect that the reason for my inability to find a Polish authored analysis of the transition from a planned market to a free market economy and its effects on the Polish society is due to the lack of distance and grand perspective, which David Ost possessed by virtue of simply being an outsider.

The book is very informative. Its most captivating point in my opinion is the attempt to explain how the hardships of economic reforms and the inability of political leadership to keep its electorate, ultimately resulted in increased support for extreme right-wing ideas. It may seem like an unfortunate turn of events where the working classes shunned and dismissed by their elected leaders found others, who happened to espouse nationalist and catholic ideologies and who were willing to listen to their grievances and take on their causes all of course, in the self serving pursuit of rising to power. The truth of the matter is however that Poland always has been a tradition bound conservative society; nationalist, since its borders were constantly threatened by invading neighbors ever since its birth as a country in the 10th century, and fervently catholic, ever more so, since religion was denounced by the communist regime. The path that David Ost is tracing however fascinating, is rather a short one. It takes a religious society with strong national identity to one that is inclined to emphasize those aspects as unique attributes.

My hesitance for drawing too literal of a parallel between Poland and America, stems from uncertainty as to whether the same basic list of ingredients will produce the same exact cake. In other words, whether liberal market, social conservatism and prominent religion will result in a society of marked contrasts between rich and poor, little or no social safety nets or benefits, discrimination towards minorities on the basis of alternative sexual orientation, reactionary and defensive stance in respect to the rest of the world, dated and dangerous attitudes towards women and reproductive rights, inclination to limit or outwardly suppress free speech in attempts to appease religious sensibilities, just to name a few.
Common sense dictates that I am both right and wrong in tracing the similarities between the two countries as predictors of Poland’s ultimate post transitional outcome. Of course, there is the process. Skilled cooks can work marvels with just potatoes, peas and carrots. At the same time, their creation has zero chances of turning out to be a lemon merengue pie.

Sat. Feb 10th 2007.

Slate’s daily newspaper overview titled Du Faust Mich provocatively translated by Babel Fish as “You fist me” . (With all fairness, not knowing German and being weary of dangers of literal interlingual translations, I am a little suspicious of the interesting double-entendre, especially since the article mentions another headline about the nomination of Dr. Drew Gilpin Faust as the first female president of Harvard.) Perhaps Faust in the title is intended as last name only.

However, having proceeded to read about the Bushies machinations to draw a link between Al-Qadea and (spinning the roulette… wait.. wait…) ah yes this time - Iran, “you fist me” comes to mind.

The Washington Post leads with a fascinating/frightening story on some al-Qaeda militants that Iran has under house arrest. They’re kept as bargaining chips, but Bush is about to label it cooperation between al-Qaeda and Iran.

Actual Washington Post article, here. More about the humdrum march towards incitement and escalation of the conflict with Iran is wittily written at Empire Burlesque . To those with short memory spans I’d like to remind that this entire exercise is a repeat pattern of setting the goal first ( ex. invading Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein ) then proceeding to misrepresent the actual events to support that predetermined goal. Think The Downing Street Memo .

What did the young poles at a Warsaw anti war protest in early 2006 know that the American public is not waking up to? The top most line on the sign translates: “No to war with Iran”.

Sat. Jan. 27th 2007.

Anti War rally in San Francisco, supporting the march on Washington . Too many of whom I know did not attend. Among reasons given was the unwillingness to be identified as supporting various radical agendas of extreme left groups, or doubt that anyone at all listens. Ironically, San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area have grown complacent about their civic responsibilities, precisely because of the area’s famous history as a bastion of liberalism. Maybe, it is a new generation which never had to struggle for work, safety or pay. A new generation which considers the spoils of the middle class lifestyle its birth right.

I sincerely believe that making a presence at a anti-war rally while no visceral consequences of it are felt, is an abstraction to most. A war goes on half way across the globe for which our administration and our tax money are responsible and yet we continue dining out, dancing, drinking, watching football, movies. What good does a protest do anyway? How effective is it in bringing about change? Perhaps not very. Historically strikes and rallies were the means of the poor, the exploited, the uneducated. Their only power - their physical being, their only advantage - that of numbers of their bodies lined shoulder to shoulder and their will and determination to not submit to exploitation any longer.

