HUMINT

HUMINT: Seven Years

2008-09-11T17:00:00.004+04:30

Since 9-11-2001, millions of Americans, and millions of people from other nations, have faced up to the threats and destabilizing acts of a few suicidal cowards. Before I begin to cover what this essay is about, I want to clarify what this essay is not about:

1. It is not about the pain of September 11, 2001,
2. It is not about the murders that occurred that day
3. It is not about the fear of death caused by terrorists in the past
4. It is not about the anxiety of anticipating new terrorist acts in the future.

IT IS ABOUT LIFE: This essay is about defining critical terms important to the process of remembering tragedies. Without a clear understanding of the terms; life, death and fear… there can be no peace or justice in the aftermath of such tragedy. The focus of this remembrance essay is also on terrorists’ fear of life. In addition to that, it’s also an admission that there will be a cultural projection of what I believe about life, death and fear on to what I cannot understand about the people who could commit such an evil crime.

TERRORISTS FEAR LIFE: I believe the perpetrators of 9-11-2001, were driven by fear of living in our imperfect world. In other words, reality could not meet their expectations so they quit the life they had, taking other individuals’ lives in the process.

NEVER FORGET: To remember 9-11-2001, it is important to revisit the concepts of fear, life and death. These ideas must be redefined in order to observe their meaning in the context of 9-11-2001… Why? The notion of existence, in terms of political terrorism, does not subscribe to traditional definitions of life and death. While I do not know what the concepts of fear, life and death mean to terrorists, nor do I care, for their sake. I do however know what the concepts of fear, life and death mean to me.

LIFE IS: Life is the pursuit of happiness without unduly infringing on the lives of others. Life is a struggle for independence from servitude while simultaneously transcending all dependence on servants. Life is liberty, freedom of choice and the self control to restrain ones self from over indulgence in the presence of plenty.

DEATH IS: Death is anxiety over probable events that have not yet occurred. Death is a prayer for misfortune of others, when those “others” wish he who is praying no ill will. Death is the absence of choice. Death is the absence of all temptation or similarly, death is the protection from all temptation. Death is perceived powerlessness while the real power from within is ignored.

FEAR IS: Since a person can be, by these definitions, physically alive, but exist in a dead state, fear is what death feels like. Fear is the observable phenomenon that grips the living dead. It is not fear of death that renders a living person dead. Rather, it is a haunting fear of life that renders a terrorist capable of committing acts contrary to the pursuit of happiness.

TERMS REDEFINED: By these definitions, one must be mortally alive to experience the joys of life. However, one could be physically alive – with a heart beat – but be dead to the joys of life. In other words, one need not die to be dead. A coward, like those who attacked on 9-11-2001, is already dead and they die in their minds many times before the natural life in their body expires.

LOGIC

1. If a person is physically alive, they may, by these definitions, be alive or dead.
2. If a person is physically dead, they are dead without any possibility of life.
3. Fear is what a person who is physically alive feels as they prepare for death.
4. Fear of death is death.
5. Fear of life is death.
6. Therefore, fear is death
7. Do not fear

NO CONCLUSIONS: There is no conclusion to an enduring definition of life that leads to your happiness, your liberty and the liberty of your family, friends and neighbors. A life worthy of enduring should not fear either life or death. The power to live a great life is within each of us. The experience of the last seven years after such a tragedy is proof that our nation can endure difficulty. We may yet prove that our nation can eliminate all of those who committed the terrorist act on 9-11-2001 and target every nation, group or person who indirectly encouraged 9-11-2001.

DO NOT FEAR: To live in a state of fear, or to fear life itself, is the only physical experience of death we will ever have. Do not waste your life approaching death in fear. Instead, spend your life proving that liberty and happiness are why we want to be alive.

WHAT AMERICANS KNOW: Before the tragedy of 9-11-2001, there was the enlightened day of 7-4-1776, the great day the United States was born. Since that day all Americans were given a license to exercise liberty. Since that day, many have sought to deny Americans (including other Americans during the civil war among other times…) our just pursuits. Many more have suggested Americans do deserve our liberties at all…

ALLIED TO LIBERTY: That there are men who would deny natural rights to others is not new. Americans knew in the 18th century, as we knew on 9-11-2001, as we still know and will forever know, an American’s liberty is worth more than their life lived without it. If anyone or anything is determined to prevent your liberty and happiness, they deserve your overt and conscious resistance. If anyone or anything is determined to prevent your liberty and happiness, consider Americans your ally in the struggle against oppression.

HUMINT: Free Body

2008-06-03T09:55:00.006+04:30

In science and engineering related industries, there is an essential tool called a FREE BODY DIAGRAM. It’s commonly used by scientists and engineers to predict the future. Sir Isaac Newton’s third law of motion is probably the most important narrative of the FREE BODY DIAGRAM. Newton’s third law states that for every force there is an equal and opposite force. To express that concept geometrically, [engineers | mathematicians | physicists] use vectors. A vector is used in FREE BODY DIAGRAMS to express a magnitude and a direction for a force.

Newton lived between the years 1643 to 1727 and has had an indelible impact on anyone willing to admit that mankind has the capacity to formulate accurate explanations of events. These days, it would be absurd to dismiss his 17th century thinking as obsolete. The fact is; Newtonian Physics effectively explains most of the observable phenomenon happening around us in our world today.

Newton was a Brit. However, his national origin has little relevance on the propagation and use of Newtonian Physics. A FREE BODY DIAGRAM is not a subject for nationalistic debate. Rather, it is arguably the best way to accurately predict the future.

It’s unfortunate that the future location of a projectile is not considered a more viable resource for predicting the future of society or the future of conflict than a strip mall psychic. Indeed, it would be interesting if social scientists were able to use a measure of Newton’s genius to test the legitimacy of their craft.

Instead, casual supposition still pervades the social sciences. Politics and war are as they always have been, but occur now in a modern context. Conquest is out of fashion these days but the underlying neural mechanics that made imperialism and colonialism fashionable a half century ago have not changed one iota. We are of the same mind as our ancestors, as far back as 50,000 years.

What that means is that our modern society holds the biological capacity to do anything our ancestors did over the last 50,000 years. While it would be nice to forget the past and assert that history is obsolete, we cannot and should not. Ask yourself about the origins of our contemporary stability… if you are honest, you’ll find that peaceful coexistence in contemporary America originated with the Declaration of Independence and continued all the way through the Civil Rights movement of the 1960’s. Martin Luther King quoted Jefferson and Lincoln in his socially transformative speeches… but social scientists tend to shy away from assigning sociological vectors to Jefferson, Lincoln, King and forecasting who will rise up to their ideas and ideals in this decade or the next.

HUMINT: In terms of propagating civility today, the plasticity of the human brain affords each of us the ability to adopt new and more complementary behavior. That’s why Americans take peaceful coexistence for granted today and so many other societies cannot tolerate themselves, much less outsiders…

Indeed, it is the raw power of each of our individual intellects that represents the most encouraging asset society has. Ideally, we should be organizing, agitating and educating young Americans. Instead, most Americans accept the ritual pacification they receive daily – as if it were a good thing…

Unfortunately, the more pacified we each become, the more susceptible each of us are to the influences of historical oppressors such as Mao Tse Dong, Joseph Stalin, Adolph Hitler, and Ruhola Khomeini. These men of the past represent a negative force in society. These names engender fear precisely because they became mass murderers to further their political ambitions.

As a social scientist, create a politically derived FREE BODY DIAGRAM for the ideas of Jefferson, Lincoln and King confronting the ideas of Mao, Stalin, Hitler and Khomeini… Does the diagram abide by Newton’s third law of motion? Do the positive forces of the liberators cancel the negative forces of the despots?

HUMINT: Why Democracy?

2008-01-09T01:30:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: Advocating democratization may sound provocative, even interventionist, but it isn’t. Instead it is the exact opposite of provocation. Democratization policies presuppose that less intervention is preferred to more intervention. The objective of democratization policy should be to tip a volatile situation in favor of freedom and stability without offensive or defensive violence.

WHO can democratize best? Everyone! Democratization as a foreign policy represents a commitment from all strata of society. Unfortunately, these diverse elements remain uncoordinated today. Fortunately, intra-national and inter-national incompetence is not a permanent condition. To perform effectively, democratization requires a synchronized philosophy of civil society or at least a cross-cultural commitment to find and respect such a philosophy. Once articulated, that philosophy must cross traditional cultural as well as interagency boundaries.

WHAT isn’t democratization? Synching a healthy philosophy of governance among national leaders isn’t neo-colonialism. Democratization is about explaining what a healthy society actually is. Between you and me, I don’t have all of those answers. To be sure, the best answers are a moving target. Unlike colonialism, democratization is always a two-way conversation.

DOES local dysfunction hurt central government? We do know and can empirically prove that dysfunction at a local level adversely influences central governments. That fact is as true for the United States as it is anywhere else in the world. Therefore the principal mission of democratization is to empirically demonstrate how central governments, retarded by local dysfunction, adversely impact international stability. Democratization is about honestly assessing and reporting the results of policies around the world and offering thoughtful alternatives to policies that perpetuate dysfunction at a local level.

ARE Americans nation builders? To that end, Americans needn’t open their wallets for massive nation-building projects. People around the world intend to develop and pacify their own communities themselves. When they are failing however, it should not be assumed that they are failing on purpose. Every community in the world is burdened with common obstacles. Many of the obstacles nations are facing today, American institutions overcame centuries ago. Here is where American mentorship and management has an essential win-win role to play.

IS the USA positive? Democratization is also about American officials demonstrating that the USA is playing a positive role wherever Americans are involved. Indeed, democratization efforts are occurring already. The US government should highlight its success stories but does not. A major problem is that positive American democratization policies are poorly explained, allowed to be mischaracterized for nefarious ends, and almost never justified by Americans with the zeal they deserve. It’s time to start explaining that democracy is a positive pursuit.

WILL it be hard? Yes, but less hard than dealing with governments that hide their intent and do not respond to internal or external dissent. Let’s be honest about the costs of democratization. Curbing misconceptions is not the same thing as curbing offensive or defensive violence. Violence may occur when a clarification is made. That’s fine! Fighting isn’t failure. Democracy is no guarantor of peace and stability. Instead, democracy is a proven procedural approach to achieve sustainable peace and sustainable stability.

WHY democracy? Democratization is about fostering transparency and responsiveness of government institutions. Not only does democratization curb threats, it creates new opportunity. For the sake of increasing opportunity, as well as saving lives and resources, it’s time to start explaining that the pursuit of democracy is a positive pursuit and in so doing, encourage democrats around the world!

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1. Image assigned to this post is of George Washington crossing the Delaware. During the night of December 25, 1776 Washington led his troops across the ice-swollen Delaware about 9 miles north of Trenton. The weather was horrendous and the river treacherous. Raging winds combined with snow, sleet and rain to produce almost impossible conditions. To add to the difficulties, a significant number of Washington's force marched through the snow without shoes. Washington's leadership is an historical benchmark for democratization efforts.

HUMINT: Thank You

2008-01-05T07:24:00.001+03:30

This essay was composed to thank everybody who does what they do when they are motivated by a sense of justice, righteousness and civility.

Thanks go to the owners and employees of businesses; you keep lines short so citizens can do whatever it is they do when they’re not wasting their time in lines. Thanks to bankers for keeping our money safe and currency legitimate. Special thanks go to judges and lawyers; your knowledge of case law establishes the rules by which we all live and thrive. Thanks go to police officers, fire fighters and hospital staff. Without you, society would be corrupt, on fire and sick, which would be Hell. Your effort to keep chaos at bay is nothing less than an undeclared war… Thank you.

Thank you, Rabbis, Priests and Clerics. Your various interpretations of scripture guide many of the world’s inhabitants toward tolerance and justice. There are too many spiritual heroes to name here but there is one example worth mentioning; Islam’s Imam Hussein sought to inspire life by risking his own. His journey to Valhalla was not suicide, but a risk taken in faith against long odds. Those are the facts of Imam Hussein’s narrative as I understand them. Indeed, Imam Hussein was a public servant.

Thank you, public servants! No other role contradicts the core American identity more than that of a career public servant. It must be difficult. A servant’s pursuit of life, liberty and happiness is secondary, conciliatory and supportive to that of all other American citizens’ pursuit of life liberty and happiness.

Thank you, soldiers, sailors and airmen. The United States is an island of peaceful coexistence surrounded on all sides by divisive forces. The world beyond our borders taxes you most of all. Corruption, poverty and violence are three sides of the same coin. Where diplomacy is ineffectual, you will be called to protect Americans from the ever present threat of chaos.

Entrepreneurs and inventors, thank you! You have liberated so many hours of laborious tedium, our children have little, or no concept of manual labor. Before household appliances, keeping our homes clean and our families fed required every ounce of energy. Suffice to say that those are only the most vivid examples of your intellectual generosity. Thank you for all of your inventions that we do not see but enjoy every minute of every day. The pursuit of life, liberty and happiness could not march forward without your eternal vigilance.

Thank you parents! No one is more responsible for the condition of society than you. Thank you for teaching your children to stand up for what they believe in. Thatnk you for teaching your children to respect the oppinions of others. What you do is taken for granted, misunderstood and misrepresented. There is no manual that comes with a child; only a flood of informed opinion; sometimes wrong, but always well meaning.

And last but not least, thanks go to our own intelligence. Thank you for making smart, intelligent decisions untied to dogma, cognizant of history, aligned with the American national identity. Nothing deserves higher regard. Thanks!

HUMINT: Hypocritical Labels

2008-01-04T07:50:00.000+03:30

Reasons for believing in and supporting any American policy are subject to change. Indeed, change is a natural part of the human condition. There should be no shame in changing one’s mind, if the reasons for doing so are empirically defensible.

Obviously, flippant opinions on subjects as serious as American-War policy are dangerous. At the same time, American policy can be over-analyzed and mischaracterized. Such hypocritical labeling leads the public and their representatives toward erroneous conclusions and bad policy decisions.

Where consistency should not waiver though are the broad strokes. Missing the BIG picture is a serious error with serious consequences. Unfortunately, many people do miss the BIG picture. How? The BIG picture changes very slowly, almost imperceptibly.

Its slowness breeds misinterpretation. To see the BIG picture as it truly is, consider taking the long-view. Dig into history. Find the important trends. Look for successful parallels in the past. Bear witness to past failures in order to learn what NOT to believe.

The BIG picture is most discernable when juxtaposing facts sampled over long periods of time. In terms of American policy, the big picture appears to be:

1. The United States is a positive moral force in the world today and has been since 1776

2. The American Message begins with Americans, but is broadly articulated by their representatives

3. American Wars are catastrophic and wasteful events, to be avoided whenever possible

4. When the United States is at war, be it civil or otherwise, the only objective should be victory

5. Victory is defined by the elected President of the United States

These five points are empirically defensible. Labels contradicting them are taxing but welcome. A contradictory mischaracterization is ultimately a hypocritical label. Here’s why; labeling a positive force negative sustains bad policy. That’s an embodiment of hypocrisy.

Hypocritical labels deserve to be challenged. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter who mischaracterizes the United States. Irrespective of where the distortion comes from; a foreign official or an American activist, every single mischaracterization deserves a rhetorical confrontation.

What will that confrontation look like? Inevitably, challenges to the BIG picture, will be conceptually deconstructed. Political discourse on the subject tends to lean toward specific policy failures or questionable military practices. That’s fine!

Those debates are an exercise in free speech [1] and precisely why the United States is a positive moral force in the world today. The freedom to accumulate and present empirical evidence virtually guarantees improvement in policy and tactics.

Broadening the scope of this essay beyond American policy; success in anything, including victory at war, is not possible without incremental improvements derived through informed debate.

Where should the debate occur? Unfortunately, that’s not a rational choice to make. The debate must occur wherever and whenever a mischaracterization is made.

Why should the debate occur? Obviously, not every confused soul is going to listen to an intellectual argument rooted in empirical evidence, but mischaracterizations shouldn’t be ignored.

However, there are priorities among the broad ecosystem of mischaracterizations. To be sure, the debate must happen when the results of an American policy or military tactic do not satisfy the BIG picture.

Engaging in debate over policy and tactics is the least an American patriot can do. Failure is not the intent of any American policy or tactic. American policy failures under public scrutiny right now cannot substitute as the BIG picture for American domestic or foreign policy. That’s substituting a distorted short-view for a more accurate long-view. Unfortunately, the substitution is made too often, causing a public opinion vortex.

When public opinion is distorted by mischaracterizations of American foreign or domestic policy, the world is burdened with a hypocritical label.

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1. The painting on this post is entitled "Freedom of Speech": In 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave a speech about the "Four Freedoms" everyone should have: freedom from fear, freedom from want, freedom of speech, and freedom of worship. Norman Rockwell painted these Four Freedoms. These paintings succeeded in raising almost $133 million in war-bond purchases. Norman Rockwell said the Four Freedoms were "serious paintings which sucked the energy right out of me, leaving me dazed and thoroughly weary." Rockwell uses various techniques to draw your attention to the main character in Freedom of Speech. The speaker is in the center of the scene and he is the only one standing. Other people in the picture are looking up at him. Rockwell creates a strong sense that the speaker is really speaking and that the listeners are really listening. To illustrate listening, he slightly exaggerated the size of their ears.

HUMINT: Musical Chairs

2008-01-03T07:19:00.001+03:30

The game “Musical Chairs” is played by a group of N people. The rules are so simple, they’re almost stupid. When the music stops, each player must find a seat. While the music is playing, the players walk, dance, trot or meander around a row of N-1 chairs. The chairs are configured in a circle or are arranged to face front and back at repeating intervals of two. This is to ensure players standing on either side of the row of seats can find one quickly when the music stops. If the letters p and b represent the chairs facing opposite directions, the configuration would look something like [pbpbpbpb] if N=9. But there aren’t enough chairs… Count them. There are 8. That’s the point of the game. The player left standing when the music stops is that round’s loser.

The type of music playing isn’t supposed to matter to the players. The only thing that should influence the behavior of the players is whether or not the music is on or off. The game represents a Boolean condition. If the music is on, everyone is standing. If the music is off, everyone must be sitting. Anyone standing when the music isn't playing exists in a false condition.

The game however could become complicated if the music were to directly contradict the rules of the game. Imagine playing musical chairs to the song “Get Up! Stand Up!” by Bob Marley (I am a fan) and the Wailers. If the players listen to the lyrics, believe in the lyrics, put faith in the lyrics… Well, then it wouldn’t be musical chairs anymore… It would be a different game entirely.

HUMINT: Iranian Tyranny

2007-12-18T02:04:00.000+03:30

The Islamic Republic of Iran is directly and indirectly perpetuating violence across the Middle East. Iran backs violence because it is a sectarian and dogmatic regime. Iranian foreign policy is an ever-present danger. Iran’s ambitions are overt and extend well beyond the scope of illegally pursuing a dual use nuclear program. The Old Persian Empire is wearing a new shroud and it’s an oppressively theocratic breed of governance.

Wherever Iran operates, organizations supported by Tehran represent political forces that pursue the fracture of sovereign nations. Iran backs militias around the world that seek to become states within states. Hezbollah represents a near autonomous State within Lebanon. Hamas represents an autonomous state within Palestine. The lesson here is that Iranian foreign policy follows a clear pattern of reckless destabilization.

Iran destabilizes a host nation by encouraging strife at the local level, splitting local municipalities from their central government along sectarian lines. Overtime, this policy makes the central government fracture and look for external sources of cohesion. Ususally that cohesion is found through a shared enemy, IE the United States and or Israel. Regardless of which nation Iranian interference occurs in, the policy always threatens the sovereignty regional neighbors.

Make no mistake; the Islamic Republic of Iran remains a serious regional threat. That’s no secret. That’s not hype. That’s a fact. But Wait! If the situation in the Middle East were to improve, could the U.S. partner with Iran? Could the political situation conceivably improve if a “grand bargain” were struck between Iran and the United States? No! Iranian imperialism will continue destabilizing the Middle East because that’s the reality of that government’s world view. Iranian officials feed on crisis.

Some experts argue that the imperialist tendencies of the Iranian government are shared by the Iranian people themselves. Evidence suggests the opposite. In polls conducted in Iran, Iranians want to join the international community and are overwhelmingly pro-American. There’s no question about it. The Iranian people are not represented by their Government. Therefore, they are not likely to share the Iranian Government’s anti-American foreign policy either.

Yet many Western intellectuals argue that supporting the Iranian people’s democratic aspirations is too problematic and too confrontational to become official American policy. As for the Iranian people and Americans who support their aspirations for democracy, it’s definitely worth the risk to challenge the status-quo in Iran. [1]

Pundits who claim the Iranian people will side with Iranian clerics before siding with Americans who support their inalienable rights are missing the big picture. So what if Iranians do turn to their masters before embracing liberty? Those that side with tyranny over their own freedom are politically and diplomatically irrelevant. Therefore, international relations with Iran remain tenuous at best and dangerous at worst.

Iran’s intransigent birth cannot be downplayed. The Islamic Republic was born a hostage taking nation and continues to use hostage taking as leverage in foreign policy negotiations. Violence is embedded in the current Iranian government’s national identity. Nothing short of a regime change will end Tehran’s imperialist ambitions. Call this essay a quest for behavioral change among Iranian officials, if you like; nevertheless, regime change is this essay's ultimate demand. [2]

If recent newspaper headlines are an accurate indication of a shift in American foreign policy toward Iran, the United States has once again rejected a policy of regime change in that country. Recent headlines across Europe and the Middle East are lavishing praise on Iranian nuclear resistance to international requests for the Iranians to halt their nuclear enrichment program.

It's not in anybody’s interest that Iran receive a pass for its bad behavior. Western pressure to stop Iranian uranium enrichment has been met time and time again with deception and denials. Ultimately, U.S. consensus on the Iran issue has been capitulation. Rational requests from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to halt uranium enrichment are repeatedly denied by the Revolutionary Government of Iran with a consistency the International Atomic Energy Agency, (IAEA) and UNSC couldn’t match.

It’s been the Iranian government’s lying, sarcasm and stubbornness that effectively broke the back of the UNSC and the IAEA. The IAEA is tasked with inspecting declared nuclear sites in Iran. Instead, the IAEA has been complicit in Iranian lying, sarcasm and stubbornness through mismanagement and lethargy. Arguably the United Nations and its sister organizations have been a broken bureaucracy from their inception. So what do world leaders do? Do they find a way to make it work? Do they engender the will to face sarcastic liars? No! They dither!

None has dropped the atomic ball more than the world’s recognized democratic leader, the United States of America. U.S. efforts to curb Iranian domination are not easy, but they shouldn’t be undercut by agencies within the United States. Of course, Russia, China, Venezuela and Syria support Iran’s nuclear progress. Dictatorships actively sabotage the efficacy of democratic international relations. That’s because they aren’t democracies. Their obstructions are expected. Capitulating to these nations’ support for Iran’s defiance is capitulating to global dictatorships. That’s a far cry from the UN operating as a healthy global democracy. Global policy toward Iran at this time is no longer about consensus building, it’s about dithering. Arguably, that’s what the United Nations does all the time. Dither!

