Fighting Terrorism at Home & Abroad

When we talk about “Real Security through International Cooperation and the Funding of Human Needs” it is sometimes hard to understand what that means in terms of our daily lives. 

On my way home I often pass a family saying hello and usually exchanging brief pleasantries. Normally, the father and sometimes the mother sit on the front stoop watching the baby play.  Last night, however, as I rounded the corner something was very different.  All the contents of their house had been dumped haphazardly onto the sidewalk; they were not sitting on the porch but rather on the street near their clothes.  They had been “put out of their house.”  They could not make the rent for this month and so this family of three (with a toddler) was homeless, sitting in the dark and cold with no place to go.  They had left that morning for work and daycare with a small sense of security, only to arrive that night vulnerable and in genuine danger.  How is it, in the richest democracy in the world, we can put a family out?  

My neighborhood is known for gang activity.  I myself, have witnessed 3 shootings; none of which, thankfully, resulted in death or injury; but they were scary. I can’t imagine being a toddler on the street hearing those booming noises echo only feet away from me.  I have lots of Libertarian friends who don’t believe the government could solve these problems even if it did have a billion dollars.  I might agree if we ever had a chance to test the theory.  The money spent on militarism represents more than 70% of our Federal budget.  The money for social programs is less than 5%.  Where are our priorities?  Why have we, for decades, chosen bombs over people?

Again, I turn to my Libertarian friends who claim the ONLY function of a Federal government is the protection of national boarders from foreign invaders.  I would like to see a more comprehensive idea of ‘foreign invaders.’ I think hunger and frost bite should be counted among the terrorists affecting our world.

It strikes me that these terrorists are potently killing people all over the world on a daily basis – and U.S. investment in militarism only compounds the problem.  I lived in Kosova for a time about a year ago.  The people there are so grateful to the U.S. for ending the genocide perpetuated by Milosevic.  They have a picture of Bill Clinton or Gen. Wesley Clark on nearly every street; including a giant mural on Bill Clinton bvld in downtown Prishtina.  Of course there is another side to this gratitude.  On Bill Clinton blvd there are still apartment buildings bombed out from U.S. strikes in 1999.  People are still living in homes exposed to the elements with no water or electricity.  The unemployment rate is staggering and the thousands of ‘missing’ are still unaccounted for.  The political status of Kosova is still in flux between a Serbian territory and an independent state.  Neither Europe nor the U.S. has invested enough money and time into the rebuilding of Kosova.  We saved them from genocide and then condemned them to poverty through our inaction. 

There is a similar story happening all over the world:  in Ethiopia & Eutria; in Pakistan & Afghanistan; in Burma & S. Korea; in Sudan, in Sri Lanka, in Palestine, in Columbia, in Morocco, in every continent.   Real security, internationally, means investing in the health and well being of all humans; knowing that persons whose security needs are met will never strap a bomb to their back and then board a train.

Terrorism, both the Islamic kind and the gang kind, can only be stopped by meeting our human needs as a global community.  The U.S. is in a unique position to take leadership in this endeavor, and we have historically.  Although now contentious, the IMF and World Bank served their original purpose after WWII.  The funding provided by these international organizations rebuilt Europe after the devastation and renewed the historic cities to their former glory.  We have lost the philanthropy which launched us into a global super power.  Now we face our challenges with bombs and empty promises.  Ours is a path of destruction and destitution.  We must regain our conscious and expand our sense of community if we are ever to realize a peaceful world.

Promoting REAL Security through International Cooperation and Democracy Building

This week we have all seen the horrors unfold the territory formerly known as Burma. It was renamed Myanmar in recent years by the ruling military junta.  Up until 2 weeks ago Myanmar was the internationally recognized and used name for this state much to the dismay of Democracy activists and Buddhist Monks.   Now, since the pictures of a dead Monk floating in the Inle Lake and the truth of the military dictatorship have immerged in mainstream media the international community has jumped on the ‘democracy for Burma’ bandwagon.

Isn’t it a little late to support these Democracy activists?  Would it not have been more productive to address this issue back in 1990 when a general election voted agianst the militaristic government and these results were thrown out by then State Peace and Development Council Chairman Than Shwe?  This is the man who responsible for the atrocities of recent weeks and for the renaming of this once democratic country. 