Today’s affluent and resourceful Americans have created entire organizations, web sites, short films, street art, spoken word, poetry, donated money, bought and wore tshirts, bumper stickers, to voice their disapproval of the Iraq war and the way the Bush administration misled the country. Yet, unless one condones those actions - standing at a protest is the very least one can, and should feel compelled to do. Anything else, like focusing on the minutia of group affiliation or futility of a protest, is grossly missing the large picture.

Here are a couple of reminders from people wiser and greater than myself, whose words will hopefully weigh enough to push through the inertia of the middle class comfort (via quotes.liberty-tree.ca )

George Orwell

“The ordinary man is passive. Within a narrow circle, home life, and perhaps the trade unions or local politics, he feels himself master of his fate. But otherwise he simply lies down and lets things happen to him.”

Plato

“The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs, is to be ruled by evil men.”

Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoi

“You may not be interested in war, but war is very interested in you.”

James Madison

“Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.”

Reverend Martin Niemoeller

“In Germany, the Nazis first came for the communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, but I didn’t speak up because I was a protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak for me.”

Please visit:
afterdowningstreet.org

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Last week I flipped through the chapters of “The God Delusion”, a Richard Dawkins book. Most arguments were familiar and I decided not to pick up yet another book to add to my reading list which already magnifies exponentially. Yet, I payed extra attention to the last chapter hoping to get the very general summary of the book’s drift and there I found a very interesting analogy. Dawkins compares religion restricting the viewing field of humanity, to that of a woman peering out from behind a burqa. Both are limiting, and in case of religion deprive the believer from a deeper and fully encompassing view of the world while in case of a burqa deprive the wearer from basking her limbs in the free flow of air. Perhaps because I am more sensitive to the tragedy of limiting a human mind than merely her body, I am not going to argue the first point. The topic of a burqa however, is more complex than it seems at a first glance.

To many in the western world the burqa has become a symbol of female subjugation. Understandably so, a head to toe clad female figure is a powerful image to unaccustomed observer. It is true that women in countries like Saudi Arabia or Iran are required to wear the strictest form of hijab and are discriminated against, their legal rights held in the hands of male relatives. Yet the two are not tied by default. In the majority of Muslim countries modest dress is encouraged, while the full bodied cloaking an option, undeniably reinforced by societal and or family pressures, but a choice nevertheless. What the westerners often ignore in their aversion to hijab, is that denying a woman a right to wear it in public, is an oppression equal to the one exerted by theocratic governing Muslim states which mandate it.

Religion ought not drive legislation and government should not favor any one religion in particular, but we ought to provide room for religious expression in our personal lives if such need exists. By wearing a head scarf, a hijab, or in its extreme form a burqa, a woman guided by her faith asserts in public her modesty, just as another woman by wearing tight fitting clothing chooses to emphasize her femininity. Ironically neither one is freer than her sister.

It is no secret that women in the “free” society spend significant amount of their income on apparel and cosmetic procedures in indirect and for the most part unconscious competition with each other. Competition as always, for resources. The resource being male attention for the purpose of mating and companionship. It used to be a matter of survival or at least of bettering the quality of life for her and her offspring. It has become a luxury since women become providers in addition to being mothers and care takers, one that nevertheless is not trivial to renounce.

The story of a young girl, Cennet Doganay trapped in the clash between two cultures, and her dramatic response to the 2004 french law banning conspicuous religious symbols in schools by shaving her head, is a poignant example of a secular rule perhaps taken a little too far. The French government in an attempt to better integrate the diverse cultural and religious minorities and reinforce the non religious nature of its institutions, has infringed on the personal freedoms of its citizens.
The fact that the citizens in question are minors and their liberties are otherwise fully held by their family members, is another grand topic on to itself. Yet, with the inter-cultural tensions rising in France and Britain in the last few years, it is worrisome that ignorance and xenophobia are excused in the name of secularism as in the more recent example of squabbles over muslim and christian religious symbols in Britain.