No matter how one looks at it, Iran’s inflexibility has been met with flexibility from the Untied States and the International community. That’s not pragmatism. That’s capitulation. The United States, a world leader for freedom and democracy looks as though it recently surrendered to an international oligarchy, hell bent on protecting Iran as it continues to develop the means to make a nuclear weapon!

The international community can continue equivocating over such things as Iran’s intent. In terms of the Iran threat, it represents more than a nuclear threat. The threat is the regime itself. Nothing’s changed.

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1. The pursuit of freedom is not just one option among many; it is an obligation. If there are no Iranians who harbor an ambition to be free, that would only make the effort to encourage democracy in Iran more urgent. Fortunately, there are many Iranians who do pursue their own freedom and they deserve Americans’ support.

2. Regime change in Iran is an appropriate foreign policy position. Regardless of Iran’s nuclear intentions, which remain dangerous, Iran represents a threat to freedom of [religion, expression, assembly and of the press]. The threat occurs inside Iran and extends beyond its borders.

HUMINT: Unconditional Love

2007-12-08T18:13:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: Unconditional love can be expressed in many ways. I think of unconditional love as the emotional expression of a part for the whole. A mother and her newborn are emotionally inseparable. That’s an expression of unconditional love. Brothers may share it, if they’re close confidants. Soldiers may feel a version of unconditional love for those they risk everything for. A priest may feel unconditional love for his parishioners and vice-versa. Unconditional love is usually detached from materialism but it can indeed exist over purely material relations. A zealous store owner may feel a version of unconditional love for their most loyal customers.

The interconnectedness between part and whole is a transcendent bond that engenders unconditional love. Only through exercising those bonds can love be replenished. Without a sensation of unity; a part yearning to be whole, unconditional love is impossible. To understand unconditional love we need to consider what is conceivably whole and all the parts that contribute to its wholeness. Alternatively, we might assert, when parts are missing from the whole, there is an observable incompleteness.

At first glance, it’s apparent that none of the relationships that tie a part to its whole is ambivalent. In other words, the cohesion that binds a part to its whole is biased. It makes sense in the context of righteousness. There’s no such thing as righteous ambivalence. Pragmatism is often masqueraded as righteous ambivalence but instead, it’s self delusion; a form of escape; a part abandoning the whole.

Examples abound. Tribalism is often an elaborate expression of the bond between a member and their extended family. Nationalism is an elaborate expression of the bond between a citizen and their state. Consumerism is a bond between a consumer and their market choices. Environmentalism is a bond between a person and the earth. Spiritualism is an elaborate bond between the individual and their universe. None of these bonds is mutually exclusive. Each tug and push on the other, vying for equilibrium.

When these cohesive forces contradict each other too quickly or for too long, the inevitable result is a crash. In terms of tribes and nations, these crashes are called revolutions. They’re called recessions in terms of markets. When discussing the environment, they’re called extinctions. Only religion asserts its permanence yet we know that religions are as equally capable of extinction as are all of a faith’s adherents.

That said; how do we know these things? Inversely, how could we thrive if we did not know these things? Even if you’ve never heard of the scientific method, or never conducted a single laboratory experiment; we’re all aware of the past. Our unique interpretations of the past may deviate wildly; nevertheless we all know our present condition is a product of events that occurred in the past.

Humanity, in the here and now, represents all people --- a seemingly comprehensive whole to consider. Unconditional love exists between individuals and humanity, although it is very rare. It’s rare because it’s impractical. It only works for individuals loosely bound to their own past, and the history of all the wholes they belong. It might work for revolutionary idealists, but not their children or their children’s children. That’s because unconditional love for humanity is not the same as the whole represented by all of human history.

Human history is a truly comprehensive whole. Like religion, history, so long as there is a person capable of learning and remembering it, is impervious to crashing. Unlike religion though, humanity’s history includes all of the religions any one of us or our ancestors have ever believed in. Indeed, unlike these other sub-wholes [Tribe Nation Market] are each included in human history. Unfortunately, unconditional love does not exist between historical events (the parts) and history (the whole). History’s many parts are incapable of emotion; therefore past events have no cohesion to the whole of human history. It’s only through iterative interpretation of historical events that cohesive parts begin gravitating toward a unified whole.

That’s what all of us do with the history we think we know. The truth is, only historians operate with the legitimate qualifications, AKA, academic license, to organize historical events into a cohesive unified whole. Every other interpretation of history is just a convoluted opinion cobbled together by the emotional mix that guides each of us through our lives.

Maybe, one day, when historians are allowed to abandon their own [Tribes Nations Markets Environments Religions] and begin articulating human history as the whole that it truly is, the rest of us highly emotional laymen will understand the deeper meaning of our life, love and work in the context of all the life, love and work that was accomplished before us. From that awakening, we will see ourselves anew; we will find a new respect for history and an unconditional love for the future.

Among the competing forces that define who we are now, there is a force generated by the image of who we intend to be in the future. Constantly baptized by the fires of history making events, for better or worse, we are all changing. The questions we should be asking ourselves and each other are “how?” and “why?” Arguably, the force compelling us to succeed in harmony with each other is the most potent of all forces. Its power is an enduring theme throughout human history because it is a complementary force. Given freedom, and an accurate history, there is no reason to believe we couldn’t all be born again, in sustainable peace. That’s my definition of victory.

In short, our history deserves unconditional respect and our future deserves unconditional love.

HUMINT: Satire as Philosophy

2007-11-28T21:52:00.000+03:30

Satire: a manner of writing that mixes a critical attitude with wit and humor in an effort to improve mankind and human institutions.

Philosophy: the rational investigation of questions about existence and knowledge and ethics.

Cynicism: originally the philosophy of a group of ancient Greeks called the Cynics; believing the worst of human nature and motives.

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HUMINT: Political theater in the form of satire makes introducing taboo subjects relatively easy. Good satire has real power. Introducing a subject in the form of a joke is like adding a giggly escape hatch for all of a conversation’s participants. But comedic reprieves from responsibility only work for those willing or able to retreat from tough subjects. John Stewart and Steven Colbert are perfect examples of America’s finest satirists. These men herd public opinion with satire as if they were cowboys driving livestock across the mid-western prairie. These two brilliant comedians make Americans laugh about subjects that we would otherwise prefer to avoid. Even if we don’t need a humorous back door to the tough subjects in America, we still want a comedic escape hatch. Indeed, we’re willing to pay for it as though it were as important as our prescription drugs...

Unlike American society, some societies need a scocio-political escape hatch just to think straight. Anonymity (using an alias and IP Address masking software) combined with satirical ambiguity is particularly useful in societies where spreading controversy can get you executed. An Iranian dissident for example, might be able to speak his or her mind -- pseudo freely -- encrypted by satire -- to avoid a few years in jail, avoid a public beating, or avoid execution. Unfortunately, the fascist authoritarians ruling Iran with an iron fist today are not known for their sense of humor. But that’s them… not us… que sera sera.

Living in a society like America or Europe, where controversy is embraced, satire is an indelible art. Comedians are masters of controversy and Americans love comedians. But how does it work? Who protects a comedian’s right to joke and the audience’s right to laugh? We all do… To be sure, citizens afforded the requisite security to be controversial by their government and their society is a rare phenomenon. When juxtaposed against the violent and mostly authoritarian history of humankind, living with a little uncomfortable controversy every once in a while has become very comfortable indeed.

What changed? Who is responsible for our modern freedoms? We all are! Our role in society is a function of what we collectively believe or have the capacity to believe… Our social identity evolved through iterations of victory in our wars, curing our diseases, feeding our hungry children and learning from our dissenters --- be they satirists, philosophers or cynics.

Let’s not give to much credit to the suffering of our ancestors. Humanity is not made better through suffering. Humanity is made better by outwitting the causes of suffering. There is no humility in defeat. There is only humility in a willingness to change in order to succeed, eventually. Case in point: Americans respect each other’s inalienable rights because our intellectual DNA constantly informs us of the inherent danger of NOT respecting each others inalienable rights. To that end, satire has played a major role in helping Americans understand who we are.

For context, consider the satirical approach to feminism taken by the renowned philosopher Plato [1]. In ancient Greece, Plato introduced the idea of women’s participation in democratic government as if it were a satirical joke. His thoughts about women leading men were comedic, but prophetic. To what extent Plato thought women could or should lead society is debatable, but that’s not the issue. Given the status of women in ancient Greece, could Plato have introduced the idea of women’s rights without a satirical façade? Could any Athenian have protected Plato from an angry mob if he didn’t add a humorous escape hatch to the notion of Athenian women as equals or as leaders?

Nowadays, it’s taken for granted that the political ideas of American women deserve the attention afforded to all American citizens in every public forum. Ask any American and they’ll tell you about America’s implicit and explicit gender rules. What does Plato’s story teach us? The lesson is; Plato introduced the idea of feminism imperfectly and the subject has morphed into something else; a new feminist philosophy about gender and leadership. We know Plato’s philosophy did not spread without controversy or consequence. Consciously intended or not, Plato’s concepts on the subject were encrypted by satire. Satirical encryption may have saved his life… His satirical expression may have help create and thus save our American lives. It was Athenian society and Plato’s willingness to express his philosophy that contributed to the creation of our American democracy. America’s Founding Fathers knew Greek history.

As they did, we know too, ancient Athens was a bloody place in Plato’s day. Freedom and her companion, Justice [2], were talked about at great length in ancient Athens by men like Plato. But what ancient Athenians practiced wouldn’t look much like freedom or justice to modern Americans. That fact cannot diminish the socio-political trajectory ancient democracy established. It was their ancient mental model that helped develop the mental models of America’s Founding Fathers. If and when Americans are inclined to look for their philosophical ancestry, they’re bound to discover something about themselves. Regardless of what our emotion may tell us about the ancients and their ways, basic human freedoms are both subjectively and objectively defined in American law.

That said; is there a logical limit to freedom or justice? Are Americans a free people? Yes, we certainly are! Can Americans challenge their authority figures in public? Yes, we do! What about controversial opinions and American national security? Is it safe to disagree satirically, philosophically, or cynically on issues related to the security of the United States? Of course it is safe to do so! Whether or not it is healthy to be cynical about American leadership is another subject. The fact remains, U.S. National Security is represented by a highly educated cadre of career professionals who embody personal responsibility and sustain the American Republic with military strength, rational analysis and perpetual readiness.

My respect and admiration for this generation of American men and women leading the United States today cannot be overstated. Likewise, my ambition for them to succeed cannot be overstated. My success is inextricably linked to theirs, as is all Americans’ success. Their failure would be my failure… Failure is an unnecessary and unacceptable outcome and could only occur in the realm of ideas. History has shown that our freedom is our strength. History has shown what Americans can do. History suggests what Americans will do.

Are American officials perfect? No! Do they make mistakes? Yes! Are American officials approachable in the context of correcting the mistakes they’ve made? Yes, they are! These truisms exist whether or not American citizens agree or disagree with U.S. policy. Even the most obtuse critics of American foreign policy argue that American officials are doing what they believe is necessary to protect the United States and our allies abroad. That’s a good thing! American officials should be trying to protect American interests. In many instances, American interests coincide with the world’s interests, but that’s not the crux of most American disagreement, argument and debate. The core disagreements between Americans are over methods to achieve those interests, whatever those interests may be.

Are American citizens (or anyone else for that mater) obliged to treat their disagreements with American foreign or domestic policy issues as a joke, presented in satirical form, providing themselves and the United States Government a comedic escape hatch? No they are not! Are American citizens obliged to sue the United States government for every mistake one of its representatives makes? No, what a waste of time and tax! Are problems in society too big to fix without a utopian myth and a charismatic leader to chase? No, not at all!

In practical terms, however you decide to express yourself, look to others for advice, look for solutions and look for happiness. Keep your expectations realistic and optimistic. Realize, not all rules benefit society. Realize some members of society will refuse to follow the rules. Challenge the rules you think hurt more people than they help. Think about what rules people break and why. Challenge authority. Challenge cynics. Cynicism is as much an illusion as utopia and the charismatic leaders who claim utopia exists if only we were all perfect... None of us are perfect. Use historical analogy. Use your imagination. Use satire when it suits the subject matter, but know that satire stylistically distorts the material it conveys. Satire is the art of bending our familiar rules of implicit and explicit communication. Realize that success embraces communities that exercise their freedom to learn, speak and assemble. And finally --- Be proud of your ideology. Describe it accurately no matter how seductive it appears to be. Whatever you believe, if you only represent your philosophy as satire, it will forever remain the joke you’ve made it to be.

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[1]

Plato as a Proto-Feminist --- EXCERPT: Of course, we cannot be absolutely certain of Plato’s views… such knowledge would be impossible without interviewing the philosopher himself. But, through careful analyses of his writings, we can certainly glean out ideas which paint him as a proto-feminist.

[2] The image is of blind justice with its pixel color inverted, Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert in the upper right corner and the Parthenon sits in the lower right corner. Inverting the image of justice is my satire. The meaning remains but the overall seriousness of the statue is limited by manipulating the image’s color. Stewart and Colbert are brilliant satirists. While they are funny, the direction they are going with their satire deserves to be challenged. The Parthenon in the lower right corner represents the Athenian Empire, Athenian Democracy and Plato’s world. That era deeply influences Americans today even if most of us don’t realize it.

HUMINT: Mental Models

2007-11-17T00:11:00.000+03:30

Seductive: tending to entice into a desired action or state.

Successful: having succeeded or being marked by a favorable outcome.

HUMINT: Survival depends on a clear conception of how the world works. You can be wrong but it always has consequences. Your personal understanding of the world and its mechanics is a model of reality. Your model transcends your personality. It transcends your nationalism. It transcends your religion. It’s true no matter what threatens the survival of your model or what threatens your reality. Understanding our history in the context of world history helps us form our models, but history alone cannot serve as sufficient mental model. At best, history is a user’s manual for society. That’s why historians tend to be extremely competent model makers. Historians can see patterns most of us can’t. But don’t embrace a historian’s version of reality casually. Just because historians can see patterns and articulate them doesn’t guarantee those patterns are real or relevant to the rest of us today. History is an interpretive enterprise. Historians aren’t priests. They don’t demand your faith so don’t give it to them. History is comprised of disconnected windows into the past; like pieces of a model that someone is going to glue together. Too often history is ignored when we’re building our mental models. What I’d like American professionals, professors, and politicians to realize is that history’s pieces will be fashioned into a model, by someone, whether we like the results or not.

If you’re expecting me to force my model on you, that’s not what this essay is about. That’s not what my writings here at human intelligence are about either. It’s a fool’s errand to force a model on anyone. By virtue of their existence, all models are seductive. Put a brick on a podium in an art gallery and you’ll see what I mean. As the pontificators gather around it, they’ll invest their own meaning in the brick. I’d like to believe the most accurate mental models are the most socially seductive, but they’re not. The most accurate models are usually the most successful, but success is not universal, therefore successful mental models tend to be unseductive when other illusory choices are offered. Ultimately, it’s not what a mental model looks like that matters. It’s what a mental model does for its subscriber. Successful Washingtonian, Jeffersonian, Hamiltonian, to name a few mental architects, have a high melting point in our American melting pot, but the mental models they created for Americans are not indestructible. The work done by the Founding Fathers is being undone by a number of disingenuous members of American Authority who claim American foreign policy is an arbitrary adventure in aggression.

Any implication of arbitrary acts of aggression committed for the sake of a nation or government is enough to degrade any mental model that sustains that nation or government. In terms of Iraq and Afghanistan, empirical evidence does not support accusations that the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War were not necessary. Despite the lowest record of error and casualties in any American war ever, the daily news in America and around the world is replete with implications of misconduct. The fact is, the Iraq War and the War in Afghanistan are being conducted with a high degree of professionalism. Those are the facts… So, why are there implications to the contrary? Where are the implications of misconduct coming? If consensual government is a just cause, where’s the disconnect between success on the battlefield and support for our wars abroad?

I don’t know the answer. I do however know that long term peace (a highly desirable outcome of any violent conflict) fosters the idea that all aggression is arbitrary. This is a very self destructive misunderstanding of violence in the midst of a struggle for consensual government in Iraq and Afghanistan. Americans are ideologically and institutionally geared to fight for inalienable rights, liberty and an enduring pursuit of happiness. That’s a good thing. To be coy about that reality is a tacit acceptance of contrary mental models. Nothing could be more debilitating to the American Mental Model here at home than the belief that “conflict” and “failure” are equivalent concepts. For those that see the world through this distorted lens, are as likely to avoid decisive victory in Iraq and Afghanistan. Presumably they’re skittish of escalating conflict in the Middle East when they are doing exactly that. War without victory is a stalemate. It is a recipe for sustained conflict.

To clarify this point, let’s dissociate America’s Wars from American Sport. Non-violent competition may feel like war but each is an entirely different experience. Unlike victory, spiking a football after a touchdown may be bray. On the other hand, declaring victory after a war or the pursuit of victory during war is the only guarantor of finality. Violent engagement will only cease when one mental model supplants another in society that accepts attacks against the United States and our forces serving overseas. The mental model that remains after victory needn’t be American. It shouldn’t be. It must however peacefully accept the United States as a legitimate component of the world we live in today. If it does not, and as long as it does not, our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq will smolder indefinitely. Mental models do not peacefully coexist in the minds of militants. Either the United States is a legitimate nation pursuing legitimate goals around the globe or it is not. It is not bray to actively seek the elimination of dangerous ambiguities swirling around in the minds of Americans and our enemies abroad. At this important moment in history, when more and more identities are expressing their mental models in public and online (with the technology the American Market empowered them with) it is dangerous to modest.

The best of my ability, I built my model and will risk everything for it. I’m not a cognitive architect but I love my model like a mother loves her newborn. I’m still working on it but enjoy displaying it; unfinished, unpolished, with pride. My confidence comes from acknowledging my model’s limitations and my enduring attempts to articulate it. But set that aside. No matter what you may think of me or my model, think about the model you consciously or unconsciously push on the world. Is it inclusive, exclusive or divisive? How did you derive your model? Was your model a gift to you or did you earn it with blood, sweat and tears? Did you find it in your teens or are in adulthood? Was an introspective experience or some kind of group love-in? Is it sustainable? Be honest with yourself. Do you talk about or even think about your mental models? If you’re modest with your model at home or abroad, it doesn’t count. Look at the alternatives. There will always be plenty of alternatives. The most seductive models are shown often and copy themselves in the public arena. Think about it. Missionaries take their models on the road. Door to door, they sell their ideas best face to face --- with a smile!

Whether we’re conscious of it or not, our world model changes as it asymptotically approaches reality. It’s very difficult to notice these changes as they overtake us. The mental model of the world we have now is our point of reference for the past, present and future. It’s not Orwellian. When your mental model of the world changes your conception of the past present and future emigrates as well. Nevertheless, we hope our model is increasingly accurate. At least the ecosystem of mental models appears to be evolving toward better precision and accuracy. It’s a trend that occurs without bias, because biased models, no matter how seductive they are, biased models always fail their subscribers. Unfortunately, I’m describing a feeling. I have no proof. I’m extrapolating because I know; no matter what models individuals subscribe to today, reality and all of our mental models of it are dynamic, no matter how wrong or right they are. Some mental models will be adopted; others will be edited to accommodate reality or abandoned in their entirety. I don’t care if you adopt my mental model or call my articulation of it bray. If you do adopt it, do it without me. I’m not trying to start a cult. If you think I’m bray, it’s a tangent worth spending a few words on --- kiss my ass! [2] I’m here to define and defend my ideas at all costs --- that applies to dinner parties and fist fights. I prefer the former to the later, but know both intimately. Defending a mental model with pleasantries does not contradict a healthy readiness to engage in violence. If anything I’ve just written is intimidating check your mental model. It’s probably biased.

That said --- During the American Revolution, whose mental model was more accurate; King George III or Thomas Jefferson? Obviously Jefferson! Right… well, that’s how it all played out didn’t it. Thank God that’s history and thank God for our British allies! --- NEXT! During the French Revolution, whose mental model was more accurate; Marie Antoinette or her pitch fork wielding, revolutionary people? With hindsight, perched high on my own mental model, I’d say both were wrong! Thank God that’s history. Thank God for our allies in France!

Let’s keep going --- During the Iranian revolution, whose mental model was more accurate; Shah Mohamed Reza Pahlavi or Ayatollah Khomeini? Both were wrong, but this revolutionary example is different than the American or French Revolutions. Empirical evidence suggests the Iranian Revolution isn’t over. Nothing has been settled since it occurred. It never fulfilled its purpose. We could pretend it’s over… but that would be biased. It wouldn’t explain why the Iranian Government continues to burn American flags in their streets. It wouldn’t explain why a sovereign nation like Iran is pushing the International community to the edge of smacking it with debilitating sanctions. Tehran is running a reckless nuclear program making the region more nervous than anything else occurring there. Pretending the Iranian Revolution were over wouldn’t explain the mass graves scattered across Iran. It wouldn’t explain what’s going on when student leaders and democracy advocates are tortured for their opinions, or gays hanged for being gay or feminists beaten for demanding women’s rights… The fact is, the slogans from 1979 were never realized. Victory in that revolution was suppressed and that’s precisely why turbulence continues in that country today.

Revolutions are turning points in many minds. They have influence that ripples through generations of mankind. Revolutions may be the most significant events in human history, for better or worse. Events larger than individuals like Revolution and War usually shape our mental models, even if we don’t realize they do. From my reading of history, only a few brave souls have been intelligent and brave enough to bring the world’s collective mental models closer to reality. Many of those individuals paid for their altruistic curiosity with their life. I don’t know all their names and cannot sufficiently praise them. They are the real architects of our existence today. Some names I do know and cannot be coy about. Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Hamilton, Lincoln, Grant, Sherman --- these men were architects. Their bold acts transformed into modern day gifts Americans take for granted today. Now, we look back and consider their miracles mundane. They could not have made any other choices, could they? How could we not look at them that way? It is through their design that we see the world. Their omnipresence renders Americans blind to them. No matter what we can see or what we believe exists… our current mode of survival is just one model among many that came before it. How the world really works is too complex for our minds to fully comprehend. Our beauty comes from the struggle to understand what we know we can’t fully know…

Ideally, one day, the most successful mental models will also be the most seductive… That’s not going to be easy to manifest. Get out there. Test your model. Learn something new about us and spread the word as though it were gospel!

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[1] Earth’s atmosphere is protected in part by our planet’s magnetic field. The Earth’s auroras are incredibly beautiful. This image shows a solar flare to be deflected by our magnet field. We perceive such events when we see the aurora.

[2] If I come across as aggressive, you don’t know what aggressive is. There are diverse peoples in the world with bad ideas and guns to back those ideas up. They want to kill Americans. If you can’t look them in the eye and express your mental model, you definitely won’t be able to deescalate the situation. In the heat of a fight, you won’t be able to kill them before they kill you. You won’t even know when violence is about to happen. In fact, if you never express your mental model as an sign of modesty, you’ll make violence inevitable.