Pres. Bush, at the UN meeting declared that we must support democracy in Burma.  After our invasion he declared we must support democracy in Iraq, and after 9/11 he declared the Afghans ‘hated us for our freedom’.  Why, after we supplied AK47’s and rocket launchers to the Taliban to support our proxy war with the Soviets did they have such a change of heart against the U.S.? 

Surely, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism was a significant factor.  But how did this rise occur?  The Taliban, like the SPDC did in Bruma, took over Afghanistan with military might.  They terrorized Afghan citizens, created a huge refugee crisis, and institutionalized Madrasah educational systems to teach Islamic fundamentalism to the oppressed and disenfranchised population.  It is apparent to me that if we had supported a democratic movement and given non-military aid (in the way of education and basic necessities) to citizens in those early years we could have avoided the tragic events of 9/11.  Subsequently, we could have avoided the current international quagmire we find ourselves in today.  No one straps a bomb to their body if they are leading a fulfilling and secure life.

The only way to combat terrorism and promote grassroots democratic systems is to engage the population BEFORE the violence comes to a head.  We have the largest military in the world and yet we have no Peacekeepers.  We allocate 90% of our security budget to our own military and a fraction of it to international cooperation.  It is time we switched our priorities to secure a future for our children and children all over the world.

Creating a Digital Movement

“As technology advances, it reverses the characteristics of every situation again and again. The age of automation is going to be the age of ‘do it yourself.”
Marshall McLuhan

In The Medium is the Massage McLuhan suggests that our world is moving into a digital age.  Written in 1967 he made predictions of a ‘global village’ a place where people can come together, across geographical & cultural borders, to share ideas and experience media simultaneously.  He believed this would bring our world closer together and prelude a more harmonious existence on this earth.  Forty years later we are still embroiled in wars which, at their core, speak to the inability of the global village to overcome greed and hate.

We who believe in peace are the global majority.  And yet, our President is unresponsive and mainstream media  continue to trumpet his call to war.  How, without satellites and TV stations, can we make our voices heard above the gatekeepers?  The lessons from Media still apply:  we are in the age of automation, we must ‘do it ourselves’. 

The genius of the internet is the decentralization of power and information.  In other words, YOU have the power to share the information.  Every time you pass on an action alert to your network, every time you research a subject, every time you publish your opinion - you are unseating the status quo.  You are saying NO to watered down information ‘from the ground’ in Iraq.  You are saying NO to the lies perpetrated by the Bush administration. 

Instead, you are saying YES to the peace movement.  We will never have a satellite (or the money to rent one) so we depend on you to broadcast our message of peace to the global village.  I urge you to take on this challenge.  Go to our website, do your research and remember that every moment is a teaching moment.  Take action, online or otherwise, and tell people what you did encouraging them to join the movement.

You are frustrated by the lack of movement in a progressive direction – I understand.  We long for peace and justice while our world seems to become less and less oriented towards those goals.  There is no alternative than to ‘sound my (our) barbaric YAWP over the rooftops of the world.’ (Walt Whitman) demanding we be heard.  The Internet is the best way to unite our voices so they cannot ignore us. We have the power share our goals with the world and expand our knowledge of that world - use it.

Reflecting 6 Years Later

It is hard to believe how much in our world has changed since the events of September 11^th. I do not intend this post to paint a rosy picture of the world before the towers fell, only to mark how that day exacerbated the oppression and violence in our world by playing to our fears and prejudices. Bush and Bin Laden have created a world in their image though the violence they met out on our global community. They have created a world where we see a ‘culture clash’ instead of a chance to learn one another. They have created a world where our fears of ‘an imperialist west’ or ‘a terrorist threat’ command us to abdicate our rights and responsibilities as human beings. They created a world where the threat of nuclear destruction is at its highest levels ever.

On this fateful and devastating anniversary I ask that we come together to mourn the millions lost since to violence: in Afghanistan, England, Guantanamo, India, Iraq, Israel, Lebanon, Pakistan, Palestine, Spain, Sudan, United States & countless other locations.