The greater picture of a woman in burqa is not the superficial outward appearance of her limited freedom, but that covering or baring her body, is ultimately her very own unadulterated choice. For biological and evolutionary reasons perpetuated into today’s societies a woman’s body has been iconicized and thus in a way made into a domain of public debate. What polemicists of all persuasions ought to remember is that tolerance for variety and furthermore, respect and celebration of our differences, is what brings about harmony and creates a stable society, and not a forced uniformity of dress or suppression of personal expression. What can unite us, despite the myriad of life choices we all make, is the universal ability to chose who we want to be, misguidedly perhaps, but freely.

In an attempt to expand my horizons last year I attended a short math refresher course. I very vividly remember my delight at solving very simple math problems. It was the absolute and definitive nature of it that had me almost laugh out loud. There may be numerous methods, but unequivocally there is always only one correct answer and it is always persistently true. Having heard about Grigori Perelman’s refusal to accept the Field’s Medal for a body of work helping to solve the Poincare Conjecture I found his response pleasantly in sync with my impression of mathematics. Perelmans refusal to accept the honors and attend the prize ceremony was unilateral, unquestionable and left unapologetically unexplained. And so, I spent the last few weeks contemplating *absolutes*. Operating outside of the scientific realm, absolute imperatives of conduct are willingly adopted and broadly accepted. Political opinions, family values, belief in God in all their permutations are all convictions assigned highest importance often promoted by the beholder as “true”. These personal biases surface anytime a person is asked to state an opinion. At best they are choices based on a mix of personal experience along with a certain amount of introspection and logical thought, and at worst they are indoctrinations by nurture, never shed in adulthood. In either case the absolutes we live by, are arrived at not by mathematical deductions but by more or less haphazard choice or worse, by blind faith. How can we then trust our convictions? American Civil Liberties Union for example, has adopted individual rights as its highest principle:

The mission of the ACLU is to preserve all of these protections and guarantees:
* Your First Amendment rights-freedom of speech, association and assembly. Freedom of the press, and freedom of religion supported by the strict separation of church and state.
* Your right to equal protection under the law - equal treatment regardless of race, sex, religion or national origin.
* Your right to due process - fair treatment by the government whenever the loss of your liberty or property is at stake.
* Your right to privacy - freedom from unwarranted government intrusion into your personal and private affairs.

Seemingly, no one who’s thought has been shaped by western civilization would disagree with the above statements. Certainly all Americans to whom the Bill of Rights carries special significance would subscribe to ACLUs mission statement. Why is it then that its actions are considered controversial? Howstuffworks poses that question and attempts to answer it:

Simply put, the organization holds an absolutist view of liberties — they defend all people whose liberties have been violated, even if their views, ideas or actions are unpopular. Therefore, the ACLU ends up defending Nazis, pornographers, religious zealots and extremists of all types.The point of such unpopular cases is to protect the rights of all minorities. Many minorities do have unpopular points of view. In the ACLU’s eyes, the right of a Nazi group to freedom assembly is just as important as, for example, Native Americans’ freedom of assembly. Allowing the government to restrict any group’s freedoms would invite restrictions on other groups.

That is a simplistic explanation and a very dangerous one at that, if true. It suggests that the Civil Liberties Union automatically dishevels its objection to any violation of free speech, only because the first amendment says so, and since ACLU’s raison d’etre is to uphold it, Native American freedom of assembly is qualified on par with that of the Nazis whose hostile motives are regrettably well made known through history. A little research however seems to indicate that the organization supports free speech only to the degree where it assesses that there are no superseding concerns of detriment to others or where the expression of free speech isn’t at odds with other clauses of the amendment. The depth of consideration is well illustrated in The Rutherford Institute ’s interview with Nadine Strossen the president of ACLU.
She explains her position:

Ironically, I have been attacked by some of the Christian organizations lately for defending the free exercise of religion, specially defending the rights of fundamentalist Mormons to engage in polygamy. I have to say here that no rights are absolute. That is true for freedom of speech, and it is also true for the free exercise of religion. If, for example, your religion believed in human sacrifice, you would not be allowed to exercise that because there is a countervailing interest of great importance in protecting human life. The same point can be made about polygamy. It could be limited to protect the safety and rights of all the participants, and to ensure that all participants were consenting adults.