HUMINT: Chemically Neutral

2007-11-13T22:37:00.000+03:30

Entropy: A measure of the disorder or randomness in a system. The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy of a closed system always increases over time. This means that energy is being transformed by the mechanics of the universe into uniformly-distributed heat energy. What this means is that even a chemically neutral process will increase entropy. There is no way around entropy… no matter how green or chemically neutral mankind intends to become.

Quote 1: Is it better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both? --- Niccolo Machiavelli

Quote 2: War is an extension of politics by other means. --- Karl Von Clausewitz

When it comes to our society’s environmental wars, I want to be neutral. Not with regard to my opinion, but with regard to my chemistry. I don’t want to be Green! I don’t want to conserve! I want to be neutral! Unfortunately, a chasm of leadership for the cause of chemical neutrality exists in our endless war with the environment. Shouldn’t we be asking: "Where is the Enviro-equivalent of Master Strategist and Tactician, General David Petraeus in this fight? Where’s our Patton? Where’s our Sherman?" Admittedly, the void is partly my fault. For years I’ve been ambivalent, and for it, I am ashamed. I’ve never asked for representation or leadership on environmental issues, until now. In place of good leaders, thorny weeds with bad ideas are blooming. Sadly, now, these bad ideas are difficult if not impossible to remove by Enviro-reform or Enviro-revolution. The real question is, “who leads today?” and “what kind of leadership does the environmental movement need?” Current leader’s ineffectiveness aside, the generals leading our global environmental wars are ruthless. They are as Machiavellian as any leader that preceded them. No, these generals do not wear uniforms, but their divisions are gearing up for battle. Make no mistake; they will fight for their bad ideas. Arguably, Enviro-generals are more political than military; nevertheless, my analogy deserves enough latitude to develop. Today’s environmental generals recruit and lead with an intoxicating mixture of fear and love; Fear of impending global doom, and love of the planet as it exists today. All that’s required of our Enviro-generals to keep their status and rank is that they regularly imply environmental doom is imminent. The more emotional their arguments, the better. Like many of those who have already joined the multitudes marching behind these generals, I tend to fear their environmental scenarios. My fear is manifest without looking at any of the data. Why? The predisposition in every society is to believe the sky is falling. It’s human nature. Human nature is not something to be ashamed of. Indeed, fear of the worst case scenario is what kept our ancestors alive long enough for us to inherit this beautiful earth.

Born into this conflicted world; born into this environmental war raging beside many other wars, I harbor no love for Enviro-generals. I do however fear them. Enviro-generals imply global climate change is an occurrence human beings are fully capable of controlling. But that’s like saying humans are fully capable of controlling national markets, or controlling each other, AKA, communism or slavery. Pardon my skepticism, but history suggests authoritarian egotism usually precipitates disaster! Asserting authority over a system too complex for the human mind to comprehend tends to cannibalize and destroy the system. The only systems human beings have shown any competence controlling are programmable systems. The efficacy of programmable systems is another matter entirely; an interesting tangent for another day. In the context of this essay however, it should suffice to say, the environment is a non-programmable system. In other words, there are climatic variables outside of human control. Therefore, a rational environmental debate cannot be centered on the magnitude of human influence or the certitude of a solution if and only if competent individuals assert control over the earth’s climate. Both of these environmental angles are indefensible. Both are being used by today’s Enviro-generals! The fact remains, no matter how elegant the argument, it is a leap of faith to believe climate is significantly influenced by the activities of mankind. It is an even larger leap of faith to believe human beings are capable of controlling the climatic environment.

The only way to prove mankind’s influence on the global environment is to extricate mankind from the globe and observe the results. That’s impossible! The protest slogan for the “Chemically Neutral” movement should be: WE’RE HERE, WITHOUT FEAR, GET USED TO IT! But Enviro-generals feed on fear and anti-human fantasies. Undeterred by the embedded contradictions in their ideology, Enviro-generals use their public speaking skills to acquiring venture capital. They transform love and fear into weapon-like words and attack public emotions with unmitigated vigor. But why fight the environment? Why attack the public for trends they may have no control over at all? I believe these leaders would choose to be generals in any other war if environmental issues didn’t resonate so well in the public domain. Am I questioning their sincerity? Absolutely! A way to spot a disingenuous Enviro-general might be to look at the other wars they’re fighting or the level with which their own environmental hypocrisies neutralize their environmental positions. Some of the most outspoken Enviro-generals these days are fighting against America’s Long War, the Global War on Terrorism. They are anti-anti-terrorism. To poach soldiers and advocates from other wars, Enviro-generals are not constrained by the environmental issue alone. Therefore the environment may jest be a means to maintain their status and rank in the public eye.

Empirical arguments and reasoned solutions are an anathema to the Enviro-general’s goal. A thorough environmental solution might end their war and eliminate the platform on which they lead their troops. Right? No, not really. Not in this war. While comprehensive solutions lead to sustainable peace for conventional wars, the Global War Against The Environment (GWATE) cannot be won. Our war against the environment can only be fought or lost. Humanity’s existence puts us at odds with the green utopia environmentalists are fighting for today. Under their utopian paradigm, we are guaranteed to lose! But that doesn’t curb the illusion that peace between mankind and the environment is possible. The environment represents a perfect war for Enviro-generals. There is no environmental utopia! All of our choices have consequences. What’s at stake is the magnitude of those consequences. The fact is, the Garden of Eden is lost to mankind. We’re all exiles from Eden. Unlike the analogous illusion in the aftermath of World War I, the Global War Against The Environment (GWATE) is not the war to end all wars. The Global War Against The Environment is the only legitimate war to fight without forever. It may be hard to fathom but, imagine an American War without an Anti-War movement… oh the bliss. In this war, no matter what side you are on, we are all soldiers. But what are we fighting for? Conservation! Recycling! New Technology! --- No. Chemical Neutrality! The environmental debates are wholly sustainable if and only if mankind can reconcile the embedded conflicts within the current environmental movement. That’s not going to be easy. Whether these conflicts are resolved or not, our environmental wars will not end as long as human beings depend on a natural environment for survival. Like the Global War On Terrorism, (GWOT) the Global War Against The Environment (GWATE) all humanity can ally against a common enemy. While humanity need not live with terrorists indefinitely, we are obliged to fight with our environment forever. That’s why most societies set aside their differences to find common ground against a common enemy.

HUMINT: We cannot win this war but we can lose. What can this generation do to guarantee humanity does not lose this war? I believe the answer is to endure as allies through the pursuit of chemical neutrality! But that’s not what environmentalists are doing today. What’s missing today in the almost spiritual search for environmental salvation is a valid philosophy that marries economic progress to environmental sustainability. Let’s take a step back to enhance the clarity of this point. Without an appropriate philosophy, no appropriate identity will emerge. Without identity and the resultant behaviors born of it, their can be no population where best (environmental) practices will be adopted. Without a philosophically cohesive populace there can be no constituency and no legitimate popular sovereignty derived from it. In short, only limited progress can be made without identifying an environmental philosophy that reconciles economic progress with environmental sustainability. Buying green isn’t enough! Now is the moment for truth, not illusions. Buying green has a placebo effect on the masses because it is new spin on the old idea of conservation. It too will fail.

The many points of failure of prevailing environmental philosophy are irresolvable. Environmentalists and their movement’s generals that I talked to, listened to or read, tend to see the end-goal of human behavior as the reduced impact on, and the segregation of, people from pre-human environmental states. Admit it. Environmentalists are seeking to create Eden without Adam and Eve. Seriously, it’s as though they see the natural world without mankind as the Garden of Eden [1], a paradise without the possibility of human induced degradation. The ideal environment, as they imply, exists without the interference of mankind. No one can know for sure, but maybe this environmental philosophy is a derivative of the Christian conception of man’s relationship with the animal kingdom. If it is, it’s a common misinterpretation of the familiar biblical narrative. Why? It is a misconception because environmental philosophy contradicts itself. God created the animal kingdom and mankind. God then endowed mankind with authority over the animal kingdom. Adam’s and Eve’s expulsion from Eden was not a revocation of that authority. If the philosophical undertones of environmentalism are Judeo-Christian in origin, nothing suggests the philosophy hasn’t also been corrupted by a malignant hybrid of other failed or failing ideologies. Beyond Judeo-Christian misinterpretation, I also sense a blend of zoological elitism, socialist and theist philosophies that, when combined, invite repeated failures. In any case, where the flawed philosophy comes from is less important than understanding the need to supplant it.

To liberate mankind from the Enviro-generals and their misguided philosophies, the most obvious and straight forward approach would be to find a philosophy that marries economic progress to environmental sustainability. How? As we’ve covered before, total liberation, as proselytized by Enviro-generals, suggests mankind should abandon the earth to go on without us. That’s absurd. Local liberation implies that sections of the earth can be maintained pristine without interference from people who live elsewhere. That too is absurd. The only viable environmental liberation movement is to declare the pursuit of chemical neutrality and accept that it will take generations to achieve. The struggle will be long and arduous, but their can be no compromise with today’s philosophical contradictions. Pursuing chemical neutrality will change the way we think about the future of our economy and environment. Pursuing chemical neutrality will bring humanity into direct confrontation with itself. It is a task bigger than you or me. In the context of chemical neutrality, start abandoning the old environmentalist ideas of conservation now. Chasing efficiency is like chasing a rainbow. Efficiency through conservation should not be the pursuit of environmental foot soldiers as it is today. Saving a kilowatt-hour here or a ton of carbon dioxide there is only going to slow the inevitable --- whatever that inevitable scenario may be. This is true whether or not Global Warming is fact or “the sky is falling” fiction. The pursuit of mankind’s environmental liberation through chemical neutrality on the other hand offers a philosophy that embeds only one irresolvable conflict. Entropy! But we live with entropy today, as did our ancestors before us. It’s an unavoidable product of any action or reaction, even those that cancel each other chemically.

Operating in an economy that rewards action, while simultaneously rewarding the opposite/equal reaction – from a chemical perspective, humanity would stay environmentally happy, healthy, and prosperous. There would be no need to limit population density nor would it matter where businesses or individuals operate. Now, you might be wondering if “chemical neutrality” is philosophically different than the existing notion of recycling or buying green. Recycling today isn’t really recycling. It’s a fancy form of conservation. For the most part recycling is down-cycling. Plastics, paper, glass and metals are routinely degraded and reprocessed into commodities that will eventually end up in a landfill. Chemical neutrality is recycling at the molecular level and would demand more environmental awareness from individuals, business and governments than anything we do today. To move toward chemical neutrality civil, political and industrial leaders will have to find markets for products that can chemically balance their own or each others products. With the level of marketing genius and business acumen in corporate America today, I have no doubt it can be done.

IN CONCLUSION: This essay is a humble request for a tactical change and a thorough review of leadership in our environmental wars. And finally, I believe the first Enviro-general who leads the call to demand chemical neutrality will have fired the second “shot heard round the world” [2]. Someone is going to do it. Will it be you?

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1. www.crystalinks.com: The image is of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden which alludes to how Judeo-Christian values may position contemporary environmental philosophy as well as the issues fostering this generation’s environmental debates. The Garden of Eden represents paradise lost because of human fallibility. It is my assertion that the majority of environmentalists operating today are working for the extrication of mankind to preserve what they see as paradise.

2. wikipedia: The "shot heard round the world" is a well known phrase that has come to represent several historical incidents throughout world history. The shot was heard in Lexington. It was known to kill eight Americans and injure ten. The line is originally from the opening stanza of Ralph Waldo Emerson's Concord Hymn (1837), and referred to the beginning of the American Revolutionary War. Later, in Europe and the Commonwealth of Nations, the phrase became synonymous with the shot that killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand and plunged Europe into World War I.

HUMINT: Unconscious Design

2007-11-09T02:22:00.000+03:30

Conscious Design: The product of an individual or engineer who formulates mechanisms based on tangible environmental constraints.

Unconscious Design: An individual’s consumer choice made to satisfy real or arbitrary requirements they imagine exist.

In the film, Who Killed the Electric Car there is a conclusive scene near the film’s end, where the vehicular hero of the film, the Impact, is side by side with the vehicular villain, the Hummer. The scene is as dramatic as it possibly can be. The two automobiles are shiny and clean; the size differential overwhelmingly evident. The behemoth Hummer dominates the camera with its sharp edges and bulk, while the Impact’s polite curves announce a superior sophistication. Both are poised to go forth into the future, seemingly born equivalent if not equal at the starting line of consumer choice… When they start to roll toward the camera, in a pseudo race, the Impact pulls ahead, as though it’s the better choice, subtly implying consumers would be fools to continue to favor the Hummer over the Impact or its future electric equivalent. Recall, the major premise of the film is that the Impact was murdered by a vast conspiracy.

Like the Roman Coup that took the life of Gaius Julius Caesar, the Impact was conspired against and eventually murdered. The film’s actors even stage a funeral for the automobile. Who Killed the Electric Car is product anthropomorphism at its best. Without regard to the tears and angst of the committed drivers, the Impact’s business model bled to death from hundreds of tiny cuts inflicted by a multitude of enemies. The guilty provocateurs include Big Government, Big Oil, Ignorant Consumers, Auto Manufacturers and Corrupt Environmental Regulators. No cut was deeper however than the Impact’s father, played by General Motors. GM’s betrayal was epic, even biblical. GM is portrayed in the film as the corporate combination of Caesar’s Brutus and in a biblical context Isaac’s Abraham1. GM was determined to sacrifice its more successful offspring to a viscous, capitalist God. What else could GM be thinking? Nothing good of course… Big business is always bad (right?) therefore GM must be guided by an evil paternalistic impulse to keep its dirty children alive at the expense of its only clean one. Not so fast! While that narrative is possible, it’s not necessarily probable.

In my opinion, the relevance of the Impact/Hummer scene cannot be understated. Setting aside the fact that both vehicles are made by GM, serving as an incestuous corporate competition that GM can’t lose; it says more about transportation and environmental problems than the film’s dominant narrative. The film is an emotional rollercoaster that intends to leave an average viewer in love with the martyred Impact and at odds with everybody else. Unfortunately the dominant narrative basically ignores the unconscious engineering problem as it relates to consumer choice. What the actors and director apparently failed to understand is how most normal people make their decisions. While this essay may not answer that question in its entirety, hopefully it will provide some insight on big commitment decision making as those decisions relate to a family vehicle.

People unconsciously design their lives with the most tangible, best/worst case scenario in their unconscious mind. You might be wondering how I can claim to understand the unconscious mind of average consumers. Am I a mind reader? No, I’m not. I actually don’t understand the unconscious mind of others. What I do have instead is a related insight into energy, efficiency and conscious decision making. To demonstrate the difference between conscious design and unconscious design, let’s consider a problem similar to the one introduced by the film Who Killed the Electric Car. To get a feel for solving big problems, I always start small and work my way up.

So let’s get to work. Design a solar powered street light with me and you’ll see what my analogy means. We’ll keep the design at the conceptual level so you won’t need a calculator. You’re familiar with the inherent variability in our environment, right? Some days are cold. Some days are hot. Some days are sunny. Some days are cloudy. Some days are long and some days are short. Alternatively, some nights are really cold and really long. In every case, we can tame these variables with historical data and competent estimations. At night our solar powered streetlight batteries will have to keep our street light ON for the longest and coldest night of the year. We can’t afford a lawsuit if the light goes out at three AM. Guaranteeing the light stays on during the night is one engineering constraint. During the day, our solar panel will have to charge the battery for that scenario plus some safety factor. A safety factor of two suggests a battery charge that would last twice the duration of the longest, coldest night. The size of the solar panel will be derived from that most tangible, worst case scenario engineering requirement.

Now let’s use what we’ve learned about conscious design to understand unconscious design. An automobile is a big commitment. To make that commitment, the vehicle should perform under the worst case scenarios. In the mind of a consumer, however, the worst case from an engineering perspective translates into the best case scenario for the consumer. This I know from personal experience. I want to drive where I want when I want, with my whole family and everything I own. Any vehicle that cannot accommodate my best case scenario, by default, is a luxury item. Let’s go back to the analogy for a minute. A long sunny day for a solar powered street light represents an incredible amount of wasted energy, as does a luxury car to a family on a budget. Every day that isn’t the worst day for a solar powered street light is a luxury. The actual usage of the vehicle may never approach the unrealistic expectations a consumer takes with them to the dealership, but that doesn’t matter.

The electric car must be reinvented if it is going to compete with consumers who aren’t actors. To baptize an electric vehicle anew in the competitive fires of the free market, an electric car will have to be able to go wherever drivers want it to go, whenever drivers want to go there. There can be no mistakes, like forgetting to plug in the car at night. Let’s be honest. Forgetting to charge the battery would be more costly in terms of time than running out of gas on the highway in a Hummer.

To the other issues raised by the film… The reduced impact (not the car name) on the environment is of intangible value, if there is any at all. An individual vehicle has negligible influence over smoggy days, unless the power plants that generate the power to charge the batteries have scrubbers installed on the exhaust stacks. The Impact’s business model does not eliminate tons of carbon dioxide that will still enter the atmosphere, regardless of a vehicle’s fossil fuel power source. A shift in fuel source from oil to coal has geopolitical benefits, but again, those are of intangible value to a consumer, that is unless you’ve ever seen a strip mine. Strip coal mines are extreme environmental hazards. What about the H2 economy? Hydrogen embrittlement is a serious problem left unmentioned. Standard pipes don’t work for H2. The molecules are too small for effective containment. They slip through the gaps in pipe walls making them brittle and dangerous. Alternative pipes capable of safely moving H2 around the globe are very expensive. I am not optimistic about the future of H2 as a fuel. Plug-in hybrid vehicles sound very interesting in terms of diversifying America’s energy portfolio. Half coal, half gasoline --- sounds like an emotionally stable balance even if it doesn’t help the atmosphere very much. In terms of the historical accuracy of the film was stretching the truth if not intentionally disingenuous, steam powered cars nearly beat out the internal combustion engine. In 1906, Fred Marriott drove a steam powered vehicle built by the Stanley Brothers to a speed of 127 MPH.

In conclusion, there are no easy answers to the energy problem as it relates to automobile fuel. Right now, electric cars are a luxury item that lack comprehensive usability. As for alternatives, Cellulosic Ethanol looks very promising. It was a source of fuel conspicuously absent from the film. Maybe Cellulosic Ethanol will kill the need for an electric car. We’ll see. I’ll be exploring the manufacturing process for Cellulosic Ethanol in a follow up post to free fuel. If we are going to indulge luxurious fantasies, the best case scenario would be to have access to equipment capable of making fuel in an average consumer’s garage. Think about why consumers want to stop at a gas station anyway. They don’t! Consumers want an easy to use gas pump in their garage. Developing do-it-yourself fuel making equipment would reduce the need for an expensive Ethanol upgrade to gas stations around the country. Actually the opposite could happen to investing in gas station upgrades. So called “Big Oil” would probably be forced to close most of the existing gas stations as well as their existing oil refineries. To stay afloat they would probably need to raise the price of fossil gas; $20 per gallon of gasoline, anyone?

No thanks… More to come on the future of fuel.

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1: The image is of Abraham about to sacrifice his son Isaac. It is related to the piece Unconscious Design by analogy. The film Who Killed the Electric Car portrays GM as a parental corporation sacrificing its good vehicular invention the Impact in favor of its black sheep son, the Hummer.

HUMINT: American Empiricist

2007-10-31T23:56:00.000+03:30

Imperialism: any instance of aggressive extension of authority.

Empiricism: an iterative approach that argues for study of events through observation and the formulation of new policy based on lessons learned.

How long should the American People wait before they start taking foreign policy matters into their own hands? Indeed they already have! There is a domestic backlash against an absurd narrative that claims “the United States is an empire”. The United States is definitely not an empire, but few Americans are willing to state the obvious. Even fewer are willing to aggressively tell the truth. American wars are anti-empire. American wars are for liberation, not occupation. That’s why Americans are pro-victory. American wars have always been about liberation and I believe American wars always will be about liberation. Because of a leadership vacuum on this issue, Americans are once again solving their political problems themselves. Now, we are witnessing the rise of ideological entrepreneurs inside and outside America who aren’t willing to wait for their elected officials to wake up. Like Paul Revere, they are raising the Alarm, here, here and here ... Indeed, there is a natural awakening happening across America that can be felt --- in our libraries and in our classrooms --- temples, synagogues, churches and mosques --- inside coffee shops, book stores and restaurants --- wherever people meet. Indeed, elected American officials have been unwilling or unable to acknowledge the awakening for what it represents. I have a feeling that that’s about to change. It doesn’t take a genius to realize democratic change always lags behind the spirit of the electorate. In a way, that’s the beauty of democracy --- slow, steady, and stable! Democracy in practice, like survival in the wild, is a constant exercise in expression and representation. But how did we get here?

A free mind in the wild reacts appropriately to dangerous changes in its environment. That’s how early humans survived the trials and tribulations of the wild. It wasn’t through cooperative collectivism --- it was through the mass adoption of best practices discovered by free thought! Hunters and gatherers first… then farmers… After farmers came engineers. Now lawyers and businessmen serve the community as leaders. Each phase overlaps, but the trend is undeniable. We are talking about positive momentum. All good leaders operate by reviewing recent history and adopting best practices. Each societal transition occurred because observant empiricists crossed cultural boundaries to express solutions to problems they felt. Each transition was sparked by carefully recognizing the genius of the system that came before it, without the shackles of embellished nostalgia or arbitrary demonization. Interestingly, each phase still exists in America in one form or another today. Americans still hunt, gather, farm, engineer, litigate and trade. American democracy facilitates communication across each phase to stabilize and prepare for whatever is coming next… If you have sensed it too, ask yourself, what’s the common denominator? The voices of each phase can be heard (in one form or another) calling for American leadership to represent empiricism, and reject baseless accusations of American imperialism.

To prove the point, let’s go back to the beginning… Free thought was thrust upon mankind as a primary defense against premature death. Not strength. Strength is a symptom of adopting ideas that work. Human beings are fragile and physically impudent creatures in the wild. We still are at birth. This is where the phrase, “created equal” comes from. At birth we are all equally impudent and dependant upon others for our survival. Equality does not extend into adulthood. This is the natural difference between “equality” and “equal opportunity” in society. Only those who leverage opportunity will succeed. This is not an imperialist concept; it is an empirically derived concept.

Make no mistake, extreme freedom of thought is the arena mankind dominated all of our natural competitors. Freedom of thought remains as the source of all human power. The size of bombs, the speed of jets, and the agility of tanks are all symptoms of free thought harnessed against violent and aggressive competitors. Much has changed since the beginning of history. I can understand why many people are confused about the nature of American Empiricism, but I cannot condone it. Too many people in the world live in the “here and now” mindset. They are blind to history’s lessons. It is difficult to tell if they are malicious in their rhetoric or are simply blinded to reality by illusions. By abstracting reality with language, many human beings are stupefied by their own lack of (near) threats. Many of us have never faced death eye to eye. In the abstract world of our own making, we are the only threat that remains capable of destroying ourselves. Why would we do that? Presumably, we would consider destroying ourselves because we don’t know who we are, or who our enemy is. The warning signs of impending confrontation must feel surreal to someone without historical context. Those who believe the U.S. is an empire write as if all human beings were not engineered to kill, capable of killing or capable of dieing for their abstract beliefs. They defend the war rhetoric of Iranian President Mahmood Ahmadinejad by admonishing American President George Bush for rhetorically answering it.