• Afghanistan: After 9/11 the destruction of this country quelled Taliban power briefly while leaving millions without homes, jobs, or hope. They as a nation are still struggling with abject poverty, mounting violence, corruption, inequality, and oppression.
• England: On July 7^th London suffered a calculated attack to their transit system 52 people were killed and over 700 were injured. The horrors of that day were followed up by a less deadly attempt to destroy the Glasgow airport on June 30^th, 2007.
• Guantanamo: The camp has drawn strong criticism for its extrajudicial detention of captives and the possibility that captives held there were subjected to abusive interrogation techniques that constitute torture. The detainees held by the United States were classified as “enemy combatants” by executive order and without due process.
• India: On July 11, 2006 at least 200 people were killed when a train was bombed in an attack.
• Iraq: Too many deaths to count. Too much destruction to fathom. Too many soldiers used, abused, raped, manipulated, and martyred without one ounce of remorse from their Commander and Chief. Too many refugees scattered around the world. It makes me sick so I want you to check out this link for a realistic picture of the losses in Iraq.
• Israel & Lebanon: In July of 2006 Israel and Lebanon engaged in a deadly war. The violence began when Hezbollah forces crossed into Israel, killing three soldiers and abducting two others. After that cross-border raid, five more Israeli soldiers were killed, as well as two Israeli civilians. Two Lebanese soldiers and 45 Lebanese civilians were killed. Rocket fire to Israel was confined to the Haifa region while the air strikes on Lebanon destroyed the capital city of Beirut.
• Pakistan: On March 2, 2006 a car bomb killed 4 and injured 52 outside the Karachi Marriott – yards away from the U.S. consulate. In June 2002 a car bombing attack left 14 people dead, all Pakistanis outside the building, which lies in an upscale district of the sprawling city’s downtown.
• Palestine: Palestine, since 9/11, has deteriorated into wounded nation broken by rocket fire from Israel and sickened with civil war between 2 political parties. The violence mounts daily with civilians suffering the most.
• Spain: The 2004 train bombing in Madrid killed 191 people and wounded 2,050.
• Sudan: The genocide continues unabated while the world watches. Internationally, states make decisions about foreign priorities not based on resources but politics. The genocide continues because Africa is not priority in the war on terror.
• United States: On September 11, 2001 Al Qaeda orchestrated the most devastating attack on U.S. soil since Pearl Harbor. There were 2,974 fatalities, not including the 19 hijackers: 246 on the four planes (no one on board any of the hijacked aircraft survived), 2,603 in New York City in the towers and on the ground, and 125 at the Pentagon. Among the fatalities were 343 New York City Fire Department firefighters, 23 New York City Police Department officers, and 37 Port Authority Police Department officers. An additional 24 people remain listed as missing.

On this, the day as we recall the horrors of violence in our borders let us not forget the violence meted out since. We have a choice in this. We must learn to address violence with justice or we will always be fighting the terror campaigns raged by state and non-state actors. We must invest in humanity by rebuilding New Orleans, by investing in healthcare, by stopping atrocity with diplomacy. We have a choice; to unquestioningly follow our leaders to a new war with Iran or to say NO before the war starts. It is beyond time to take our democracy back and make progressive priorities American policy. Only peace and justice can end terror.

Saving the Intellectual Capital in Iraq

Financial Times recently reported the Gates Foundation is diverging from its primary missions, to irradiate AIDS and Malaria world-wide, and focusing $5 million “for a project granting fellowships to Iraqi scholars seeking to continue their work at institutions in other countries.” The U.S. Congress has approved an additional $5 million to further fund this project.

I am a champion of preserving intellectual capital, especially in countries like Iraq where the infrastructure is so broken investment in academia is a low priority. It is vital that we protect the present and future knowledge of this ancient civilization. However, this effort is, like so many before, short sighted.

Investing in intellectual capital is a multi faceted process. You must protect the intellectual elite from persecution and allow them to do their research; but, that is a short term solution to a long term problem. You must also provide for the future academics by through proper educational facilities at refugee camps and psychological care to address student’s substantial emotional needs during a war. So many children, forced to leave their homes, interrupt their education, and basically live in transience desperately need the stability of school and the support of adult mentors. Additionally, there must be a way to ensure intellectual capital sent abroad can return home. An Iraqi scientist working out of Sweden does very little to help rebuild their country of origin. Nothing I read about the Gates effort addresses these needs.

The Gates Foundation has founded itself on attacking a problem from all sides to make the most positive impact possible. Indeed, in the case AIDS and Malaria it has done just that. I hope, in the oversight process for this program, they will maintain the same strategy and look at investing in the future of Iraqi intellectual capital by investing in the children they are leaving behind.