The ACLU as a point in case of cogency of our moral beliefs, is an example of critical thought at its finest. In its non partisanship, lack of attachment to any particular outcome and its attention to due process, the union’s practices mimic the objectivity of the scientific method. The yard stick is the same in all cases (the individual rights guaranteed under the first amendment), but it is the unique scenarios and specific combinations of circumstance which prompt the ACLU to take a stand one way or the other. I wish there was a paradigm shift in common thought and our moral values, instead of being considered the final and absolute judgment, were instead the guiding principles of a moral algorithm .

It is only fitting that I resume voicing my say-so with a few words on a topic with which I left off. Last week the New York Times has proclaimed the Housing First project a success. Despite my disbelief that simply providing a new context to otherwise “broken people” will do anything to relieve homelessness the article New Campaign Shows Progress for Homeless marks the following improvements:

In Philadelphia, street dwellers have declined 60 percent over five years. In San Francisco, the number of the chronic homeless is down 28 percent in two years, in Dallas 26 percent and in Raleigh-Durham, N.C., 15 percent.

Here is how the program works:

In a first step, confirmed street dwellers are coaxed into rooms of their own, a more attractive proposition to many than the drug treatment programs or transitional group homes they had been offered in the past. Some skittish people take along their shopping carts.
Once drawn into so-called supportive housing, the participants are monitored by social workers and offered psychiatric and other services that might stabilize their lives. But breaking addictions or seeking other needed treatment is not a prerequisite for entry.

It is noteworthy :

Some “tough-love” groups have opposed housing first, saying that without more discipline, addicts will never succeed. But in experiments around the country, 80 percent or more of those housed participants remained in their quarters after a year.
Workers at the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, which runs Mr. Sena’s building, said they knew that some tenants were using drugs or alcohol.”It’s better that they pass out here than in the streets,” said John Parvensky, director of the coalition.

The above brings into light that the issue is composed of two problems the success of which should not be cross credited:

1) Eliminating the general and often abstract social problem of homelessness.
2) Helping the homeless persons to a life of independence and normalcy within their capacity.

Presently, since Housing First is a widely embraced experiment however very much in its infancy, what is being reported is the drop in number of homeless on the cities’ streets. The initial successes have stimulated the funding of the project and further creation of low-income units. Reportedly 80% of the program’s participants remain housed however they are not automatically rid of their addiction habits and more often than not, continue in their cycle of substance abuse indoors. There are no statistics on how many have stabilized, found employment and started contributing rent. It is a long way before the rehabilitation part of the program is tested and as the article acknowledges the “change will come in fits and starts, for cities as well as for individuals.”

Not to discredit the effort, it is notable in an era of conservative politics. Homelessness advocate Bob Erlenbusch points out:

… federal programs for low-income housing, which can prevent homelessness, have languished in the Bush years or been cut. Also, cities have combined federal and local public money with foundation and corporate grants to start these programs.

( by Mary Reynolds at Planetizen )

It is not clear where the financial support will keep coming from once the initial investment has been made and the excitement subsides. As long as this ideologically conservative approach ( apartment “ownership” stimulating the dispossessed into discipline and health )will coax the government into supporting the program ( or any social program ), the means are of no consequence. Ultimately the goal is universal - cleaner streets and a healthy society.

Malcolm Gladwell’s article Million Dollar Murray reverberates across the web in multitudes of blogs. Homelessness has been quantified, a new distribution curve has been found, a scientific approach may help solve a deep social problem with which modern cities have been struggling with for decades. Based on a research by Dennis Culhane Ph. D. , the power law as applied to homelessness suggests that roughly 10% of the dispossessed are chronically so, and they are the ones straining the resources of health care and social services. Those very few can cost the system hundred thousands of dollars a person per year. In medical terms here is a typical scenario as described by James Dunford, the city of San Diego’s emergency medical director:

“If it’s a medical admission, it’s likely to be the guys with the really complex pneumonia. They are drunk and they aspirate and get vomit in their lungs and develop a lung abscess, and they get hypothermia on top of that, because they’re out in the rain. They end up in the intensive-care unit with these very complicated medical infections. These are the guys who typically get hit by cars and buses and trucks. They often have a neurosurgical catastrophe as well. So they are very prone to just falling down and cracking their head and getting a subdural hematoma, which, if not drained, could kill them… . Meanwhile, they are going through alcoholic withdrawal and have devastating liver disease that only adds to their inability to fight infections.”