HUMINT: What is the difference between imperialism and empiricism? What is the difference between wild society and civil society? What is the difference between freedom of expression and oppression of expression? I believe free citizens are afforded their illusions in a free society with an expectation that free thought, exercised in the free-market of ideas, will conjure a more accurate representation of threats. In doing so, free minds will simultaneously conjure apt solutions to existing problems. Virtually the same logic applies to free market economics. Civilized elected officials in a democracy are expected to pursue best practices derived from empirical evidence, just as the markets respond naturally to supply and demand. What then should we say about the electorate’s demand for empiricist leadership? Elected officials may only feel their electorate’s presence during elections, but empiricists live among the electorate. They have always been there; observing, planning and making suggestions. In all honesty, elected officials may or may not have the intellect or audacity to represent American Empiricists, unless they are already empiricists themselves. Under the circumstances, American leadership is about to experience a wave of American Empiricism if they aren’t already.

I confess to being an Empiricist; however, I am not just an American Empiricist, I'm an aggressive American Empiricist! As an aggressive empiricist, I despise imperialists. I love confrontation and seek it. The best confrontations I have had are with people who assert the United States is an empire. Little effort is required to dispel the lie. The fact is, authority in America is earned by applying successful policy. It is taken away when an advocate’s policies fail. All policy in America is subject to criticism and review by anyone and everyone, even foreign nationals. Criticism alone however does not prove a policy is failure. Only empiricism can derive legitimate answers to constructive criticism. American progress around the world is not the product of American Imperialism; it is the product of American Empiricism! Know the difference! Spread the word!

HUMINT: Internet Savant

2007-10-26T23:48:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: What would ancient philosophers think if they had access to the internet? Imagine Aristotle surfing the web… what would he Google? Thinking about philosophers and the Internet creates an opportunity to explore the philosophical origins of the Internet. Interestingly, the imagery of ancient philosophers surfing the WWW is particularly helpful. It will help us forecast the emergence of a group of hyper-aware individual internet users we should expect to enter adulthood in the next decade or so. Internet Savants, if I may coin a phrase, will eventually emerge as the intellectual progeny of Aristotle, Plato, Archimedes, Locke and Hume among others... But how do we know Internet Savants are on the way? We’ll have to travel through time and space to develop a plausible forecast…

The storm of Internet Savants I’m forecasting began forming in the 17th Century. It has been developing for centuries, if not longer. The British empiricists John Locke and later David Hume articulated the role of mankind on earth as that of a witness. In their philosophy, we (humankind) are observers of nature, which we are ourselves a part. The Internet is a product of humankind, a kind of child that could not have been conceived without prudent observation… It is their ideas that suggested we embrace our sensorial experiences in concert with our spiritual senses. Not surprisingly, David Hume was an historian before he turned to philosophy. Both men boldly allowed themselves to deconstruct the world they observed. They did so with the intent of formulating the most accurate and honest philosophy they could imagine. Hume was inspired by Locke, and I am humbly inspired by both.

Thomas Jefferson, in cooperation with Benjamin Franklin composed the Declaration of Independence, which was ratified by the Continental Congress Jully 4th 1776. The Declaration of Independence was inspired in large part by the philosophy of John Locke. The Second Treatise of Government, written by John Locke but submitted for public consideration anonymously in 1690, remains an extremely influential essay. It influenced the political philosophy of Americans to such a degree that its meaning is embedded in the American psyche. Locke’s pivotal piece provided a basis for more American doctrines, such as those set forth in the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights. It is from this initial observation that we might assert a theory about the mechanics of humankind.

Applied philosophy is identity.

In other words, every society applies some form of philosophy to function, and through its operation, the identity of a populace is revealed. To validate the theory by observation; the most accurate philosophy, if applied judiciously, would reveal a successful identity – probably the most successful identity. Would it not? Now, let’s flip the timeline of history and work backward. Consider successful societies in existence today and consider the philosophical origins upon which they are built. While there are many examples, the most familiar to Americans, is their own nation state. The technological and spiritual success of American society is unprecedented in the history of mankind.

Freedom of thought is a prerequisite to deriving solutions to complex problems, be they of mortal origin or natural origin. In the United States, honesty and fidelity are rewarded with technological progress, economic stability and sustainable growth. This is what Americans believe. Iterations of 1] innovation and 2] reward established a static identity and a dynamic national trajectory. This is how “We the People” (A quote from the U.S. Constitution) in many cases invented, manufactured, developed and adopted such technology as the transcontinental railroad, the automobile, the light bulb, the airplane and the personal computer. Americans are witness (recall “witness” as a reference to Locke’s and Hume’s empiricism) to the world in the most unfettered circumstance enjoyed by any group of people in the world today.

What trajectory does rewarding innovation establish? Think about the common denominator of almost every successful innovation in the United States! Each invention has made Americans a more capable witness of the world around us. The American identity is prepared to adopt new technology that makes us more aware precisely because Americans apply the philosophy of John Locke. The internet is simply the culmination of these successive adoptions. Indeed it is the adoption of an invention that makes it valuable. If an invention is never adopted, its value remains trapped in the mind of the inventor. Which brings us back to the forecast for which this essay is entitled; Internet Savants, having developed the skills to “witness” the world in a way that no human being could have witnessed the world before will begin revealing new truths about the world we live in.

Internet Savants – having been born after the invention and adoption of the Internet will seldom disconnect from their source data. Internet Savants will be able to absorb information from the internet as if their interface were a sense organ, not unlike their eyes or ears. The Internet Savant will relate to other Internet Savants in the context of their shared hyper-awareness. These individuals will not be deterred by government censorship because they will be able to understand what is being censored by observing and comprehending all of the other data at their disposal. By virtue of the propagation of the technology, these individuals needn’t be American at all but hail from every corner of the globe. The mosaic the Internet Savant builds in his or her mind will fill in the perceptual gaps of censorship just as the occipital lobe fills in the visual gap created by the optic nerve. Once they’ve achieved hyper-awareness, they will use their ability to continue what Locke started. Why? Because Internet Savants will be the most empowered witnesses the world has ever seen. They will know their identity. They will know their philosophical origins…

HUMINT: Mendeleev Sleep

2007-10-23T00:20:00.000+03:30

MENDELEEV SLEEP: The development of the periodic table of the elements was a leap forward in the chemical sciences. Although not responsible for discovering the elements he knew existed, Mendeleev organized the information available to him like no one else before him. It was his organizational skills that revealed something critically important to the advancement of mankind. What he discovered was new! Mendeleev noticed patterns in the properties and atomic weights of halogens, alkali metals and alkaline metals. According to the legend, Mendeleev had written what he knew about existing elements on the equivalent of flash cards and organized, reorganized and reorganized them on his bedroom floor. Mendeleev had an unknown number of iterative organizing sessions interspersed with sleep cycles. Mendeleev let his brain do what brains do naturally by living with it. By absorbing the information and allowing his hardware to “crunch” the data, he could see the world in a new way. In order to complete the pattern he observed, Mendeleev predicted several new elements. Interestingly, months after Mendeleev published his periodic table of all known elements another one, virtually identical to Mendeleev’s was published. Mendeleev was born 1834. He was not a stellar student and was rejected by major universities. He died in 1907 in St. Petersburg, Russia from influenza.

ARTIFICIAL INTUITION: What is the Mendeleev story telling us about intuition? Do we know how a genius’ mind works? I think researchers do, but society doesn’t spend much time talking about how genius works. To be sure, we are always more interested in the discovered than the discoverer. What if we only considered how geniuses discover without considering what they discover? What if we (the observers of genius) were to dedicate every bit of our energy to how geniuses discover and nothing to their discovery? We would be talking about the mental mechanics of genius and how we might apply them to solve new problems. If average mortals could successfully emulate innovators, computer programmers probably wouldn’t be far behind them in terms of simulating the intuition process. In other words, computers could be programmed to innovate if and when a computer programmer (or someone a computer programmer knows) has a comprehensive familiarity with the process of intuition. Indeed we don’t spend much time talking about how our minds work, much less how the minds’ of geniuses work. We do know intuition is statistically predictable and therefore cannot be random phenomena. The problem with our current understanding of intuition is that as an individual experience it is not repeatable phenomena.

MOORE-HEISENBERG UNCERTAINTY: Once an individual discovers something new, it can’t be undiscovered. Intuition is not directly repeatable and therefore is not directly observable. In a population of people, intuition is occurring at a measurable rate for any given technology. For things like silicon semiconductor computer chip technology, intuition is accurately describable by Moore’s Law. “Almost every measure of the capabilities of digital electronic devices is linked to Moore's Law: processing speed, memory capacity, even the resolution of LCD screens and digital cameras.” Moore Law cannot select which individuals or companies in any industrial ecosystem will innovate. The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principal in “quantum physics states that the outcome of even an ideal measurement of a system is not deterministic, but instead is characterized by a probability distribution, and the larger the associated standard deviation is, the more "uncertain" we might say that that characteristic is for the system.”

BOILING DATA SOUP: Within an individual mind, a fundamental mixture of data must be present for a discovery to occur. Prescient awareness is about seeing patterns in the information as it’s processed. But how does information simmer in the mind? The living brain experiences waves of electro chemical activity named Beta, Theta, Alfa and Delta (Sleeping) waves. Theta waves are associated to expressions of intuition. Epiphanies might come during theta cycles but theta waves are not necessarily the creative phase of cognition. In any case, we are talking about output during particular brain waves. What if we were to look at how geniuses solve problems, in terms of seeing the data they have to see to solve the problem they are working on while experiencing all of their neurological phases? I bet we would see that they are fully invested in solving a problem. In other words, geniuses may work on problems they are obsessed with during their Beta, Theta, Alfa and Delta phases.

HUMINT: Inspiring an intuitive response requires emersion in the variables necessary to reveal previously undiscovered patterns. Before a discovery, it is impossible to tell how many variables are needed to illicit an intuitive response. Someone trained to detect patterns may need less information than individuals with no training at all. Inversely, a pattern that someone who is trained to recognize patterns expects to see in their data may not exist at all. Indeed, the human mind is notorious for chasing dangerous illusions. What is important to note is that the process of discovery occurs naturally, most likely across all neurological states, including Beta, Theta, Alfa and Delta phases. Find the passion for your problem that Mendeleev had for chemical elements and go to sleep with them! One day, you’ll know the answer, or at least the pattern pointing to it.

HUMINT: Interpretive Theology

2007-10-18T00:41:00.000+03:30

For a society to guard against malicious ideological threats, it must at least recognize and respect the fact that some citizens will invariably believe in the power of God as a cohesive force separate from the power of the state. This is particularly true for any government run by militant atheists or militant theocrats. But why would any society believe they need to protect themselves from malicious ideas? To be sure, I’m not talking about recruiting a division of thought police to guard against threats to social morality. Free societies recognize freedom of religion as sacrosanct --- either consciously or by accident. Militant atheists or militant theocrats put themselves in a position to defend the state with “brown shirts” or “morality police” respectively.

The point of this essay is to demonstrate how some societies ensure they are never attacked or abused by thought police. Almighty God has a power influence in the lives of many healthy and happy people. Only arrogant thought police would seek to strip them of their beliefs. For example; early Jews under the Egyptian Pharos and Christians under early Roman Emperors were members of world changing movements. Both were accelerated by brutal oppression. Indeed, it appears to matter greatly if an earthly authority suppresses spiritual expression. Indeed, suppressing an individual’s relationship with their God strengthens spiritual relationships. It does so most likely because earthly oppression of the divine only validates the perception of illegitimacy of the earthly authority.

The Buddhists of Myanmar, the Yazidi of Northern Iraq, the Bahai’ of Iran and the Falun Gong of China are modern examples of cohesive spiritual interpretations persecuted for their political beliefs derived in part for their spiritual explorations. Although not the case with the Falun Gong or the Bahai, in some cases, state sponsored oppressions of religious expression has empowered the sense of righteousness and militarization of the oppressed.

The U.S. Declaration of independence handles the argument with unparalleled spiritual and political precision. “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Within the first two sentences of the American definition, Americans’ political decisions are legitimized by the Laws of Nature and the inalienable rights endowed by their “creator”. But these two indisputable authorities are not given an anthropomorphic consciousness to govern. The United States is not a theocracy or governed by the laws of nature. Instead, government is the responsibility of fallible human beings. The responsibility to govern belongs to the intellect of the people, yet the authority for people to govern themselves is endowed by God.

This is an important point that all militant atheists and militant theocrats should learn: Americans are not successful because we are an arrogant society. Americans are successful because we modestly accept our fallibility and compensate for it with tolerance for ourselves and others. Our admission of fallibility is manifest in the separation of powers, checks and balances, regular elections and basic human freedoms such as freedom of [speech, religion, press, assembly]. The accusations heaped upon the United States by despotic regimes are almost always an unwitting self referential statement about the accuser, not the policies of the United States. Militant atheists and militant theocrats are irredeemably arrogant. They both formulate governments that legislate as if their great leaders hold a monopoly on genius. It is their arrogance that guarantees their failures (or limited success) will repeat ad infinitum.

While there are many official government interpretations of almighty God; from pure disbelief in the existence of God, to God as the source of legitimacy for the authority of consensual government, to unadulterated submission to God’s will; only one interpretation affords sustainable peace. The official American interpretation of God is the most durable interpretation applied to a society. The fact that it is the most durable implies that it is also the most accurate and honest, either with respect to humankind’s perception of God or God. Either way, the American interpretation is subtle. It is so subtle in fact that it often goes unnoticed. Its low profile belies its importance. Without it Americans would not sustain domestic tranquility as we do. The Founding Fathers of the United States took strides to make room for spiritual interpretations other than Christianity in American society. They also took strides to ensure the definition of American governance closed the door to interpretations of God that coerces Americans spiritual submission or attacked their benign spiritual beliefs or traditions.

The spread of the American interpretation of God is not any more hegemonic than the spread of successful behavior. The official American interpretation of God is not being adopted around the world because Americans are hegemonic or because the United States is a new kind of global empire. The opposite is true. The act of spreading the American interpretation of God in government is a somber request for humility. It is no accident that such a request primarily targets arrogant groups of militant atheists and militant theocrats.

HUMINT: Americans’ War on Terror is not a crusade! It’s an appeal to justice and reason. If forsaken, arrogant liars will be devastated. Do you suppose that reality follows one of: A) Nature’s Laws, B) one of God’s Laws, C) both or D) neither?

HUMINT: Free Fuel

2007-10-16T23:08:00.000+03:30

ENERGY IS INHERENTLY VALUABLE: There will never be such a thing as free fuel, however, energy is now and will forever be the most important commodity in human society. Energy is valuable because it can be converted into virtually every other commodity. With enough cheap energy, civil engineers could create land – so there would be no need for feudal systems of land owning lords or renting serfs as was witnessed in history when people and energy were synonymous. Automation and mechanization has liberated mankind from most of the backbreaking labor of our ancestors, yet machines and automation still require energy to operate.

COSTS OF COMMODITIES: What about other commodities such as gold, platinum or silver? Recycling for example, is cost prohibitive because of the amount of energy recycling requires. If fuel were free, or nearly free, the price of recycling would presumably drop below the price of mining for more gold, platinum or silver. For a while at least, the price of all consumables would drop, and or the amount of profit made by businesses would skyrocket.

PENNIES PER GALLON: An economic and environmental analysis probably should be used to show the direct impact on the planet if a gallon of gasoline were to cost consumer’s pennies instead of dollars. Thinking about free fuel is fun. Free fuel is a feel good idea, even if it isn’t going to happen tomorrow, even if it’s not going to happen in the next century

REVERSING ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE: Free fuel implies more than just “no financial costs”; free fuel also implies “no environmental costs”. If energy were free, it might become feasible to deploy machines/filters capable of reversing most if not all environmental damage created by using the fuel in the first place. If fuel were free, it would be feasible to purify salt water and pump the resultant fresh water wherever it’s needed. These are just a few obvious opportunities that would be revealed if fuel were free.

CASTRATE RESOURCE OPPRESSORS: An immediate benefit of cheap synthetic fuel would be stripping the Islamic Republic of Iran of billions of dollars in revenue it receives for its oil exports. Iran’s President, Mahmood Ahmadinejad is a radical religious fanatic who enjoys threatening the United States and our allies around the world. He uses the money his nation makes from exporting unrefined oil to denigrate and attack the United States. Fossil fuels are extremely valuable but it is not an earned value. The fact that Iran doesn’t earn its wealth is probably why it feels justified in hating the people and nations that pay them for their oil.

WORSHIP THE SUN: In terms of the fuel we use today, it is extremely inefficient. It took millions of years to produce, it takes millions of dollars to extract, it costs U.S. consumers billions of dollars use, and it costs the environment an undetermined amount in atmospheric damage. It is important to realize that most of the energy consumed in the world today is a manifestation of solar energy. Coal, natural gas, oil are all fossil fuels that stores energy chemically. The source energy of the fuel you use in your car and probably your home as well originated as nuclear energy inside the sun. As you are aware every day, that energy travelled to the earth in the form of radiation (sunlight). Geothermal and nuclear energy are the only exceptions. Nuclear energy, as we all know, has serious drawbacks in terms of safety and weapons proliferation. Therefore we should collectively look to the sun for energy salvation, if there is such a thing.

MIRRORS AND MICROBES: One approach to efficiently harvest energy directly from the sun could be some configuration of mirrors concentrating solar energy to force feed genetically engineered microbes capable of converting the energy into usable fuel. Theoretically, genetically engineered microbes could produce usable fuel at a pace consistent with our current lifestyles and growing energy demands. Where would we do it? Vast areas of international waters could be used as oceanic fields to produce the fuel. All of this brain storming is wildly speculative but there are reasons to be optimistic about genetically engineered microbes. Genetically engineered microbes are already producing valuable commodities such as insulin for diabetics.

FOR EXAMPLE: Dr Stephen Curry, a structural biologist from Imperial College London's Division of Cell and Molecular Biology who participated in the research explains: "This work has shown that it is possible to manipulate molecules and proteins that occur naturally in the human body by changing one small detail of their make-up, such as the type of metal at the heart of a porphyrin molecule, as we did in this study. --- "It's very exciting to prove that we can use these biological structures as a conduit to harness solar energy to separate water out into hydrogen and oxygen. In the long term, these synthetic molecules may provide a more environmentally friendly way of producing hydrogen, which can be used as a 'green' fuel."

HUMINT: While fuel will never be free, the future sources of fuel will not remain what they are. Woe to energy exporting nations who are leveraging their natural resources against free people who represent their customers. What seems clear is that resource rich oppressors are extremely ambitions despite the fact that they didn’t earn their petro-wealth. Their day of reckoning is near…

HUMINT: Ambassador McDonald

2007-10-12T11:05:00.000+03:30

Many years ago on a long back country hike I was following a winding trail that loosely traced the path of an old creek. Every mile or so, the path would cross the creek and I’d get another chance to wade through the cool mountain water. I’d been hiking that trail since sunrise and had crossed the creek at least thirty times. It was getting late in the day and some angry looking clouds were rolling toward me overhead. I could hear cracks of thunder in the distance. It wasn’t easy to see the sky through the thick canopy of trees but I could tell rain was coming. The woods seemed quite. Only a few hundred yards ahead I knew the trees were going to open up to a little field about an acre or so big. The small field was gorgeous. It hugged the banks of a large lake.

My plan was to beat the rain to the field and set up my tent, open my book and read while listening to rain falling 10,000 ft onto my ripstop roof. I planned to build a campfire after the rain stopped and cook my dinner. All that hiking had made me very hungry before I arrived. I clearly remember hoping for a short squall. I may have even prayed for it, but if I did, I don’t remember what I said to God. Anyway, in situations like those, God always seems to have more important things to worry about than selfish requests driven by a hiker’s empty stomach.

When I got to the small field, the tent went up smoothly. I gathered up some wood for my dinner fire and tossed the logs under a small tarp I was carrying with me. If I couldn’t keep the logs dry during the storm I knew it would be hard to get my dinner fire started later that evening. As I was collecting wood, big rain drops started hitting the landscape like artillery fired at my LZ by some distant army. Where ever they hit, the surface turned from dry to dark wet. Fortunately, I finished in time. When I crawled into my tent the drops were hitting about a foot apart. My cloths and gear hadn’t been hit hard enough to be wet. About fifteen minutes later, after getting situated inside the tent, the rain outside started coming down hard. The sound of it hitting the roof of my tent was deafening. It was time to kick off my boots, read and wait out the squal. I pulled Zen and the Art of Motor Cycle Maintenance out of my pack… Pulp seventies philosophy had captured my attention in the book store earlier in the week because I thought it actually had something to do with motorcycle maintenance…

It really didn’t but I found the book interesting enough to keep reading without the technical motorcycle jargon I was looking for. The big ZEN idea of the page I was reading was about a “country church building with an electric beer sign hanging right over the front entrance. The building had been sold and was being used as a bar.” … “a number of people had complained to the church officials about it. It had been a Catholic Church, and the priest who had been delegated to respond to the criticism had sounded quite irritated about the whole thing. To him it had revealed an incredible ignorance of what a church really was. Did they think that bricks and boards and glass constituted a church? Or the shape of the roof? Here, posing as piety was an example of the very materialism the church opposed. The building in question was not holy ground. It had been desanctified. That was the end of it. The beer sign resided over a bar, not a church, and those who couldn’t tell the difference were simply revealing something about themselves.”

The book continued pontificating about academia and its purpose as an institution of learning as opposed to its material manifestation. It was interesting but I remember drifting away from the authors narrative and creating my own of a similar vein. Listening to the rain outside I started to disagree with the author and contemplate the deeper meaning behind tangible buildings that serve customers like restaurants and bars. The Catholic Church may be spiritually superior to the bar, and maybe that’s what the Catholic parishioners were missing when it officially transformed into a bar. However, their needs are independent of their neighbors’ needs that prefer a bar to be where the church once was. At that moment a common denominator was revealed to me. The relationship between the bartender and the priest in this context is customer service.

In the back country mountains, in a small field, under the rain, on the shores of a beautiful lake with an empty belly; I couldn’t help but think about the importance of customer service and the role it plays in society. Indeed, democracy is all about customer service. Can you have a democracy without a society that respects good customer service? I doubt it! Out there in the wilderness, I was on my own, serving myself. I had no expectation of help from anyone else. My only concerns were about large animals that might take my food or break my gear or try to make a dinner out of me. Facing nature with what you can carry on your back develops a new perspective, especially after an all day hike. In a community of citizens that make a democracy work however there is an expectation of, if not appreciation for, customer service. In every civilized society there exists an ecosystem of services, the best of which succeeds over eventually eliminates poorer services fulfilling the same need. In an environment where there were no stores for miles I was thinking about free market economics and their influence on democracy.