In a radical program to end homelessness advocated by the executive director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness Philip Mangano folks like these and the titular persona of the article - Murray Barr, are handed keys to their very own rented apartments. In exchange they are required to comply to the monitoring of case workers who are in touch with them every couple of days. They expectation is that as soon as the participants stabilize and find work they can start covering their rent in portions incremental to their overall progress.
As shocking as the description of those hard case homeless beneficiaries whose mental state allows for such profound disregard to their very own wellbeing is, the solution appears abysmally inappropriate. It isn’t a problem of the undeserving being treated to comfort, or the fact that this solution is meant to save the system 2/3 of presently incurred costs and sweep the homeless out of the view of the average american, it simply is a question of feasibility and common sense. Before the Murray Barrs are assigned their homes and are expected to rehabilitate they need to be placed under psychiatric care and possibly on lifelong medication which in turn would inflate the cost of their care, not decrease it. Malcolm Gladwell, muddies the homeless issue and the proposed solution with other power law conforming examples in his trademark sexy panoptic style. He invokes cases like the Rodney King beating and the subsequent Christopher Commission report and a mobile smog emission testing proposed by Donald Stedman, a chemist and automobile-emissions specialist at the University of Denver which is meant to replace the current comprehensive smog test. The only thing the three examples thrown into the article’s mix have in common is the pattern of their distribution, it should not be implied that a simple solution to decrease overhead on smog testing by targeting and policing the most serious offenders is also an applicable working model to end homelessness. In his book “The Tipping Point”, Mr. Gladwell produces an example of the Broken Windows theory which states that dilapidated environment invites crime, the solution to which among others is “quick replacement of broken windows “. It comes in a chapter about “the power of context” in which he also relates a Princeton University Good Samaritan study. The study concludes that even seminarians thinking of the biblical story of a good samaritan, under certain circumstances such as pressure of time, will act against their predisposition. This example is meant to prove that human behavior is malleable by the surrounding context. Drawing on this train of thought the author seems to suggest in the Million-Dollar Murray article, that simply giving homes to chronically homeless and placing them in an environment free of “broken windows” and signs of decay, will be enough to rehabilitate them. It is erroneous, ignoring the fact that it is the hard case homeless people themselves who are “broken”, in need of psychiatric care. Simply placing them in a new context will do very little to cure the self destructive streak which lands them in emergency rooms and intensive care time and time again.

Religion demands respect. No opinion on other topics has me tip toeing around the speaker with same care. After all, believers of all faiths base their daily and seasonal routines and often their entire lives around “dos” and “don’ts”. They curtail their experiences limiting their range of foods and activities to fit within the constraints of their chosen dogma. Attempting to debunk the existence of God with a theist is an assault on their philosophy threatening to subvert their entire life. How did it come to be? How did a cosmology based on a compilation of self contradicting ancient oral traditions (bible) gain such high degree of respect? This question surfaced for me once again recently while reading a superficial and lighthearted “Marx for Beginners” which fell into my hands as a result of a conversation with a friend. While the book does very little to significantly summarize the Marxist theory, it is a fun, quick, illustrated overview of the western man’s history, from the cavernous times to to the industrial age and society which was a fertile ground for the rise of communism. The simplified format presents the human thought in stark light and brute manner but with fascinating clarity. Religion has been with man since since the beginning of conscious thought. Rius writes:

In the beginning, ignorance and fear predominated. Because they didn’t know the meaning of things, early peoples were afraid of everything which moved, and their first thought was about the supernatural: Who made the noise of thunder? Who moved the earth? Who made it rain? … To provide some kind of explanation of natural events mankind created the gods: the god of rain, of fire, of earth, of sun, the goddess of fertility, the god of hunting… Out of this came the magicians and sorcerers, who exploited the idea of divinity for their own benefit. By using all kinds of cheap tricks they passed themselves off as special delegates of the gods with fantastic powers… This is the way gradually an upper class was formed - or the ruling class, and a lower - or ruled class… As time went on - and profits rose - the ruling class perfected its religion and added more gods, more myths, more rites and ceremonies, temples were built in which gods an goddesses were worshipped, which usually meant donations of money or other things had to be paid up to attract divine favors… At the same time, a divine cast set itself apart. Witch doctors had elevated themselves to priesthood. Their power was so great that together with kings and pharaohs, they created huge empires of faithful slaves “by the will of the supreme gods.”

With the advent of philosophy, logical thought and dialectic exchange gained prominence over the mythical view of the universe yet it seems that the more the idea of god was debated, the more strongly rooted it became in the human psyche. Whether is was Xenophanes who refuted the anthropomorphic gods in favor of “incorporeal eternal being”, or Thales who presumed water to be the primary element in nature and not gods yet believed in “soul (which) was the cause of motion, permeating and enlivening the entire cosmos” or Heraclitus described by some as atheist, who hinted at a presence of element of the “divine” in the world’s order. Since the pre-Socratic times till today, the idea of god has undergone innumerable permutations. It continues to be debated, its essence is attempted to be captured and defined by Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche , and Heidegger and so many more. Admittedly, by now “god” must be the most universally recognizable term yet one that is, despite the eternal length of debate surrounding it, most poorly defined. It is, and here by throwing in my 2 cents I join in with the millions adding to gods superfluous credence, a “carte blanche”, an ace, a joker in the making of our own custom flavored reality, in our own image, according to our very personal tastes.

I could not recover from amidst the shreds of paper and waste that, which is the subject of this blog entry. For the nth time in the past few months the National Survey On Freedom Tolerance And Equality arrived in the mail. Having had some precious free time, I used some of it to look through the high piled stack of mail, bills, receipts and correspondence. It is a chore I dread most, ranking as my most hated, more irritating than folding laundry because in addition to requiring petty meticulousness it also necessitates paying attention. The envelope containing the National Survey from ACLU was among the last ones opened. Although already familiar with the text I read through it once again, agreeing with the causes the organization stands for and thinking it deserves my support. After all I remember being angered and dismayed at how dutifully we trace our daily commute to work, day in and day out, while the current administration literally gets away with murder and promotes machinations designed to further line the inner pockets of the richest few. By not objecting we are all accomplices standing for the degradation of our civil liberties, and disrespectful disregard to other nations of the world. I also know the deep frustration and a sense of helplessness. How can one individual change anything - how can I, make a difference? The answer seemingly arrived in the form of that envelope. What better way than joining with others and supporting a non profit organization which clusters together many more similar minded individuals who on their own are voiceless and weightless?
I filled out the Survey and hesitated. A “National Survey On Freedom Tolerance And Equality” - is a BIG title commanding authority and credibility, yet the 10 questions constituting the survey are shamefully leading in their formulation. They aren’t stated in an objective non partisan manner encouraging free thought and a personal conclusion, instead they are dummed down to solicit an automatically affirmative answer. Here is an example:

1. I believe freedom to follow one’s own religious belief is fundamental and that the government should stay out of religion and leave us all to practice any religion in our own way.

The mutliple choice answers are: 1. Yes 2. No 3. Not Sure. And so on, on the topics of privacy, women’s rights, abortion, gay marriage. If it is an affirmation of the 10 guiding principles of the organization - I support it whole heartedly, but by no means it should pretend to be a survey. According to CASRO and its first principle of Interview Design Guidelines:

The key criteria for the design of the quantitative questionnaire or qualitative interview guide are: The questions and questioning procedures are unbiased. The wording of the interview questions does not predetermine the answers to the research questions. The questioning and analytical procedures allow responses over the entire range relevant to the research objectives.

And so, the National Survey on Freedom Tolerance and Equality ended up shredded in my waste bin and I posted my opinion on ACLU’s website. To their credit, I received a prompt response and a case record no. While trying to recover the exact wording of the Survey I had to resort to online sources.
The only full verbatim transcription of it I was able to find is on a right wing blog mixed in with testosterone drenched commentary. Somewhat reluctantly here it is , read and marvel how the same values I uphold as noble are derided by another, ironically also a resident of California, possibly not too many miles away, subject to the same environment and responding to the same events.