Restaurants are, in a sense, pews in the church of democracy (I was thinking to myself as the rain continued to fall and my stomach began to growl). Restaurants demonstrate the interdependencies of citizens whereby the best customer service attracts more customers. Employees of a restaurant are campaigning to keep their customers and customers vote with their wallet and presence every time they choose one restaurant over another. Based on the sheer volume of raw “democratic” interaction occurring, a successful restaurant may be more representative of American culture and society than any other American institution.

Is it any wonder that there are more Chinese restaurants in the United States than there are in China? That implies (by this back country social scientist metric) Chinese society is capable of being more “democratic” than the government of China is currently allowing its people to be. Is it any wonder why McDonalds (for example) has served more than one trillion meals? That’s over one trillion (meal) votes for McDonalds! McDonalds is doing an incredible job servicing its customers and is rewarded with returning customer. Why? Set aside the employee uniforms and the Golden Arches. Set aside all of the branding and look at what McDonalds means --- and to how many people it means it to. McDonalds, on the subject of food, may be the most democratically appreciated restaurant in the history of mankind.

The rain outside my tent finally stopped falling. I left the tent to prepare for my primitive dinner. The moon was out and peeking through some clouds. Everything was drenched but the wood for my fire. After making a small ditch down wind and a safe distance from my tent, I surrounded it with large stones I collected from the lake shore. After that, I broke up some of the smaller pieces of wood for kindling. The fire started quickly and before long the rocks around it were warm and dry. I remember kicking one of the larger rocks away from the fire and replacing it with another rock. The warm dry rock I had kicked away from the fire would be my table and chair for the evening.

Remembering that hiking trip I am struck by how much I enjoyed the juxtaposition of primitive experiences of nature and self sufficiency and the civilized interdependencies that develop naturally through free citizens democratically choosing good customer service. I felt like I had proved McDonalds is more than just a successful restaurant. I’d decided it represents what Americans want at home and abroad. McDonalds represents what any restaurant can hypothetically do if the society that it thrives in and the government that it thrives under value customer service. Americans definitely do value customer service and that makes McDonalds a valued American Ambassador at home and abroad. But I don’t think I would’ve realized that without an empty stomach, a back country hike, a storm and pulp philosophy book.

Thank you Ambassador McDonald. Super Size me!

HUMINT: Secret Transcript

2007-10-10T00:23:00.000+03:30

SATIRE: The following are transcripts of recorded conversations between chess pieces conspiring to check mate their opponents. To understand the jargon, let’s review chess pieces and the chess board. The players on each side include 1 King, 1 Queen, 2 Rooks, 2 Bishops, 2 Knights and 8 Pawns. The board, or battle field as it is aptly named by the pieces, is broken down into eight rows labeled 1-8 and eight columns labeled a-h. To designate the location of a piece, the notation is as follows, [ROW,COLUMN] for example, 1a indicates the far left and closest square on the white team’s side of the board. There are 64 squares on the battle field, differentiated by color, usually light and darker shades of wood. Each team is separated by color as well, commonly black and white.

The method by which this conversation was recorded is considered a national (chess) secret, not to be disclosed under any circumstances. The transcript was released to the media by an anonymous source who felt compelled to be an ass, despite the illegality and immorality of their treasonous act. As a non-partisan “journalist/blogger/sympathizer”, I am only propagating these damaging and controversial transcripts for blog ratings. Sure, I might be destroying my own free country. So what?

Be forewarned. This secret transcript continues below with admissions of guilt and a conspiracy to commit a cover up. It reveals a disturbing fictitious truth. This is a story about two Knights abusing an enemy Queen. It’s about a Pawn who inadvertently leaked classified material and will probably end up paying for it for the rest of his short life. It’s about U-Tube and a classified threesome. It’s about a Rook running interference for a King, preparing his team for reelection. It’s about all of the chess pieces in the world… It’s about the billions of pawns playing chess on line right now. It’s more than a story. It’s a reflection of my anthropomorphic representation of chess pieces. Their fictitious hopes. Their fictitious dreams. HUMINT: Does it matter that it’s fake? No, not really… You have the evidence now. Judge for yourself.

2003-04-07 [18:06.12 – 18:32.52] Conversation between WP4 and WR2 concerning their opponents

WP4 to WR1: Damn! Did you see that U-Tube video of BQ with WK1 and WK2? They were tag teaming her in front of BK’s face. WK1 came in from behind and locked her down. She was trapped and WK2 took her out.

WR1 to WP4: That was a classic, but that film shouldn’t have been made. That was a classified move they made and now the whole frikin planet knows it… You know our king! Mother [redacted explicative, substitute “messing”] WK doesn’t want BK1 and BK2 [redacted explicative, substitute “messing”] around with his WQ. Do you know who was holding the camera… filming this thing? I’m going to kill the prick. That’s not to mention what I’m going to do to the guy who posted it on U-Tube…

WP4 to WR1: Oh [redacted explicative, substitute “crap”] WR1, I did it… that was classified?… you’ve got to be kidding me! WK1 and WK2 were doing their jobs and I was thinking…

WR1 to WP4: You weren’t thinking, God [redacted explicative, substitute “Bless You”]! What the hell am I going to tell WK about this? He is going to frikin kill you.

WP4 to WR1: Have you seen how the pawns are acting out there on the front lines WR1? They’ve seen the video and are all fired up. We are cutting the enemy’s lines of communication, chasing them into their little spider holes and tossing grenades in after them. Do you know how important U-Tube is? Do you know how many pawns are playing chess online right now? You and WK must be so out of [redacted explicative, substitute “”] touch that you’ve forgotten how to lead a group of pieces to victory. Did you ever really know? Do you pricks actually believe in anything or are you a bunch of… That’s it isn’t it? You’re afraid of true believers and that’s why you cower when it comes to a fight or a conversation with them. There was no such thing as U-Tube when you guys were earning your spots on the board. You have to understand, if we lose out there, we lose here as well! Damn it!

WR1 to WP4: Bull [redacted explicative, substitute “crap”]! Our team has elections coming up again soon and we aren’t ready for this mess you’ve made…

WP4 to WR1: Who do you think we are WR1? We’re chess pieces. We don’t have elections! It’s our job to go out there and take down the other team. Listen to me WR1! You are going to do exactly what you did after you killed eight BPs in a rage after one of them took out your WR2. You are going to cover this thing up and we are going to forget about it. Alright!

HUMINT: Drunken Style

2007-10-09T01:10:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: As a student of Chinese culture and war, I seldom mention my preference for Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching over Sun Tzu’s Art of War. Why? I’m not sure, but it’s certainly not to hide my love of universal wisdom in order to emphasize my learned theories of war. On the contrary, my favorite moments are spent with enlightened souls who appreciate consuming and producing contemporary versions of ancient wisdom. Ancient Chinese philosophy and superstition is unique in its ability to condense knowledge, history, lust, love and experience into snappy little phrases.

Ancient Chinese texts are fascinating. They tend to organize words and images, as though they might become keys in the right hands… keys to a spiritual dimension where time becomes irrelevant; where the past, present and future join together and are at one with wisdom. I suspect much of the universal wisdom and superstition held by the ancient Chinese came through spilling the blood of their enemies. Wise men do not gain their wisdom without challenging themselves or facing their greatest challengers. In the rich history of China, there have been many great fighting styles that merge observations of nature and society to facilitate the only conceivable resolution of conflict to warlords, victory! One of my personal favorite ancient fighting techniques is Drunken Style…

There are many stories about the origin of Drunken Style but none speaks to its effectiveness or even its enlightened meaning in terms of combat. To my mind, Drunken Style is a philosophical place where the Tao Te Ching and the Art of War meet. Drunken style is deceptive to an opponent, rendering a combatant numb to the attacks of his adversary, fluid in his attacks but the accuracy may be impaired – or so an opponent may think. Drunken Style contains moves that are nearly impossible to achieve when one is impaired by alcohol, so the thinking goes, the style was used primarily by sober fighters. Therefore, it is most probably a style that seeks to hide something --- and or express something --- that could not be hidden or expressed otherwise.

Sober or Drunk, Drunken Style is a frame of mind. Like many ancient Chinese fighting styles, the combatant takes on the role of a character, transcending their own. It’s as if the Chinese understood the concept of traumatic stress and shock so well that they developed ways to preemptively split their personality before entering combat. If true, there are undoubtedly benefits and drawbacks to an individual’s psyche. Instead of getting too carried away with therapeutic repudiations of how the Ancient Chinese prepared for combat may have adversely influenced their relationship with their mother, for the sake of this essay, it is sufficient to say the benefits must have outweighed the risks. If choosing a fighting style kept a combatant winning over rivals, that fighter would be better off suffering with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) than being dead. Lest we forget, Ancient China existed in a near constant condition of war and conflict.

Fortunately, average Americans are not burdened with the pain of existential war or the need to study martial arts as a means of survival --- or at least that is what we have come to believe. Because it seems unnecessary to some, my fascination with ancients at war may resemble a tourist taking photos of a fatal car accident to them. Be assured, my intellectual journeys through time, space and culture are a search for broader wisdom, not a Barnum & Bailey search for spectacles. The lesson gleaned from China’s Drunken Style are many but probably the most important is that manipulating ones identity during combat is an effective approach to dealing with inescapable horrors of war.

Here’s an illustrative, albeit fictitious example. In the 2001 series about World War II, Band of Brothers, a short dialog occurs between Private Albert Blithe and Lieutenant Ronald Spiers. It’s a dialog that contains all of the inherent wisdom of the ancient fighting techniques of Drunken Style. Spiers says to Blithe, “We're all scared. You hid in that ditch because you think there's still hope. But Blithe, the only hope you have is to accept the fact that you're already dead. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner you'll be able to function as a soldier is supposed to function. Without mercy. Without compassion. Without remorse. All war depends upon it.”

To be sure, there is no other way to approach an enemy. To illustrate the point; with regard to all aspects of life but war one should live life in pursuit of liberty and happiness. When it comes to war however, a separate identity should replace the main; an identity able to accept the worst case scenario as if it had already happened, and continue functioning normally, or almost normally. Every student of martial arts should know that there is no combatant more capable of destroying their enemy than one who appears drunk --- has abandoned all hope of survival as if he were already dead --- yet continues to strike his target, blow after blow. Without mercy. Without compassion. Without remorse. Victory depends on it.

HUMINT: New Glory

2007-09-21T04:26:00.001+03:30

HUMINT: The flag of the United States of America is a powerful symbol. It is known by many names. The Stars and Stripes and Old Glory are just a few. The flag as we know it today is the product of our nation’s evolution. The number of white stars on a blue background in the upper left corner represents the number of states in the Union at any given moment in the nation’s history. Originally, there were thirteen states and thus, thirteen stars. There have been 27 permutations of the official American flag. The red and white stripes represent the original thirteen American colonies. The original 13 stripes have not changed. To me, the stars have always represented transcendence from colonial serfdom to independent citizenship.

The flag of the United States of America is rare among national flags. Symbols within the U.S. flag symbolize other sovereign governments. In other words, we are talking about dimensions of symbolism when we talk about the American flag. There is the symbolic surface layer, which represents a united country, held together not by a specific religion, race or personality but by a cohesive idea. That idea, symbolized most accurately by the American flag, is a philosophical amalgam of freedom, liberty and democracy. The idea has taken on a spiritual dimension virtually impervious to academic inspection.

The subjugation of Americans to an empire is symbolically represented in the Star Spangled Banner. The stripes tell Americans who they were. The stars tell Americans who they are. Within the flag, each star is a sovereign state. The depth of nationalistic meaning is incredible. Each sub-symbol is a reference to groups of people who govern themselves by popular sovereignty. The fact that the American flag is a symbol makes it a communicative device. All flags are symbols but the fact that the American flag is comprised of layers of symbolism tells us that its communicative value is higher than other national flags with less meaning. Consider the difference between the U.S. flag and the flag of Iran. The American flag has 50 stars, 13 stripes and 3 colors for a communicative score of 66. The Iranian flag has 1 symbol of Allah, 3 stripes and 22 repetitions of the saying “Allah Akbar”, “God is Great” for a communicative score of 26. These metrics are by no means scientific. Their purpose is to encourage citizens to think about the inherent symbolism of the American flag and the flags of other nations.

Regardless of its symbolic value the American flag should never be raised up as a sacred symbol in American society. Many nationalists around the world make themselves idolaters by worshiping their nation’s flag. If you’ve never seen it, it is a repugnant scene to behold. In the case of the Iranian flag merging spiritualism and nationalism forces Iranians to accept or reject both God and the State, at the same time. The sectarian nature of the Iranian flag is indicative of Iran’s national character. Alternatively, acts of desecration cannot destroy a symbol. Burning the American flag, for example, is a communicative assertion against popular sovereignty. While the flag burner may or may not perceive the symbolic meaning in the same way a patriotic American does, the definition of any flag is endowed by its creator. In other words, the perception that the U.S. flag represents anything other than what its creator intended it to represent is an illusion.

If an individual were to burn the American flag in protest, because they perceive it represents “imperialism” for example, they would be mis-communicating. By analogy, it would be as if that person were to point at a black surface and scream “WHITE!” The word “black” and the word “white” are widely recognized symbols of familiar colors. It would be stupefying to swap the two symbols. The act of assigning opposite meaning to symbols is disconcerting behavior to say the least. While each individual should discourage the practice of flag burning, I do not believe it should be illegal to do so. Legislating symbol usage, particularly when it is profane, tends to create more problems without solving anything. The concept is complex but not inaccessible.

For some reason, however, many enemies of these United States just don’t get it. Iran for example, regularly holds state supported demonstrations where the American flag is burnt to the sounds of crowds chanting “Death to America!” These demonstrations show that the government of Iran is using anti-Americanism as a cohesive social agent. Why are they doing it? They are getting away with swapping the symbolic representation of the American flag for an alternative meaning they control. For the sake of discussion, let’s say the symbolism contained in our Old Glory is too abstract a symbol for the Iranian government to understand. Americans, their allies and their enemies might benefit from a clearer symbol of what the United States represents. Imagine you want to show the people of the world what the United States of America represents – what would your New Glory look like?

HUMINT: The “Why?” Gene

2007-09-18T07:14:00.000+03:30

Do you believe the root cause of human behavior is the result of an individual’s genetics or is behavior a product of an environment? Is there a gene that makes us ask, “why?” or is curiosity about interacting with our environment and having access to good answers? In determining the success or failure of an individual in their environment, we now know the “nature versus nurture” debate is bunk. The question is misleading. It implies the influence of nature can be isolated and subsequently separated from the influences of nurture. The entire purpose of the “nature versus nurture” debate is to optimize our successes while mitigating our failures. Unfortunately, when the foundation of any debate makes false presumption it is irreparably flawed. The results of argumentation will be flawed as well.

These days, it is commonly accepted that “nature and nurture” interact symbiotically to determine success or failure. In other words, a successful individual is an elemental expression within their own competitive ecosystem. As a result, mankind constantly experiments with his or her “natural ecosystems” and creates new “nurture ecosystems.” The universally accepted “natural ecosystem” for human beings has become an appropriately sized house or apartment with; potable water, electricity and air conditioning. At this time however, there is no universally accepted “nurture ecosystem”.

HUMINT: Market dynamics, government policy and familial habits (in order of maximum influence to minimum) all influence our unique “nurture ecosystems”. By observation; great market dynamics can artificially sustain bad government policies and bad familial habits, but this process is a vector. In other words, this observation reveals a trajectory. The influence of a system within an ecosystem of nurturing systems appears to a function of its size. Markets are demonstrably bigger systems than governments and governments are demonstrably bigger systems than families.

Looking at it from the other direction; great familial habits cannot sustain bad government policy and bad market dynamics. Under the thumb of bad markets and bad governments, families tend to demonstrate their unwillingness to live. Individuals either emigrate or stop reproducing. Nevertheless, each system within an ecosystem has a stake in the success or failure of the other. Likewise, a dysfunctional “nurturing ecosystem” may attempt to manipulate or crash a neighboring ecosystem.

Why hasn’t humanity adopted a “universally nurturing ecosystem”? Certain individuals have tried. The fact is we don’t know if there is a “universally nurturing ecosystem”. Through false faith, humanity may just believe it exists. The cross cultural pursuit of such a system is so common; it may just be a universal dream. Unfortunately, every conscious attempt to manufacture (“universally nurturing ecosystem”) utopian empires resulted in the opposite. What we do know is that perfection is inherently unattainable. Sociopaths tend to promise utopia, while claiming that they are uniquely capable of delivering it to the masses. It makes little difference if they believe they can deliver utopia or not. The acquisition of power is their primary objective. When they have power but can’t deliver utopia, they invariably blame others; their own followers and outsiders. Sociopaths are never sincere when they ask the question “why?” they are failing because they are incapable of blaming themselves.

It should be a common objective of every free society to prevent sociopaths from attaining power over markets and governments. Through the lens of history, we are all witnesses to the deadly social experiments of sociopaths. Hitler, Stalin, Pol-Pot, and Khomeini are just a few examples. These days, free citizens around the world must guard their freedoms against sociopaths in power more than they ever had to in the past. Globalization represents an unprecedented opening of our planet’s cultural floodgates. I believe Globalization is a predominantly positive trend that will continue to improve the quality of life for billions of people. Globalization is the free market expansion of success and it will strongly influence governments and families around the world.

Presumably the world will achieve social equilibrium one day. Until that day, cultures will confront each other; some will merge and some will die. Among neighboring ecosystems, “nurturing ecosystems” are also merging and dying. Instead of defining “universally nurturing ecosystems”, which may be an unattainable goal anyway, humanity will instead continue its experiments with universal values. It is a fact that a relatively simple set of individual values, if allowed to propagate throughout society, is capable of sustaining a comprehensive “nurturing ecosystem” while maintaining benign cultural identities. Individual liberty, freedom of [religion assembly press speech] are values that demonstratively develop healthy families, governments and markets. The common denominator across all cultures, regardless of the way their markets, governments or families nurture individuals, is the question “why?”

Every “nurturing ecosystem” approaches critical questions differently. Some answer honestly. Some answer “why?” with a lie. Other systems try avoiding the question by not answering “why?” at all. But the question is always there. It’s as if there is an irrepressible “why?” gene embedded in our DNA. The success or failure of societies around the world has everything to do with whether or not they nurture the question “why?” or if they repress it.

The question “why?” cannot be surgically removed from society. “Why?” cannot be ethnically cleansed. “Why?” is an inquisitive force that cannot and will not remain suppressed. The fact that individual members of all cultures universally ask “why?” makes the behavior a natural phenomenon blessed by God. If we’re all genetically predisposed to ask “why?” it is in our spiritual, market, national, family and individual interests to nurture our “why?” gene. Those that don’t will continue to fall behind those that do.

HUMINT: Beautiful Merit

2007-09-14T17:38:00.000+03:30

Merit is in style this year, but it's not a fad. Merit will be fashionable for more than a season or two. It’s beautiful and it’s here to stay. Why?!... Because merit is a lifestyle! What’s amazing about merit is how those who own it flaunt it. You can see it in their eyes and their smiles. Their lives are happier with merit than the rest of us without it.

But you won’t see merit paraded on a Parisian cat walk. You won’t see it on the dance floor of a nightclub either. It might be hidden inside the boardroom’s best groomed metro-sexual or hiding inside a gorgeous super-model… or not. Merit is about expressions of one’s inner beauty.

Described by its most mundane definition, merit is an “admirable quality”. Buddhists tend to think of merit as “insight, power or energy bestowed on the mind when one performs virtuous actions”. In other words, it’s not about who you are, merit is about what you do and who you become after you do it. Having merit is like having universal beauty. Those that pursue it, emulate the actions of Mary Curie, Mother Teresa, or Melinda Gates.

Ideally we would all have tons of merit and simultaneously look as appealing as our own cultural archetype. Dolly Parton for instance, enjoys a spectacular career as a musician (I’m a fan) while simultaneously looking like the model for the American cultural archetype, the Barbie Doll. Fortunately for Americans, the Barbie “look” is at least attainable. If you’re not born with it, the “look” may require a series of painful surgeries to get. Modern medicine has made looking like a cheap plastic action figure with blond hair a possibility.

HUMINT: Throughout history, not all cultural archetypes have been attainable. Michelangelo sculptures of exaggerated musculature size and perfectly symmetrical facial features are an important example. As an artistic genius, Michelangelo and artists like him were able to set a new aesthetic standard for mankind that remains entrenched in Western Culture. I doubt however that he or the toy maker that invented Barbie expected to be so culturally influential.

If the West is seemingly mired in aesthetic cultural archetypes, do Easterners, Middle Easterners or Africans have aesthetic targets to strive for? Of course they do. However there is a kind of beauty that transcends culture. I believe it is merit.

Try it. For the sake of experience, consider each individual you know aesthetically naked. Now look at their merit. Designer cloths are transparent from this perspective. So is makeup, a $400 hair cut, a nose job, breast implants, tummy tucks and toe twisting high healed Italian shoes. We all know the storybook narrative of the “Ugly Duckling”. According to it, inside every ugly duckling there must be a beautiful swan desperate to reveal itself. Really?! The pedigree of our feathers has little to do with who we really are. You’ve got to be naive, stupid or four years old to believe the “Ugly Duckling” narrative. The truth is, most of us are just average ugly ducklings. In a modern society, we tend to make ourselves more or less beautiful with our actions. Now we’re talking about merit.

That said; superficial beauty is an insensitive beast that’s always out of our control. It always has been and I suspect it always will be. Besides cultural archetypes, major world events can redefine what a culture might consider beautiful.

Before September 11, 2001 I was in a unique position to observe a man working on a menial task. The memory has become more vivid than it otherwise would have if 9-11 never occurred. He was Afghani living and working in Afghanistan. His job, at that moment, was to move boxes off of a dusty flat bed truck into a mud brick hut. Over his shoulder was a Kalashnikov rifle. As I recall, he wore a traditional outfit, brown cloth draping over his shoulders. He had a long black beard. His hands were dirty and calloused. He was in his twenties but looked fifty. By all accounts he looked exactly like a warlord’s soldier or a member of the Taliban. Aesthetically speaking, he could have been a cold blooded killer. Maybe he had killed before. I didn’t know. Back then the area was crawling with killers. As you might suspect, he was an outlaw in a lawless land. He was definitely breaking the law. I knew what was inside the boxes. I was well aware he was carrying contraband. He was risking his life and I knew he was. I was helping him do it.

He was unloading school supplies for Afghani children, specifically Afghani girls. I haven’t seen or heard from him since that day but I’ll remember him for the rest of my life. He had merit.

HUMINT: 9-11 Ideas

2007-09-10T23:59:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: The 9-11 attack plan was a satanic idea perpetrated by demons on earth, supported by those who have taken the idea of Allah hostage to use as a weapon against free people. Tomorrow marks the sixth anniversary of 9-11-01. Most of America will be prompted to relive the attack by a free American press. The images of that day are some of the most dramatic scenes ever recorded. Like the Hindenburg Disaster or the assassination of John F. Kennedy, generations beyond our own will get a glimpse of that day. The images of 911 dwarf every shocking image that preceded it. God help those who become emotionally numb to the images of two suicide passenger jets crashing into and leveling two of the tallest buildings that, until 9-11-01, proudly dominated the New York City skyline.