Upon turning the last page of The Wisdom of Crowds I find myself wanting to remember key motifs about human behavior as an individual vs. that of a person when part of a group. They differ. People alter their actions, temperament, even beliefs when surrounded by others. More so, the degree and the type of action is fully determined by the constitution of the group within which one operates. For example depending of whether and how many “radicals” a group contains, is decisive in pushing the crowd over the threshold towards violence. James Surowiecki’s study enumerates conditions under which a crowd is at it’s best, creating the right balance and moral force for the individuals within it. It is also a manual on how to harness the positive group dynamic and turn it into a powerful and constructive decision making instrument. There is one observation which lingers with me however, tapering my excitement about this new societal power plant. It is the indisputable fact that learning is a “social process”. Herbert Simon is quoted saying:

A man does not live for months or years in a particular position in an organization, exposed to some streams of communication, shielded from others, without the most profound effects upon what he knows, believes, attends to, hopes, wishes, emphasizes, fears and proposes.

I very much agree and like to say that: we are all “victims” of our circumstance. Victims, because we are forever bound to experience a singular reality at one time, and usually lack the perspective and insight to all others which we are not part of. Surowiecki argues that:

… the more influence a group’s members exert on each other, and the more personal contact they have with each other, the more likely it is that we will believe the same things and make the same mistakes. That means it’s possible that we could become individually smarter but collectively dumber.

He lists Independence, specifically independence of thought as a critical factor for collectively wise decisions. When averagely informed members do not consult, their personal errors are odd and random and therefore don’t accumulate in the final aggregation of the group’s decision. When however, members of the group communicate and their judgment is a consensus or a co-informed decision, the margin of error is much greater. Imitation and interaction with Others is the way humans learn and develop personally. Ironically, it is exactly what is undesired for a collective intelligence.

On a friend’s recommendation I watched The American Pimp, a Hughes brothers documentary. The suggestion was tangential. One of the pimps featured in the documentary - Fillmore Slim, inherits the name of his domain - the Fillmore street in San Francisco very near to where I live. Unlike The Take or The Motorcycle Diaries, which carry significant historical and social content yet are mediocre in their execution, The American Pimp is dynamic and rather well crafted but the content is only as significant as the few portrayed pimps, which is to say - not very. The documentary is a soapbox for the colorful but ignorant men who coerce the women in their care to work while they retain 100% of the profits. Payroll, C-Note, Bishop Don Magic Juan, Gorgeous Dre, Kenny Redd and Charm all have the same thing to say: Women can’t do without them. According to the pimps, the women also endearingly called “Bitches” wouldn’t know how to manage their money and “hoing” wouldn’t be as profitable if it wasn’t under the male care. “Hos” are a commodity, they can be acquired at a night club or stolen from another pimp. As a side note but perhaps not incidentally, a “commodity” as an article of “commerce”, commerce is synonymous with “sexual intercourse”. The pimps are the perpetrators. Its etymology is just as intriguing:

Latin perpetratus, past participle of perpetrare, from per- through + patrare to accomplish, from pater father — more at FATHER

Women in the “Game” seek out protection and leadership not inclined to take on full responsibility for their successes or failures, while the men complement the playing field with their drive to direct, instruct, patronize while drawing profit and gloating in status. The subculture of pimps and hos is only an acute hyperbole of the greater male female relations within a society at large. From the genetic makeup, through hormone tinted brain cells and physical attributes, women are receivers, men - disseminators. Within patriarchal societies which are the majority among human cultural systems, traditionally women are the second in command with males as heads of families. They are described at best as the “neck that rotates the head” and are passive agents at worst. Predominantly still, husbands, fathers or brothers, boyfriends or lovers depending on how liberal the society is, serve as a compass and a reference point within the scope of which women act and operate. In the West, the plight of the suffragettes and feminists of the 2oth century have resulted in the women’s voting rights, laws banning discrimination based on gender, sexual harassment laws, orders enforcing child support and violence against women act. The conditions have never been better for women to flourish and achieve their fullest potential and match men not only in the equal capacity we have for excellence and professional success but more importantly in the volume of ranks and files of capable, driven and independent women. That is, if we dare to step forward.