Unfortunately, the experience of 911, like all human experience, becomes attenuated over time. The further Americans are from the event, in terms of time and space, the more surreal it feels. Under the circumstances, our respect for our own opinions and the decisions made by our leaders in the wake of 911 naturally falters. That’s why remembering 911 should be, and in my case is, a community effort. Anniversaries are important in a healthy democratic-republic. This one is no exception. Remembering 911 and acknowledging all that we have learned since is particularly healthy for American democracy.

I believe it isn’t particularly important whether or not Americans agree or disagree about the meaning of 911. Their unwillingness to capitulate to evil is what truly matters. Of course there are a wide variety of opinions about methods, responsibility, efficiency and competence. It was a traumatic experience. As a nation of free minds, we must find patients in ourselves for those we disagree with, so long as our end goal remains the same. Victory in the form of sustainable peace is what we should demand of ourselves. Sustainable peace is our collective responsibility. We must realize it will not come today, or even tomorrow. We are engaged as a nation, in a Long War, an epic struggle against an ideological foe. Indeed, it takes time for society to absorb traumatic events and create conditions that reduce the likelihood of recurrence of 9-11-01, and an enhanced national awareness of the geopolitical warning signs that preceded it.

Where American academia and the United States Military merge (for example); West Point and the Naval Academy are finally graduating classes that volunteered as plebes after 9-11-01. These soldiers and sailors are entering careers with a new global paradigm. As for the threat, the communities in the Middle East that foster the kind of militant hate that precipitated 9-11-01 are under an American microscope. We, as a people, are learning more and more about the insurgent war being waged against us. The idea that our wars in the Middle East are happening in the middle of the world’s largest petroleum reserves complicates the situation but does not render wars against terrorists un-winnable. With history as their guide, Americans will take on post 9-11 challenges with the same American zeal that won the American West.

Our sheriffs in this fight, General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker have been called to testify about our progress in Iraq. Read and think about every word they give the American people! They are depending on the American people as much as the American people are depending on them. They know Americans are passionate about peace. They know Americans are determined to create a world where men, women and children can feel secure. They also know there can be no peace without justice. General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker should expect Americans to believe the war effort is a common cause for all free people, wherever they are, whatever language they speak, whatever God they are free to pray to.

On this 9-11 anniversary, tears for the victims of 9-11 will not be shed in vain. American volunteers are relentless. They will break the remaining few suicidal demons. American volunteers will hunt them down and cast them out of our world, into hell where they belong. Middle Easterners and Americans are experiencing a revival; a mutual awakening. The 911 idea of Allah cannot stand. God will not be made a slave to the ambition of murderous fascists, be they Sunni or Shiite.

On this anniversary, there is only on fitting conclusion to this remembrance commentary: God bless America, God bless the Middle East and God bless all the free souls that live there.

HUMINT: Eye Contact

2007-09-07T23:10:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: People who make eye contact are smarter than those that don’t. It is a fact that eye contact holds the greatest capacity for human understanding. I can prove it. It’s how we’re wired.

Eyes are a sapiens primary sense organ. Binocular, color vision allows more information to flow into a sapiens brain than two ears, a nose, a tongue or a sapiens sensitive skin. According to researchers an average human eye can carry the equivalent of 10 megabytes per second (MBPS). That metric is per retina and we know, with binocular vision, average eyes send 20MBPS to the brain. For the sake of context, an average cable television channel carries approximately 50MBPS. Granted, we are only talking about data input. The human brain processes visual data in concert with our experiential memory, what we hear, smell, taste and touch. All of this data is combined and contrasted for near simultaneous cognitive processing. Nevertheless, each sense organ is genetically wired into a sapiens neural network. Therefore the rate data flow into each sub-sense-network is quantifiable.

If all neurons, AKA, brain cells, are synonymous finite elements, the size of the neural network dedicated to each sense organ should be proportional to the amount of information flowing into its neural network. This assertion might hold as a rule of thumb, but I admit, it excludes a great deal of important information about the development of biological neural networks. Yet the rule of thumb has some value. The interoperability of neurons is a highly observable phenomenon. In clinical studies of individuals born without visual ability, the neurons genetically dedicated to visual processing are engaged to process audio signal input.

Average number of cells in visual cortex = 538,000,000
Average number of neurons in auditory cortex = 100,000,000

We now have enough information to reverse engineer a guess for an audio input data rate. Based on what we know about a sapiens’ visual system, 4MBPS is a valid approximation. In other words, if a sapiens’ brain dedicates a neural network to audio input that is one fifth the size of visual input, we should expect the audio input data rate to be one fifth of a sapiens’ visual data rate.

Sense organ data rates speak to the maximum possible efficiency of unassisted real time perception. Introducing tools to facilitate clarity of the very small and objects very far away has greatly enhanced the scope of what sapiens can see – and as a direct result – understand. Microscopic research has advanced to the size of atoms. Telescopic research has advanced to the furthest galaxies of our known universe. Ultraviolet and infrared optical devices help sapiens see beyond the frequency limits of natural vision. The unassisted human eye can process electromagnetic wavelengths of 400 to 700 nanometers.

While the catalog of human knowledge has dramatically increased with the assistance of visual aids, the application of each visual tool shifts its users’ environmental context further away from the familiar. In other words, the more we know about the environment we live in, the more our perception of the 400 to 700 nanometers world changes. Indeed, a sapiens neural network did not developed genetically to process signals generated by microscopes, telescopes, x-rays, microwaves and radio-scopes. Yet the fact that sapiens are genetically blind to those signals has nothing to do with the ability to process them once converted to our perceptive 400 to 700 nanometer range.

Indeed, anti-tech sapiens who resist realities available to them beyond their natural, unaided visual spectrum, are avoiding eye contact. Likewise, sapiens are prone to assert what they cannot possibly know, given the data they’re processing. The more a sapien knows about the world he or she lives, the closer they are to God, the creator of the universe they embrace. Exploring the world assisted by tools, or without them, is making eye contact with God’s great works. In this context, the age-old conflict between atheists and theocrats is absurd. An atheist could know the universe of God’s great works far more than a learned priest, only to dismiss the priest’s perceptions – for all the wrong reasons. Making eye contact is more than just looking into your friend's and opponent’s eyes. It’s about looking into their neural network as well.

Make eye contact with the world. You’ll learn more than you could ever have imagined.

HUMINT: Human Software

2007-09-07T08:18:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: Considering the similarities between computers and human beings, both are analogous in that they have hardware and software. The first is made of metal, silicon and code – the second is made of neurons, nerves, and experience. Computer hardware has evolved dramatically since its initial invention. According to Moore’s Law, transistors have consistently shrunk by half - approximately every two years since the 1960s. If we were to compare the size or processing power of a single neuron to a single transistor, we might say our brain “power” would have increased more than 2 million percent since Moore announced his findings in 1965.

The human brain has not physically evolved by any significant measure in the last 50,000 years. The hardware component of human intelligence is fixed in time, only subject to slight variability of our individual DNA.

If the analogy between computer software and human software holds, beyond general speculation, we might assert that a human being’s software is what truly distinguishes his or her performance from their fellow human beings.

The most observable human software processes occur during collective interaction. Languages, academics, governments, religions, and games are all examples of social software processed by groups of minds. Each of these social software examples is of “established rule sets” that individual participants are obligated to follow in order to determine their individual success or failure. Success or failure in this context applies to the individual participants as well as the software itself. Social software crashes litter the history books. Languages are forgotten, academic pursuits are revised, governments have fallen to ruins, religions have been rejected and some games are never played by anyone ever again.

What prompts social software to crash? Is humanity always guaranteed an upgrade whenever social software crashes? Can we consciously upgrade our social software, or the social software of threatening cultures?

Of particular concern in our era are forms of government. Be they democracies, dictatorships, theocracies or monarchies; what prompts government software to crash is geo-political stress. The source of stress is almost always famine, disease, war, ideology, as well as economic and technology. In the case of governments, there is no guarantee a social software crash will lead to an upgrade. Without significant external (software) support, social software crashes are more likely to result in a downgrade. The French Revolution (1789), Russian Revolution (1917) and Iranian Revolutions (1979) all ousted a monarchy that resulted in an ideological cleansing. Each was a downgrade. Fortunately France appears to have fully recovered, whereas Russia and Iran have not yet.

The American Revolution (1776) was an upgrade that set a new global precedent. The American rebels who founded the United States were the most skilled managers and technocrats of their day. Not only did they possess leadership experience, they rooted their social theories in the best ideas of the Greek and Roman societies they admired from an historical distance. The governing software in the U.S. that followed the American Revolution was a clear upgrade to colonial and imperial designs that preceded it. The upgrades in the U.S. have been adopted in part or in whole by many countries around the world, to the betterment of many billions of lives. The stress that caused the crash of colonial American software was economic and ideological. The mass exodus of Americans from Europe instigated a new world view, new levels of competence and prosperity without the accompanying legitimacy Americans felt they deserved. And thus, the system crashed.

Resistance to upgrades comes primarily from ancient minds. Ancient in this context does not refer to a timeline or even a point in time, but a regressive version of social software. The Roman and Greek empires represent a relatively modern version of social software no longer in use today. Both the Roman and Greek systems eventually crashed and were relegated to historical memory. The Apache and Bedouin tribes remain in existence to this day but represent an earlier version of social software, arguably more resilient, but less technologically productive. Resilience and technological advancement both require unique forms of social intelligence. Lessons can be learned from all versions of social software to show what not to do as well as derive sustainable upgrades, like guaranteeing individual liberty and ensuring personal responsibility with a competent judiciary. Fortunately, America’s founding rebels saw fit to include a mechanism for nonviolent incremental upgrades America’s governing code – the U.S. Constitution can be and has been amended to better govern Americans.

Not all governing software is created equal, nor does existing governing software, just by the nature of its existence, deserve equal opportunity in the world today. Incompatible versions of governing software will cause serious conflict. Some versions of governing software in existence today are incompatible with the people they claim to govern. For example, theocracy, like communism is a version of governing software that abandons individual liberty and personal responsibility for the dream of a utopian ideal. In so doing, communists and theocrats tend to slaughter the same people their rhetoric was engineered to liberate.

With the success of individual liberty and personal responsibility enshrined in many governing institutions around the world today, fewer and fewer institutions of government are incompatible with each other. Therefore the likelihood of total war is diminishing every day. We now know that the problem of upgrading our social software isn’t a function of our biological hardware but instead resides in the social software we choose to govern ourselves. The demand to upgrade governing software will focus on ancient minds operating versions of governing software incompatible with their people and the rest of the world.

HUMINT: Pro-Victory

2007-09-06T09:07:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: In every free society throughout the history of mankind, citizens charged with the responsibility of war returned from the front with the truth; “War is Hell!” They always have and they always will. Free minds have no compulsion to lie about the horrors of mortal combat. It requires a disturbed kind of sickness to glorify the carnage of war. Only fascist dictators and supreme leaders revel in the blood of their dead. Dictators and fascists embrace genocide as the answer to their problems. Stalin said, “Death solves all problems. No man, no problem”.

For example, during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) Iran’s fascist leaders sent human waves of young men without arms or armor into combat. The youth brigade, known as the Basij was organized by the newly formed Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC), the same people ruling Iran today, to attack entrenched Iraqi machine gun units. Tens of thousands of young boys kissed the Koran before senselessly marching to their death into a hail of the Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein’s, bullets. In tribute to this colossal waste of life, Khomeini stained the waters of a familiar fountain in Tehran blood red – to symbolize the blood of his martyrs.

In 1988, as the Iran-Iraq War was winding down because the sociopaths in Tehran and Baghdad were running out of money to buy weapons and troops to watch slaughter each other, Khomeini’s war policy came to an end, and as a result veered off in two new directions. Told his foreign policy could no longer sustain the casualties he and his idiot generals kept incurring Khomeini authorized his IRGC goons to pursue a clandestine nuclear weapons program. Yes… I am referring to the same Iranian nuclear weapons program that remains highly controversial and destabilizing to the Middle East today. In terms of domestic policy, Khomeini started slaughtering political prisoners. Ordering the mass kill of more than 30,000 Iranians, Khomeini and the IRGC had taken Stalin’s maxim to heart. “Death solves all problems. No man, no problem.”

Fast forward to today, Thursday September 6, 2007. Iran is under the command of the same men who carried out the orders of Iran’s Stalin. Dissenters in Iran are hung in groups by cranes, on public television. Mind you, the programming in Iran is not about ratings. The Iranian Government controls the programming and they have no intention of entertaining the Iranian populace with the twitching bodies of young men and women, suffocating at the business end of a hangman’s noose. The IRGC’s skills of mass murder have not magically transferred into any moderation or responsible government. There is no indication that the Iranian government intends to be responsible, or is even considering moderation as an alternative to its history.

There are changes within the Iranian Government, akin to musical chairs. Rafsanjani, a former President of Iran who openly boasted about Iran’s intent to acquire nuclear weapons in the past – is once again, being framed in the international press as a pragmatic figure capable of moderating the more militant forces in Iran’s government. On the contrary; those that openly lie about Rafsanjani’s past are overtly seeking to pacify Westerners looking for sustainable solutions to the Iran threat. While it is impossible to prove those who call Rafsanjani a moderate or pragmatist, the repetitious nature of their labeling exposes their selective amnesia of Rafsanjani’s past.

For better or worse, American forces are fighting battles to Iran’s east and west, in Afghanistan and Iraq respectively. The dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and the Warlord Government of the Taliban has been deposed by free Americans who volunteered to do the job. The mess made by these former regimes will not be cleaned up overnight. Indeed, the sociopaths in Iraq and Afghanistan will leave scars and bloodstains in World History books that will last until the end of time.

This generation, judged through the lens of history, will be seen as the destroyers of men like Stalin. While I’ve had many heated debates with Americans, Europeans and Middle Easterners fed up with the U.S. conflict in Iraq today, none have argued that the former Government’s of Iraq, Afghanistan and the current government of Iran was and is anything but repugnant. None have offered any sympathy for the sociopaths targeted by U.S. Forces in Iraq or Afghanistan. None have argued that American casualties exceed the casualties of any other American conflict in history. None have argued that Afghanis, Iraqis, and Iranians don't deserve an American foreign policy that supports their pursuit of liberty and democratic governance. All, however, argue that we (the U.S.) should not be involved in these conflicts (as though we weren't already). The reason why is always the same, they can’t relate to the struggle under the terms given to them by their ratings driven media.

The truth is there is no Anti-War Movement in American today. Every argument against U.S. involvement in the Middle East is instead an Anti-Conflict Movement. Every American I’ve ever spoken to about the Middle East is Pro-Victory.

HUMINT: Honesty Wins

2007-09-05T01:48:00.000+03:30

Judaeo-Christian values are considered by many in the West to be what separates modern civilization from intellectual, moral and spiritual chaos of the societies that threaten and denigrate the West. Honesty and fidelity are indeed the Judaeo-Christian values on record. While these traits observably exist among Western-Western relations, do not credit Westerners for the invention of honesty and fidelity. Instead, Westerners discovered the success of such behavior through the trials and tribulation of disease, famine and war. The genius of Western Civilization is not contained in individual piety found among Western prophets but instead derives from a collective genius, repeatedly rewarded, evolving to prominence. In other words, Westerners interact with honesty and fidelity in the West because it works best and it leads to mutual success, not because it is Western or Judaeo-Christian.

Independent of culture, honesty is successful as well as liberating. Taking honesty toward its intellectual horizons, mankind has developed fascinating new skills. Mathematical modeling (for example) has shown mankind new ways to think about the world. What women and men can prove with math today far exceeds their ancestor’s wildest philosophical dreams. Leonardo DaVinci would be enthralled by the tools most of us take for granted today. Math is probably the most powerful tool; (primarily) a Western intellectual leap forward for all mankind, but not necessarily a foolproof key to a more rational world. Like a pick axe and shovel – math can be used to solve problems or create new ones by building seemingly modern temples to mysticism and deceit.

Finite element analysis (for example) is a mathematical method that can predict the future geo-spatial position and temperature of solids, liquids and gasses; as their “elements” interact – bouncing off of each other. Given accurate input parameters the results of finite element analysis can be very accurate. With poor input, the results are misleading.

Setting aside the aforementioned disclaimer regarding bogus input parameters, predicting the future is strikingly simple. As of the last century, prophets, saints and their loyal disciples no longer hold a monopoly on the future. Despite the inherent divergence between proof and faith, mathematics and theology will always have something in common. The mind of mankind will invariably turn to one, or the other, or both – for answers.

In reference to finite element analysis, you might be wondering “what’s an ‘element’ ”? Imagine a small cube with an initial temperature, viscosity, coefficient of thermal expansion, gravitational constant and six degrees of freedom in time, represented by (dP,dV,dT,dX,dY,dZ,da,db,dg), where a,b,g denote angles of rotation around axis X,Y,Z respectively. Now imagine a large cube made up of 1,000,000 small cubes defined exactly like your first small cube. Anything that happens to a small cube in the 1,000,000 strong matrix of small cubes can be cataloged. Obviously, the computational intensity of finite element analysis requires a computer. In this relatively simple scenario, you would be tracking a minimum of nine variables for 1,000,000 cubes where each new value in time is derived from a system of equations. Even if you started out with perfect initial conditions, you wouldn’t have time to solve these problems with pencil and paper if you dedicated your entire life to the problem.

The finite element analysis scenario as described above, can be modeled an open loop control system. Initial input variables would presumably shock a system that would oscillate and eventually stabilize over time. A closed loop control system, on the other hand, takes a system’s output and reinvests it into a system’s input. Think about balancing a pencil (or a similar object with more inertial stability) on your finger. As the object falls to the left, your hand moves left at a higher rate of speed to compensate. By your actions, you have created an inverted pendulum, which can be modeled with a mathematical model called control theory. The mass and inertia of the object you are balancing married to your own visual acuity and muscular coordination determines how stable your inverted pendulum will be. If your eyes tell you the object is falling left when it is actually falling to the right, your inverted pendulum will achieve chaos and fail. There is an important lesson here.

HUMINT: Honest feedback is imperative to system stability!

This is how the methodological approach to finite element analysis and control systems analysis can be applied to theological interpretations, social values, society and theories of government. Governments in particular, can be modeled as control systems (although not to the accuracy or simplicity of an inverted pendulum). Simply put, the government of a nation without freedom of speech, press and assembly cannot expect honest feedback from their finite elements (citizens). Iran for example, under the authority of Supreme Leader Khamenie and President Mahmood Ahmadinejad, are guaranteeing their country will achieve instability and fail because they do not authorize basic human freedoms in Iran today. In addition, they threaten and denigrate the West for their arrogance and decadence.

Recently, Iran’s President Mahmood Ahmadinejad made an announcement that “with his faith in God, he had used his engineering acumen to prove the United States would not attack Iran” for an ongoing dispute over Iranian transgressions. While I have not seen Mr. Ahmadinejad’s proof, I can assert, as a fellow engineer, honesty wins and Iran is a nation that abhors honesty, threatens the West for all of its successes. Iran represents one example of many, where the leaders are long tongue liars. Any competent engineer could see the cracks in Iran’s system that will eventually lead to catastrophic failure. Maybe the U.S. will bomb Iran, maybe it won’t, but that is a separate issue altogether. When honesty wins; liars and oppressors lose.

HUMINT: Counter Insurgent

2007-08-31T04:39:00.000+03:30

The United States “is not good at counter insurgency and never has been”, according to George Friedman, Chief Executive Officer of Strategic Forecasting. He also calls for an end to the limitedly successful Surge in order to redeploy troops to Kuwait or the uninhabited south west of Iraq, so that they might “flank” any expansive Iranian moves toward Saudi Arabia (for example). First and foremost, the lessons of 2003 to 2006 in Iraq show Iraqi and foreign resistance/insurgency is inversely proportional to the size of the U.S. or U.K. footprint. Dr. Friedman’s analysis calls for a reversal of successful policies in favor of those that demonstratively failed only months earlier. Dr. Freidman is so wrong as to deserve a full rebuttal.

HUMINT: The idea that the U.S. is not good at counter insurgency is flawed. The U.S. largely abandoned counter insurgency and guerilla tactics in the aftermath of WWII, in favor of a Cold War induced stalemate, intentionally encouraged by the infamous policy of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). But there’s far more to the history of American insurgency and counter insurgency than WWII and the MAD stalemate that followed it.

It would be disingenuous to suggest recent history [the last fifty years or so] encompasses all trends, or even the most important long term trends. Long term trends better represent the engine and its fuel that maintains economic growth and sustains American’s national morale.

While any long term outlook naturally calms average Americans familiar with their nation’s history, the genuinely calming effects of understating long term trends does not work on individuals with SDHSM syndrome. SDHSM is an acronym for the political disease known as Self Defeating, Hyper-Spastic, Masochism (SDHSM, also pronounced sdism)]. This rebuttal is not necessarily accusing Dr. Friedman of having SDHSM but his recent commentary shows symptoms of the disease.

Indeed, recent history and spectacular attacks can thoroughly distract policy makers and their advisors who suffer from SDHSM. The disease can be a debilitating to a nation at war, but rarely fatal. SDHSM is a contagious disease that spreads more rapidly among the true believers of the religious cult I refer to as Non-Confrontationalism.

Pfizer and Merck should seriously consider teaming up to find a cure for SDHSM syndrome. In the mean time, those with a natural immunity to SDHSM; historians, logicians, analysts, current and former members of the United States military, have a particularly important mission. Their job is to keep the nation on track. So consistent is the SDHSM phenomenon in fact, some contingent of politicians always insists on reversing their nation’s course at every nervous precipice. It’s like a socio-political twitch.

Washington DC, arguably the most powerful city in the world today, is particularly susceptible to distraction, political reversals, non-confrontationalists and sufferers of SDHSM. To its credit, or discredit depending on your point of view, Washington DC is a city of lawmakers who appear to hop erratically from one distraction to the next, rarely solving crisis with any observable coherent democratic consciousness. Instead, crisis mounts into an untenable situation and finally a group of technicians is called in to Get-er-done! It’s not pretty but it proven effective time and time again…

Therefore it’s wrong to suggest the United States has never been good at Counter Insurgency. Throughout its history the U.S. performed admirably as insurgents and counter insurgents. From the Lewis and Clark expedition to the Texas Revolution, Americans have shown their allies and enemies alike, great competence on and off the battlefield. The only argument to refute such gallantry comes from the perspective that all violent conflict represents failure and must be eliminated. It is an argument that stems from of moral relativism that makes distinguishing between gun wielding cops and gun wielding criminals impossible.

Nature is clear on this point. We are what we have to be, or we go extinct. The notion that the U.S. has not been good at counter insurgency is wholly separated from its direct and indirect need to be good at counter insurgency, at home and abroad. Free societies are always accessible to every disgruntled malcontent and are therefore ripe for insurrection. As an open society the United States must be on guard against foreign and domestic insurgent threats.

Throughout their history, Americans have performed admirably as insurgents and counter-insurgents; as revolutionaries and guerillas; as Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines. There is more fight left in Americans than Dr. Freidman might imagine. Looking at the trends, good or bad at counter insurgency is an issue of supply and demand. It’s not a choice. Insurrections will continue to occur and their occurrence will demand Americans be good at counter insurgency.

Consider this tactical forecast: Americans will continue to improve in the art war while they recall their legitimate legacy on the subject. Expect violent clashes around the world to continue without a break. Anticipate decisive American victories to come.

HUMINT: Peace Medals

2007-08-30T08:40:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: History matters. ARTICLE: For many decades before the American Revolution, the instruments of diplomacy that the rulers of civilized nations had relied on in dealing with the native occupants of the lands they claimed, were gifts of flags; printed certificates called commissions or paroles; clothing such as cloaks, blankets or military dress uniforms; engraved silver pipes and silver-headed canes; silver gorgets (small decorative breastplates); and medals. By far the most important were the medals, termed "peace medals" because the giving and the receiving of the token signified an understanding that the parties would maintain peaceable relationships with one another and with their neighbors, in the interest of fee and profitable--to the foreigners, at least — commerce. Indians also were led to believe that a medal was a guarantee of the giver's military support against their rivals and enemies. [snip] Lewis and Clark carried a total of at least eighty-nine peace medals in five different sizes:

3 large Jefferson medals about 105 mm in diameter

13 Jefferson medals about 75 mm in diameter

16 Jefferson medals about 55 mm in diameter

55 "season" medals, 45 mm in diameter

2 (or 4) "medals of the fifth size," of uncertain dimension

Alexander Henry the Younger, a fur trader with the Northwest Company, visited the Mandan and Hidatsa villages in late July of 1806, a few weeks before Lewis and Clark passed through on their way home, and recorded the Hidatsas' impressions of the Americans' diplomacy.
"In 1804–05, when Captains Lewis and Clark wintered near this place, they presented the people with silver medals and flags, the same as they gave to the Mandanes; but the Big Bellies [Hidatsas] pretended to say that these ornaments conveyed bad medicine to them and their children. They are exceedingly superstitious, and, therefore, supposed they could not better dispose of those articles than by giving them to the natives with whom they frequently warred, in hope the ill-luck would be conveyed to them. They were disgusted at the high-sounding language the American captains bestowed upon themselves and their own nation, wishing to impress the Indians with an idea that they were great warriors, and a powerful people who, if exasperated, could crush all the nations of the earth, etc."

All but one were more or less formally presented to Indians they met along the way, mainly to individuals who were apparently tribal leaders. When in doubt, the captains arbitrarily "made" chiefs, a practice that backfired when misjudgment resulted in intratribal jealousy, and once when they gave a medal to the Teton Sioux chief, Torto-hongar (the "Partisan") before they realized he was "a great scoundrel." A Cheyenne chief so honored by Clark on August 21, 1806, returned his medal with the explanation that "he was afraid of the midal or any thing that white people gave to them." Clark successfully prevailed, however, informing the reluctant Cheyenne that "this was the medecene which is Great father directed me to deliver to all the great Chiefs who listened to his word and followed his councils." Hidatsas were known to have given their medals to their enemies in the expectation that the bad medicine would fall upon them instead.

The first medals were given to Oto and Missouri leaders on August 3, 1804; the last, "a medal of the small kind," went to "a Chief of great note" among the Nez Perce (Ni-mee-poo) on May 11, 1806. Otherwise, the captains' record-keeping was generally haphazard and incomplete, and they gave no comprehensive report to the Secretary of War enumerating the chiefs they had made. Ironically, Lewis left a peace medal around the neck of the Piegan Indian whom Reuben Field killed in self defense beside the Two Medicine River in northwest Montana on July 17, 1806, so that the victim's tribesmen would know who was responsible. [snip] In 1829, while Clark was Indian Agent for Upper Louisiana, he and Lewis Cass, Governor of the Territory of Michigan, together recommended a policy for the distribution of medals and flags, to reaffirm traditional practice and avoid misuse by new government agents.

They will be given to influential persons only.
The largest medals will be given to the principal village chiefs, those of the second size will be given to the principal war chiefs, and those of the third size will be given to the less distinguished chiefs and warriors.
They will be presented with the proper formalities, and with an appropriate speech, so as to produce a proper impression upon the Indians.
It is not intended that chiefs should be appointed by any officer of the department, but that they should confer these badges of authority upon such as selected or recognized by the tribe, and as are worthy of them, in the manner heretofore practiced.
Whenever a foreign medal is worn, it will be replaced by an American medal, if the Agent should consider the person entitled to a medal.

Obviously, Clark had learned some lessons from his experience of twenty-five years before.

HUMINT: Political Tattoo

2007-08-29T08:51:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: My left arm is a freedom cheat sheet. On it, I’ve tattooed the Declaration of Independence. Freedom is as much my skin tone as my birth race. My faith in American values is enshrined in something harder than stone; my own flesh. Ink, ideology and flesh have merged into one American body. On my right arm, the same should be written in Spanish, Russian on my back and Farsi on my chest. The theory of freedom is not specific to language or culture. Either you are free or you’re not.

Image is of an album jacket… not me.

HUMINT: Original Neocon

2007-08-28T07:43:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: The lessons of economic experience are transferable. Most arguments in the media today are constructed out of pure speculation and popular fantasy. Economics and national interests cannot be separated from the pursuit of individual liberty. The American identity is grounded in the ideas of liberty, therefore American interests are global interests. Consider the widening scope of American citizenship and American enfranchisement. The people of the United States are leading a freedom movement that has no inherently distinguishable leaders. The role of American governors is not to lead the movement but to enhance and protect the freedoms of mankind. Supporting freedom for all is a universally wise but it requires a free American citizenry recognize its role in enhancing freedom for those without it today.

Why Study War?

2007-08-26T06:07:00.000+03:30

VDH: Try explaining to a college student that Tet was an American military victory. You’ll provoke not a counterargument — let alone an assent — but a blank stare: Who or what was Tet? Doing interviews about the recent hit movie 300, I encountered similar bewilderment from listeners and hosts. Not only did most of them not know who the 300 were or what Thermopylae was; they seemed clueless about the Persian Wars altogether.

[Snip]

What, then, can we do to restore the study of war to its proper place in the life of the American mind? The challenge isn’t just to reform the graduate schools or the professoriate, though that would help. On a deeper level, we need to reexamine the larger forces that have devalued the very idea of military history — of war itself. We must abandon the naive faith that with enough money, education, or good intentions we can change the nature of mankind so that conflict, as if by fiat, becomes a thing of the past. In the end, the study of war reminds us that we will never be gods. We will always just be men, it tells us. Some men will always prefer war to peace; and other men, we who have learned from the past, have a moral obligation to stop them.

*************

HUMINT: War is a form of cultural communication. It is the most destructive of all possible mergers between two sides. When each side agrees to kill the other and die for their respective causes, both assert their identity with violence. The United States of America was born as a liberation movement. I happen to believe our nation’s birth was preordained as the natural trajectory of mankind. The proof exists in our DNA. Human beings are social, highly communicative and prone to disrupt pockets of dysfunction. The American experiment is the latest and most successful incarnation of what mankind intends to do with its future.

Woe to the man who abandons humanity so that he may hide and prosper among his people’s dysfunction. One day, his brother’s wrath will strike him down. These days, his brother wears an American flag on his shoulder --- but that peculiar red, white and blue symbol of liberty is as humanistic as it is nationalistic. Freedom is the ultimate cause, and no where on earth is mankind more free than inside these United States.

HUMINT: Tech Tyranny

2007-08-15T22:36:00.000+03:30

What keeps you busy? With all of our so called “technological” advances, you don’t really have more time for yourself, do you? Admit it! None of us do. Most of the blessings of Western Civilization don’t feel like blessings. When your boss calls you on your cell phone on a Saturday for a status report, you flinch at your caller ID. When the “self checkout kiosk” at your local Home Depot can’t seem to read the bar code on your new ceiling fan, you sigh at the clerk. “A little help over here!” you say, with a tone of superior annoyance. These things can feel so oppressive…

Believe it or not, most of the gadgets you use every day have raised your expectations of quality, efficiency, and workload. When one or more gadgets fail to deliver its utopian promise, a watershed of disappointment naturally follows. Likewise, when we dehumanize each other as robots, our guilt or innocence comes from how close we associated with gadgets.

Does our techno-drudgery deserve a protest? We are not robots! We are not the cell phone we choose to buy. We are not the Satellite Radio we listen to or the Global Positioning System that guides us. Whether saving us time, providing pinpoint directions or superior audio performance, these tools help us be who we already are. They can’t help us if we don’t like who we are. If you don’t like yourself, these gadgets are bound to make your life worse, not better. Maybe we could change our outlook if we thought of all of these gadgets as tools.

Tools are a physical manifestation of liberty. They always have been (from the Stone Age) and always will be (to the Information Age and beyond). Adopting a new tool liberates us from its predecessor’s annoying limitations. Interestingly, old limitations are quickly forgotten and enhancements taken for granted once we discard an old tool and adopt a new one. The process begins anew when new limitations are quickly discovered with the new tool. Think about what you’re actually buying when you invest in an upgraded mechanism. While it may be shiny, flashy and fabulous, the inventors of new tools are really selling you more of your life. They are inventing and you are buying time saving techniques as well as experiential quality enhancements.

Regardless of how it feels; the cell phone for example, is just one of many mechanisms in an ecosystem of devices that facilitate human communication. Certainly, communication devices will continue evolving in our free market. One day however, when we consumers are unable to detect product limitations, evolution will cease. That’s how products dominate or die in a free market. They simply stop changing when they achieve equilibrium in their environment.

How did we get here? Did we consciously choose this ecosystem of gadgets? Actually, free will combined with democratic ideals of freedom of expression got us here. The society Americans built and continue to build on was done so with a collective conscious. Western Civilization’s pursuit of liberty started with philosophical intangibles and migrated into tangible art, academia and industry. Sophacles asserted more than 2000 years ago, “If we are to keep our democracy, there must be one commandment: ‘thou shalt not ration justice’ ”. Sophacles is in intellectual harmony with Aeschylus who said, “Death is softer by far than tyranny.” Technology isn’t tyranny. On the contrary, technology is the fruit of rejecting tyranny.

Without Western Civilization: your time would probably be consumed by less savory chores. If it wasn’t for the trajectory of Western Civilization your slaves would probably be keeping you busy these days. Without Western Civilization: If you would’ve become an ambitious slave driver, you would have undoubtedly spent your days beating and abusing your slaves. Not because you’re a sadist. You would need to beat them as a pragmatist – to work them harder. While violently abusing another human being sounds repulsive, there is no other way to get men and women to unquestioningly abide by your will. Technology on the other hand, is more compliant.

Without Western Civilization: and without luck, you would probably be a slave today. If you were born or sold into slavery with any ambition of self determination you could expect to spend your time being beaten and abused. Without technology, mankind’s reliance for large public and private works would invariably fall on the back of human slaves. It did in the past. Without an inherited sense of liberty and justice born of empathy and mutual respect, there could be no market for advanced technology. Without basic human freedom, society cannot support a free market. Before Western Civilization emerged, barbaric and imperial society had achieved an untenable equilibrium. In other words, mankind was stuck and was unable to evolve beyond tribalism and iterative attempts at imperial conquest.

These days, all of mankind has an unprecedented opportunity to transcend ancient forms of oppression. Ancient philosophers articulated the necessity to do so. Whether you feel it or not, we in the West are enjoying the evolved blessings of their intellectual power. No, it isn’t perfect. No, it isn’t utopia. No one is making that claim. This essay is not a call for technology over tyranny. If only it were that simple. Technology affords humanity the ability to transcend oppressive systems around the world, not necessarily the will to do so.

The next time you are in public, put down your gadgets for a minute and look around at the faces of your fellow citizens. Men, women, employees and customers --- they’re all free. If you can understand how important that is, that’s where you’ll find the will to help all mankind transcend tyranny.

HUMINT: Non-Confrontation

2007-08-14T06:09:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: In the Long War we are all in; a new religion is emerging. I call it Non-Confrontationalism. The disciples of Non-Confrontationalism preach abstinence. Not premarital or extramarital “sexual” abstinence, but “conflictual” abstinence. The best thing to do, so they say, is nothing. They seek segregation, appeasement and flawed compromises to solve fundamental disagreements – because they believe the West cannot afford a decisive victory in the Long War.

Non-confrontationalists pervade politics and war. It’s always been that way, but never before did they have so many converts. As their movement grows stronger, the United States is made weaker. Ironically, non-confrontationalists are some of the brightest people serving in politics today. No matter how beautiful their argument, do not mistake their political poetry for genius. Their success delays inevitable conflicts, only differing costs, without acknowledging accruing interest. The times, they are changing… Globalization is erasing Western intelligentsia’s ability to worship peace in the face of existential threats.

Nevertheless, true believers are plentiful among the cult of Non-Confrontationalism. A true non-confrontationist wonders why anyone would bother living any other way. If you’ve never wanted a ring side seat at a prize fight, you’re probably a non-confrontationalist. If a serious debate strikes you as the problem, you’re probably a non-confrontationist. Confrontation can be bloody, so why bother? Isn’t it best to avoid the mess? To be sure, winning without confrontation is a hidden art. The best non-confrontationalists win without having played the game. In short, non-confrontationalists are insatiably ambitious. What separates them from normalcy is that any opposition to their vision makes them nauseous. They cannot deal with divergent opinion – therefore, they cannot live happily in a free society.

Instead of passing judgment on this peculiar breed of political animal, it makes more sense to describe and categorize them, as Darwin did with the species he studied on the Galapagos Islands. First and foremost, a non-confrontationalist is a master at the art of bluffing. Bluffing is in their DNA. Decisive victory is not something they fabricate themselves. They harvest it. Victory, when they taste it, is handed to them by their opponent who would rather abandon victory than nurture it. To win, non-confrontationalists require opponents obey familiar rules. Without an opponent’s predictable obedience to familiar rules, non-confrontationalist bluffs invariably fail.

BLUFF: verb – the act of entering the mind of an opponent, in person or by proxy, to germinate doubt and or false confidence.

A non-confrontationalist can’t simply bluff all the way to a throne, can they? Sure, they can, if all of their opponents obey familiar rules. What about less successful non-confrontationalists? Liars, conmen and gamblers blend enough truth to their bluff to give it believability. That the crux of it… Truth management is what separates non-confrontationalists from a liars, conmen and gamblers. For example, a non-confrontationalist King can sustain a bluff so well and for so long that the bluff becomes a national lifestyle. The cultish façade of monarchy, if properly maintained, will become a fragile national identity. Ceremony and tradition are required to reinforce a non-confrontationalist King’s bluff. A conman on the other hand, bluffs just long enough to get what they want.

In democratic politics, a bluff cannot be maintained for as long as it could under a monarchy, theocracy or dictatorship. Cultish façades are constantly tested for sincerity and efficacy in a democracy. Democratic opponents obey the rule of law which is familiar to non-confrontationalists, so they can achieve incredible successes in American politics. Those successes are however limited by the fact that they are not authorized [by their own familiar rules] to murder their most persistent dissidents. That’s why democracy is demonstratively more stable than any other form of government.

Without the rule of law, if a non-confrontationalist becomes a dictator, domestic peace is probable – but only after all opposition is purged. Unfortunately for dictators and their subjects, a bluff ends at national borders.

In the Long War, politicians cannot measure stability in terms of a nation’s façade. In the Long War, stability must be considered in terms of the size of a nation’s bluff. The bigger the bluff, the larger the catastrophe will be when it fails. In a democracy, non-confrontation artists conceal or exaggerate their true intentions by making bogus agreements. Non-confrontationalists build the façade that precipitates their own national catastrophe. Rarely, on the other hand, could the scale of a bluff threaten the existence of a democracy. In a dictatorship, oligarchy or theocracy non-confrontationists bluff by making bogus threats and bogus agreements. Their entire system is a bluff.

For the sake of national security, ignore non-confrontationalist calls for abstinence. Be conflictually promiscuous. Go out and find the biggest bluff you can, confront it... tear it down! That’s the only way Western Civilization will win the Long War we are all in.

HUMINT: Freedom 101

2007-08-07T00:44:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: This course has no official curriculum. It has no Professor or TA. A list of references may help you pass; however, the value of each reference is largely dependant on your own interpretation of it. While there are no prerequisites for this course, consider taking [World History 101] and [Economics 101] concurrent with Freedom 101. Course materials consist of this essay, your personal experience, your community and your government.

RULES

Tests are not schedule but they will occur.

No letter grade will be given. Freedom 101 is strictly PASS/FAIL.

If you fail, you are obligated to take this course again. No one is excused.

If you pass, you are strongly encouraged to tutor those who have failed or are failing now.

CHEATING

You cannot cheat. If you steal the freedom of others to enhance your overall standing, you will be prosecuted with extreme prejudice. If you survive your punishment, you will be obligated to take this course again. If you die before you receive punishment, your cheating progeny will be punished. Also, if you die before you receive punishment, your memory will be humiliated in front of your progeny. If you are cheating now, STOP! Stopping now may or may not improve your chances of avoiding punishment; nevertheless, your progeny will be spared your fate.

FREEDOM 101 BASICS

Freedom is not easy to live with. Freedom is not easy to exercise. Having freedom to disagree with established doctrine or dogma does not imply said doctrine or dogma is wrong. Living with freedom obligates individuals to defend their unique doctrines and dogmas. Freedom is an authorization to be you in a world that is not you. No one is obligated to be like you or believe what you believe. If anyone obligates you to believe in a doctrine or dogma against your will, they are cheating. Once a cheater is identified, no one is more responsible for punishing cheaters than those being cheated. Once a cheater is identified, no one is more responsible for helping those being cheated than prior graduates of Freedom 101. So how do you know if you’ve passed or failed Freedom 101? Your personal freedom can be measured by the words and deeds of those that supervise and guide you. Once you learn how to measure freedom, check the amount you have. If you learn you have no freedom, you will fail Freedom 101. Do not retake Freedom 101 without making changes in your life.

MEASURING FREEDOM

SPEECH: The ability to accumulate opinions naturally and express them in an appropriate forum represents freedom of speech. Can you do that? If you cannot express yourself, you are oppressing yourself and you have failed Freedom 101. Learn how to express yourself and retake Freedom 101. If you or anyone else in your community are not authorized to express yourselves, you are oppressed. While the circumstances of your oppression are not of your own making, you still fail Freedom 101. Punish your oppressor and retake Freedom 101. If you need a tutor, look to those who have passed Freedom 101 already.
PRESS: Access to accurate accounts of events and all subsequent opinions represents freedom of the press. Opinions are like echoes. The loudest opinion may or may not be the most helpful or accurate. Social desirability of speech is not indicative freedom, access is. Do you have access to accurate accounts of events and diverse sets of subsequent opinions? If you answered no, you just failed Freedom 101. Learn how to access accurate information and retake Freedom 101.
ASSEMBLY: The ability to freely join with like minded friends and exclude unfriendlies represents freedom of assembly. No one should be obligated to: 1] join a group. 2] stay in a group. 3] accept members into their group. If a group’s membership does not practice freedom of speech, freedom of the press and or freedom of assembly, all group members fail Freedom 101. If you are a member of such a group, leave or change the nature of your group before retaking Freedom 101.

PREFERENCES

There are NO; national, ethnic, race, religious, tribal, familial, military, historical or economic preferences. Either you are free or your not – either you’ve passed Freedom 101 or you’ve failed. If you failed, we’ll see you next time. If you’re caught cheating, prepare for the worst. Good luck with the rest of your lives. Class dismissed.

HUMINT: Democratic Deterrence

2007-08-03T22:45:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: What kept the Cold War from spinning dangerously out of control was a bilateral foreign policy developed around Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) of civilian population centers. MAD worked because it developed out of a mutual experience. The Soviets, Americans and almost everyone else caught in between experienced the devastation wrought by WWII. Deterrence from war meant ensuring both sides were evenly balanced in the art and supplies of conventional and non-conventional warfare. The Cold War had a relatively clear set of rules that sprung from the shared experience of WWII.

When they talk about terrorism today, politicians and an international coalition of journalists seem to have forgotten about the architecture of MAD. The ever looming threat MAD represented cowed citizenries of many free and democratic nations to support foreign and domestic policies that were anything but democratic. The end of the Cold War necessitated a reorg among global power brokers. It meant populations around the world would begin expressing themselves democratically with an expectation of representation.

The transition from systems oppressive to democracy toward healthy democratic states is always turbulent. The fact remains however that once a populace arrives at democracy, stability is an ever present symptom thereafter. Pursuing democracy as a post Cold War deterrence strategy is sound in theory but the expectations of success should be measured in decades not news cycles. Unfortunately, no one in American is asking where their own Jeffersonian democracy came from… It has taken generations of war and intellectual evolution to raise successful democracies from the ashes of their past.

Meanwhile, there are many Americans who harbor unrealistic expectations. Why not, Food used to be slow, now it’s fast; why not democracy? By all indications, the fantasy they hold demands success occur at the pace of daily news cycles. Frustrated voters who fit this category are demanding the United States end its direct involvement in democratization efforts in the Middle East. To their credit, the list of alternative priorities sounds smart. I know many brilliant minds that are convinced American democratization efforts have already failed and we should therefore re-task our limited resources.

It makes no difference to many Americans that American foreign policy has not failed by any historical measure. Yet the U.S. Government is indeed failing. Where American Government is failing is in the realm of expectation and perception. If the United States government fails to meet American citizen’s expectations then it has failed. No amount of evidence can change that fact. In contemporary American citizen’s expectations of their government are set not by the government, but by the customer service industry. The “customer is always right” attitude has leaked like a toxin into American conceptions of democratic governance.

As disturbing as it sounds, democracy (American democracy) has the means to correct itself (eventually). For now, the post Cold War problems remain. Should the U.S. continue its efforts to democratize the Middle East, or not? If foreign policy fantasy trumps reality in the mind of the American Voter, what choice do policy-makers and policy-doers have? Not much!

Whether or not we would like to see a return to MAD policy, American efforts to democratize Iraq are establishing new balances between Middle Eastern states. Chief among new MAD players will be Saudi Arabia with its mutual doppelganger Iran. It sounds epic, doesn’t it? Iran and Saudi Arabia - polar foes pitted against each other struggling to fill the void left in Iraq, after the U.S. ouster of Saddam Hussein.

It may be that citizen fantasy begets policy fantasy. Without shared experience of WWII will MAD work? How realistic does this sound? Saudi Arabia and Iran are expected to stand toe to toe, prepared to destroy each other, but never quite pulling the trigger. It sounds like a dangerous gamble to me. While it may be necessary in the short term, the only pragmatic approach is to continue emphasizing peace through democratization.