I picked up again, a book I bought, started reading and put away. It is “The Wisdom of Crowds” by a New Yorker columnist James Surowiecki. It initially caught my attention because I believe the very ideas it tries to dispel. Surowiecki brings those up right away in the very first chapter, the Introduction. He quotes philosophers and historians who uphold the notion that crowds are incapable of wise judgment. Henry David Thoreau, an American author and philosopher is quoted: ” The mass never comes up to the standard of its best member, but on the contrary degrades itself to a level with the lowest.”Friedriech Nietzshe is quoted: “Madness is the exception in individual but the rule in groups”. But my favorite quote is by Thomas Carlyle an English author and historian of the 18th century: “I do not believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance”. And he is right, mathematically it doesn’t add up…So as James Surowiecki makes his case for the wisdom of crowds, putting forth example after example of point on, smart, collective judgments, I will place the Thomas Carlyle quote on my bookmark at the head of every page, to remind myself to read and assimilate critically. This practice is even more so necessary, because James Surowiecki is very convincing. His book is very well structured and balanced, studded with examples from a broad range of disciplines such as sociological studies, investment markets, political polls, gambling and historical anecdotes. It is easy to be swept away into a sort of religious awe at the “miracle” of average “bondedly rational” (term by Herbert Simon) folk arriving at an accurate prediction. The truth is, and James Surowiecki makes it an important point of his hypothesis, there are a few criteria which a crowd needs to meet in order to become wise. They are: “diversity, independence and particular kind of decentralization.”
It makes one wonder, the democratic election process encompasses the entire population of a country. Taking the United States as an example, the voting group is definitely diverse and decentralized, but is it independent? I suspect it isn’t independent of thought, due to the mass media messages and broadcasts which are sponsored by corporations with specific political agendas. The fact that GW Bush is being inaugurated tonight as President for a second term, ranks as one of the lower scores for the wisdom of crowds. However, Mr. Surowiecki emphasizes that group decisions pertaining to “matters of general interest will, Over Time, be intellectually superior to the isolated individual.” So, there is hope for the Democratic process as it is sure, Over Time, to correct its course. I’ll end with a quote from the book, which I firmly believe is true and can be extrapolated to encompass many areas of human interaction:

“Diversity and independence are important because the best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest, not consensus or compromise.”

Regardless of a problem at hand, the best way, the only way, is to fight it out.

I resisted Blogger and Friendster while in hype, dismissed the popularity value, sullied the inherent self promotion factor.
Because the two phenomena focus on outward expression and communication with others, I understood “the others and their response” to be the central focal point and the purpose of engagement in Blogger and Friendster activity…

Having had some experience, my Bayesian Inference would have to be seriously re-adjusted.
Both are forums for self expression, “I” is the topic, the public nature is secondary, a response whether in form of site hits or new friendship invitations is trivial. I do obsess about the hit statistics, length of visits, origin and ISP. Work my social network to acquire new friends, write messages to strangers, search demographics and interests, compare friends in common, the number of friends, admire size and vitality of an extensive Friendster network. But, my drive is expansively Apollonian, I am very proud to say. It is about acquisition, numbers and status.
As I revel in my cyber persona, muse about being a disembodied sentinel, watching and reading, absorbing and ingesting news and information online, I reflect about my stat tracking and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. How much the information I gather about my visitors affects my posts? I also occasionally follow the entry pages back to the visitor’s homes. Read their posts. Do they track? Do they revisit my Blog? Would the reality of my blogging experience be different if I didn’t track?
Since the subject borders on esoteric why not check out your past life experience? Only make sure to read the disclaimer, next.

There is an article on Kuro5phin titled The Decline and Fall of Canada It points out the the stability of Canadian government, its moderate international involvement, provisions for public welfare and inclusive embrace of all cultures and languages which all amount to Canada’s egalitarian society where general public’s welfare is a top concern. Despite all it’s graces, Canada suffers from a brain drain of creative professionals especially in favor of the US. Of course, I say. Why pay taxes that go into a public pot luck to be shared among all the “have nots”. If higher financial return is possible elsewhere, people will generally chose their very personal good over the benefit of others. Those driven to excel, aspire to fulfill their potential. Money, position, status - are all measures of success. To perceive the full value of their work, Canadians have to view their personal successes as reflected not in the growth of their personal assets, but in the overall growth and well being of the entire country. That is a tough feat. And Canadians are only people too.