HUMINT: Be Less You?

2007-07-27T21:23:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: For a year or so, when I first got involved with the Middle East, I thought Americans need to be more Middle Eastern. When in Rome, do as the Romans, right? Why not, that's exactly what Middle Easterner's were suggesting! In other words, I thought to myself, if you look weak by talking, don't talk. If you endanger democratic dissidents by talking, don't talk. My sentiments particularly echoed U.S. policy toward Iran. I realized one day how wrong that approach is. I realized that Middle Eastern ideas of demanding the behavior and identity suppression of others is dysfunctional in the extreme.

HUMINT: To illustrate my point, consider this analogy.

HUMINT: Is it the fault of a beautiful woman that she is beautiful? Should she hide her beauty to modify the behavior of the men around her? No! The men around her are responsible for their own behavior in the presence of her beauty. The fact that she is beautiful should be clear to all that see her. The norm would be that everyone who sees her are obligated to control themselves, not the other way around. It is a travesty of nature that she should be obligated to hide her contours for the sake of those around her. Thus the responsibility for behavior would shift from the observer to the beautiful woman.

HUMINT: If we buy into this thinking, individual liberty as well as individual responsibility are lost.

HUMINT: These are the subtle obstacles to winning in the Middle East. In my opinion, to date, the American people have not confronted the stakes in this war on terror - or rather, war on Islamic radicalism AKA Islamism. I believe we, as a people, have not confronted Islamism as a culture because we are being told not to by our own tendencies to tolerate diversity. We have unintentionally disarmed ourselves through our own cultural kindness and faux cultural understanding. To deal with the threat, we need to either learn not to be so accepting of other cultures capable of destroying our own, or accept a third party to eliminate the intolerance of Islamism entirely.

HUMINT: In other words our two options are:

1. Be less like us.
2. Find allies who respect us, who can help us, who we respect and who we can help.

HUMINT: While these two options techniclly represent a choice, the first should be dismissed. The only real option to winning in the ME is to find trustworthy allies.

HUMINT: War’s Objects

2007-06-12T03:07:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: When at war, it’s best to objectify your enemy. A few wars ago, an American might’ve expected their government to dehumanize their enemies for them. Not anymore America. Your government isn’t willing to objectify your enemies any longer. The reasons for the shift are many, but that’s not the point of this piece. The point of this piece is to acknowledge the shift and introduce a, “do it yourself” attitude to objectifying your nation’s enemies during war. But be careful, if you screw up the objectification process, you’ll probably end up making a symbol out of your enemy and if that happens, the symbol will undoubtedly be used against you.

HISTORICAL ANALOGY: Let’s get started. The easiest way to objectify your enemy is to grab a dusty American history book. Flip its pages back to a few wars ago when American leadership identified their enemies by name and had no qualms about defeating them. After reading a paragraph or two, the similarities between your enemies, your parent’s enemies and grand parent’s enemies will surface almost immediately. If that sounds too easy, it really isn’t. Don’t be surprised. You’ve inherited more from your family than you think. It’s no coincidence the kinds of people who would’ve killed your ancestors are similar to the people who would like to kill you. Rhetorical excuses to commit acts of violence against a free people are remarkably similar. But be careful, no historical analogy is precise. Flaw mongers may find a difference or two and use those differences to exalt your enemy to hero status. It’s common sense [to people that hate you] that if you’re not 100% correct, the opposite of what you believe must be true.

TRANSFER DISGUST: A harder method to objectify your enemy is one that requires creativity. Ask yourself “what filthy animal does your war time foe most closely resemble?” The idea here is to transfer the disgust of one animalistic object to create an enemy object. This is much harder than it sounds. America has a vocal contingent of animal lovers who strive to liberate all species of life through domestic bliss. Most animal lovers are going to fight you on this project. Be prepared. Adding bad behavior to the scenario might give you a pass. For example, an oversized hairless monkey that stinks might be gross enough to do the trick. If you’re a cartoonist, add some fangs, demon horns, blood shot eyes and greenish skin. But be careful, if your final sketch looks like Shrek, your kids will fall in love with your enemy.

EXPOSE LIES: An even harder method to objectify your enemy is one that requires analysis. Ask yourself “where does my enemy get their confidence to attack my country and countrymen?” If you’re willing to try this technique, prepare to get dirty. Your enemy’s thought process is a swampy mess to wade through. Most of the reasons why your enemy is your enemy in the first place developed through mental gymnastics alien to you. The idea here is to exploit every difference. When your enemy angrily exclaims something’s black, it’s probably white, or at least gray. Realize that they’re looking at America and hating it from the outside. They probably don’t even know the first thing about you. They live where they can lie about you without evidence or consequence. But be careful; don’t feed into your enemy’s hateful rhetoric. No one is more aware than your enemy that free people have a healthy skepticism of their own elected leadership.

SYMBOL DESTRUCTION: And lastly, you can help your enemy objectify themselves by destroying their symbols of hate. This is the hardest technique of all to sustain. By contrast; historical analogy, transferring disgust, exposing lies and symbol destruction, the latter is the most dangerous and most expensive. In every situation where your enemy makes a move, consider reacting opposite to what they expect. Depending on how distorted a view of you your enemy maintains – you may react opposite to what they expect naturally. But be careful; don’t become predictable.

CONCLUSION: If true justice is to be found through war, it will only reveal itself after victory. America, you’re at war.

HUMINT: Units of Grievance

2007-06-05T07:19:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: In terms of economics, a dollar is a unitized reference for value. Think about it; we trade value everyday in the marketplace; not widgets, services or currency but value. If you’re like me however, you seldom stop to think about the fact that a product’s price is just a reference of its actual value. In a truly free market, Adam Smith philosophically asserts “price is set by what consumers are willing to pay”. Beyond supply and demand, we can see value being traded in the market place when, for example, a customer chooses one tomato over a less appealing tomato. In a typical grocery, the price of a bad tomato is the same as a good tomato – but conscious consumers know the inherent value of each.

If you’ve experienced a value revelation like, for example, Milton Friedman or Thomas Freidman, you’re probably very excited about value. It’s actually a very simple observation to make. If you’re willing to peel the thin veneer off of any free market – you’ll bear witness to value (contained in products and services) flowing into and out of any market place. The net result is usually more value, not less. The more constraints on a market, the more likely value will diminish. Inversely, the fewer constraints on a market, the more likely value will increase.

FLUX: The time rate of flow. For example, volume per hour is the flux of a fluid

MARKET FLUX: The time rate of flow of value, grievance or other socially
exchangeable perception

If that’s too vague an explanation to formulate good policy, consider the following model. The independent efforts of craftsmen from every corner of the world, if allowed to operate freely, behave harmoniously to create value. Feedback from the marketplace dictates what they produce and how much to produce. The value they create locally migrates internationally to the people who recognize it. A market place is just a vehicle through which value flows. It’s the symphony of free markets that is responsible for improvements in quality of life around the world. Individuals can’t take direct credit for the success of markets but they can take credit for allowing them to operate freely, and protecting their freedom.

Adam Smith’s recognition that value is constantly created by individuals in society and subsequently flows through free markets was a philosophical leap in mankind’s understanding of itself. Thomas Friedman does an outstanding job of organizing and articulating his observations on the subject. He even delves into the implications of technological value flowing into communities who will undoubtedly use it nefariously and profess their will to do so. But why would they use it nefariously? Are they operating under a different set of rules, than you are I? Yes, their rules are very different than our own. One answer; human nature occasionally contradicts Adam Smith theories.

What if Adam Smith’s theories were entirely accurate about the flow of value? But there’s more to life than value. What if there are other social flows transiting between the peoples of the world besides value? I believe there are more flows but are significantly less understood than value. We know mankind acknowledges what it has named. In other words, what mankind hasn’t named does not exist, perceptually at least. Value exists and is easily traded between society’s members only because we’ve agreed to name it and quantify it with currency.

For the sake of argument, let’s assert the evil twin of value is grievance. Like value, grievance similarly stumbles its way around from group to group. Like value, grievance has markets, producers and consumers. Unlike value, it’s never been independently unitized and referenced – at least the way value has been. By observation, value and grievance are related but not substitutive. For example, financial reparations for slavery in the United States could never erase the legitimate grievances created by one race of mankind enslaving another.

Like value, the legitimacy of any grievance is perceived differently by its owners, producers and consumers. International discrepancies of grievance perception are almost always the result of divergent cultural experience. Producers of grievance may not even be aware of the grievance they’re creating. Consumers may not even be aware of the grievances they are consuming. The similarities to value are stark. In the same way, a craftsman may not realize the full market value of their product. So who does? A salesman certainly knows the value of his products. Like value, marketing can either increase or decrease perceptions of grievance. Assuming, however, a legitimate grievance exists, it cannot be erased by marketing or attempts to substitute it with unitized value.

If there is a market flow of grievance, and I believe there is, who are its salesmen? Politicians and statesmen of course! To a lesser extent: dissidents, rebels and terrorists. Each franchise participates in the grievance market. Democracy allows for a less hindered flow of grievance whereas dictatorships, fascists, theocrats all impede the flow of grievance. Recall the concept of market flux introduced earlier. Every form of government participates in the grievance trade just as every form of government participates in the value trade.

And hence society often does create unofficial unitized quantities of grievance… Grievance adorns our self expressions. It can be unitized but is far from uniformly expressed. The currencies of peacefully expressed grievance are: art, ballots, opeds, [now] blogs, to name a few. The currencies of violently expressed grievance are: guns, bullets, bombs, tanks, to name a few. In the transition between the two, society may not be able to distinguish between the unique purposes of each. In other words, the habit of violent expressions will initially find all manner of self expression complimentary to violence.

Without a doubt – democracy more closely resembles a free market for grievance trade than any other form of government. To my mind, that’s why so many citizens believe a linkage exists between peaceful coexistence and democracy. The legitimacy of that belief has yet to be demonstrated but endures for a reason. This is not to say grievances could be eliminated from society through democratic institutions. There is nothing utopian about the grievance trade. Indeed the opposite is true. Rather, remaining grievances are all the more obvious and painful when expressed peacefully by responsible citizens. Should it surprise anyone that the most ardent advocates of free market trade in value are also elected members of successful democracies?

If there is a market in grievance maybe the study of it could reveal some percentage of what we now know about the economics of value, and that would be valuable.

HUMINT: Permanent Press

2007-06-02T01:02:00.000+03:30

REPORTERS PRODUCE STORIES: The international press is a permanent force in modern warfare. Journalists and their crews crawl over the battle space looking for the latest “story”. Lest we forget, stories are a commodity. Each story’s singular purpose is to attract and keep the attention of an audience sufficiently long enough for the audience to watch commercial content. Never forget, advertisements are priority one. No citizen should assume the responsibility of the press is to inform the public. It isn’t. Only on rare occasions does the press inform American citizens. As a citizen, you are solely responsible for your own perceptions of any war. If your countrymen don’t understand war, shifting blame to the press for their ignorance is a deadly sin. Blame is sloth of the worst kind

GET USED TO IT: The press will permanently produce stories that distort an audience’s perception of events occurring in the battle space. Even if an accurate snapshot of events could be created with superior journalistic integrity, it would take an experienced audience to interpret it. No school of journalism adequately prepares a journalist to enter a Zen like trance of universal understanding. Only the arrogance of battle hardened journalists makes an audience believe they have their finger on the war’s pulse. Carrying with them a confidence only repeated exposure to life threatening situations can conjure; they can make their stories convincing, but not necessarily accurate or relevant.

DEMAND RELEVANT STORIES: When a journalist writes a scathing piece critical of a democratically elected official, they’re hitting an easy target while shaking the pillars of support for their own journalistic freedoms. When a journalist humanizes the enemies of the citizens that read their work, they’re protecting themselves and preparing for their next interview. Of course, these kinds of stories compel an audience’s attention. However, these stories are irrelevant to victory.

ASK: HOW DO WE WIN? In the pursuit of future victory, the Bush administration’s past mistakes are as irrelevant as Britney Spears’ emotional break down, Anna Nicole Smith’s celebrity death and Paris Hilton’s jail term. Demand stories that can help us all win at war. If you [as a consumer] can’t handle the bland metrics of success on the battlefield, there’s much more flavor on either side of your war plate. As a consumer of press products, you should demand to know why the despotic regime of Iran has a failing economy. Demand to know why Venezuela’s Chavez cannot endure dissent – and feels in necessary to pull the plug on the only privately operated television network in. Demand to know why Syria’s Assad supports terrorism in

Lebanon through Hezbollah and beyond. These are stories that matter to our mutual success at war and in peace that will inevitably follow

MISSING HISTORICAL CONTEXT: When the press fails to deliver on your legitimate demands, [and they will] you’ll be forced to go out and find your own historical context. In the history of our world at war, you’ll learn how permanent the behavior of the press has been, is now and will remain. Mankind, since the inception of language, has loudly articulated frightening stories of battle field conflict. In wars, it seems the sky always falls. The most hysterical journalistic versions of war are oft proved inaccurate. Interestingly, the physical location of a journalist makes little difference. They can be in the zone or a million miles away form it. The fact is it’s a journalist’s mental position on war that guides their narrative of battle field events. As a result of natural human bias historical context is abandoned. Why? Historical context reduces the perceived drama of events on the ground. Without drama, a journalist cannot compel an audience to stay tuned for commercials

CONCLUSION: Be selective with the information the permanent press provides. It isn’t there to inform you. Rather, their stories are only there to grab and keep your attention. Use their stories to build a mosaic of the battle space. Accept the inaccuracies of the press as an invitation for your own investigation. These days, citizens have more tools than ever before to enlighten themselves. If you demand relevant stories, will your protests make much of a difference? I think they will… Journalists need freedom more than most occupations. It’s in their interest to help their democracies win wars against fascists, terrorists and other despots.

HUMINT: Genius is Bliss

2007-05-19T04:07:00.001+03:30

True pleasure comes from finding things out. Acquiring knowledge is like a zero dollar investment that can pay its owner dividends for the rest of their life. If you’ve ever experienced the feeling of breaking new intellectual ground, you know it’s transcendent. Discovery is a form of renewal, more revolutionary than any war or politics. Having experienced epic revelation is like being born again; renewed through cognitive baptism. When you know you’ve learned something [so extremely] important, it consumes you, that’s Shangri-La! Learning has an extremely spiritual dimension to it which makes it deserving of its own religion. Learnianity, for example; with a charismatic prophet and a clear definition of God, would likely hold its own as a new religion among the family of existing monotheistic religions. To be sure; Judaism, Christianity and Islam each have their own selective approaches to learning that leave many curious minds unsatisfied.

Religion aside, It takes a fool to equate ignorance with bliss. In the context of the familiar cliché, “ignorance is bliss”, willful ignorance is little more than an illusionary shield used to protect a fragile mind from destabilizing information and ideas. Whenever I hear it, I wonder why anyone would want to protect themselves from information. Presumably, information perceived to be depressing or incongruent with an individual’s experience can be unsettling. The reality is, information and ideas are not always helpful or positive, and as a result learning can, at times, be a painful and regressive experience. Out of abject fear, individuals self censor and make excuses for important subjects outside the scope of their understanding. Ignorance has its place. It is important if only because ignorance has a role in our everyday lives. Specifically; secrets are a passive form of managing ignorance, while lies actively propagate ignorance.

In an environment rife with ignorance, a genius formulates tests. In nature, these tests manifest in the form physical experiments. Archimedes, Galileo, Copernicus, and Franklin were notorious for their brilliant experiments In society, tests could be refutations of presumed secrets or unverifiable truths. Thomas Jefferson and his political rival Alexander Hamilton exposed secrets, ignorance and lies in early America. The truths they revealed about consensual government have benefited all mankind. Likewise, the pursuit of universal truths might be a social alternative to hidden or socially implicit truths. In religion and spirituality, John Locke interpreted freedom of thought and expression as natural rights for all inhabitants of God’s Kingdom. In the spiritual realm tests are equally if not more, important than physical or social tests. Maintaining faith in one’s beliefs through hardship is the standard quiz. Information post mortem, is inherently unknowable by the mortal mind. In God’s Kingdom, it would appear faith pushes the stakes higher than any other.

If geniuses simply formulate great experiments in their respective environs, what prevents every one of us from becoming geniuses? The answer, as I understand it, is counter intuitive. Society compartmentalizes information and eventually appoints subject matter experts to each compartment. Instead of delivering new revelations, experts tend to perform guard duty over the status quo. In many cases, Instead of exploring the field, experts are expected to be human reference material. It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that a contemporary University is an extraordinarily effective means of pacifying society. Rewards are granted by familiar and systematic procedure. Grades and degrees are earned respectively. Failure, while possible, is not probable. Given the number of opportunities a university student is given to succeed, success in life appears preordained. Unfortunately, real discovery which leads to genius is far less predictable. A contemporary University, instead of the Learnianity church it could be, serves its host community as a socialist network of interested parties.

While there are many drawbacks to universities as institutions of intellectual discovery, universities have a gravity that pulls true genius into their orbit. The fact is; no bureaucracy albeit a university, government or organized religion can fully contain what is not yet known. Spiritual faith in particular, requires knowledge of scripture. The best any bureaucracy can do is to facilitate discovery and protect discoverers. The spirituality inherent in discovery deserves mankind’s highest recognition; however Learnianity should not become a formal religion as this essay proposed earlier. While discovery brings humanity closer to God, it’s a fool’s game to restrict discovery to a bureaucracy. The natural universe is God’s Cathedral and it serves humanity as the only legitimate chapel of Learnianity. Every genius is a prophet and the recordings of their experiments represent scripture.

In conclusion; look to the future, experiment and learn from each cognitive adventure. Genius is bliss!

HUMINT: Paging Ness

2007-05-17T07:11:00.000+03:30

Corruption is killing Iraq’s future. In a recent report released by the U.S. Government Accountability Office entitled; REBUILDING IRAQ, Integrated Strategic Plan Needed to Help Restore Iraq’s Oil and Electricity Sectors, the section detailing corruption is particularly disturbing. As a conscious member of the human race, I am unashamedly concerned about the black market trade in petroleum. Why? Because hundreds of millions of dark dollars are going to projects unlikely to benefit U.S. national security, or the security of America’s allies. Under the circumstances, these illicit funds are more than likely funding America’s enemies. A reasonable solution would be to sting the black marketeers. The area around Basra would be a good place to start. Who could do it better than an Iraqi version of Eliot Ness? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the U.S. Department of State had a nationwide PA system in

Iraq

--- “PAGING MR. NESS, PAGING ELIOT NESS, PLEASE REPORT TO BASRA FOR A STING… Thank You.”

HUMINT: Iran, Iraq and SIIC

2007-05-15T19:05:00.000+03:30

Iraqi Shiite party steps back from Iran

HUMINT: I'm not looking forward to the day when this line of thinking comes back and bites us in the ass. Yeah right, SCIRI, oops, SCII, is breaking away from Iran...? The mirror of time shows how ugly this analysis is. SCII are going to marry Americans after the Iraq War the same way Americans married the French after the American Revolution. England's monarchy evolved, while France's monarchy dissolved. How many decades before we seriously consider a United Islamic States of America?

I'd like to add, Christianity posed a serious challenge to the Roman Empire's identity. The Jesus Movement at that time contained more true believers than Rome could oppose. Instead, the Roman Empire would absorb the spiritual wave to survive. I do not offer the concept of a United Islamic States of America factiously. I respect Islam in America and admire Muslims. The faith is welcomed to worship in the United States, and has always been. America's current identity is not the problem.

America's founding principle of religious freedom is in danger when the United States empowers Islamic theocracy abroad. When SCII turns to Iran for salvation, and they will, we will have empowered theocratic imperialists. That is what Iran's political philosophy is. Please read the constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran if you have any doubt. In conclusion, empowering theocratic imperialists is an affront to America's true believers... The adverse symptoms of what is happening now will be felt for decades if no cure is found.

MR TIKI: I believe that the current popularity of SIIC is just temporary. Iraqis showed in repeated polls that they don’t want an Islamic state. Most of them voted SIIC (or SCIRI) because of sectarian problems (ie they voted for those whom they think can best protect them from the violent opposition). Its not the right choice I have to say, but its not from a religious motive if you know what I mean.

HUMINT: Two thoughts came to me when I read your perception of events related to SIIC. I spent the evening toiling with them in hopes that I could articulate them effectively. The first was the concept of SIIC as politically temporary. Those who identify themselves with God do not conceive of themselves as temporary. The identity of SIIC seeks immortality through spiritual righteousness on earth. The name change was not a metamorphosis, rather it was a validation of their permanence.

The second has to do with Iraqi ballots. By my estimation, purple fingered Iraqis harbor political traditions and expectations that allow for economic and spiritual subversion of Iraqi democracy. As Iraqis navigate their future toward self determination, SIIC will assert its righteous permanence with support from like minded brethren in Iran. SIIC will not lose its seat of power under any circumstance, because that would be an affront to their spiritual identity as permanent. The only way to prevent SIIC from abusing their political power would be to limit means and motives to subvert Iraqi democracy. Instead, we are facilitating subversion of democracy by obfuscating Iran's role as a spoiler...

As I write, I pray you are correct on this subject and I am wrong. We are talking about the future so there's still time to make adjustments to analysis and policy. No one, more than I would like to see the United States and Iran cooperate to build a prosperous Iraq. In the mean time, I am unapologetic about my suspicions of Iran and her allies in Iraq. The Iranian government has committed unforgivable acts against the United States, Iraq and the International community. Sooner or latter Iran will pay for its sins - despite what the Department of State may think, the United States cannot afford to assume Iran's debt.

Persian Warriors: Dedicated to President Bush

NORTON: Those I've met consider the current Iranian government only a nuisance. They travel back and forth, buy and sell property, and enjoy life here - but I don't see them calling for resistance 'back home'. Like most folks from that region, political (tribal) turmoil is what they expect and what they are conditioned to deal with. It would possibly help if they referred to themselves as Iranian rather than as Persian or Armenian. [It might also help if they could manage to be just a bit less obvious in their attitude toward Jews.] Just some thoughts.

HUMINT: Thank you for your thoughts. Your observations are legitimate and to the best of my knowledge, accurate. However, the individuals you are referring to have a responsibility to themselves, their families, their countrymen and the world to confront reality; their belligerent government supports terrorism and is systematically developing the means to acquire nuclear weapons. Every time the West turns to these willfully ignorant souls as signs Iran not so bad, or is opening up, the West is burned. By who? By true believers in Tehran. Why? Because the people you are talking about aren't willing to stand up for themselves, much less democracy, much less security...

Never forget that the Iranian people are politically irrelevant to a regime that survives and thrives on petroleum revenue. The economics are clear. The problems stalling positive change in Iran isn't that the people whom you have met only consider the Iranian government a nuisance. The fact that the Government of Iran considers Iranians only a nuisance is the problem! Petroleum revenue disconnects the Iranian government from responsibility to its citizenry. That's why Khomenei's political illusion can thrive with successors in an environment like Iran and Iraq, but only by proxy in Lebanon, and other places...

The signs that Iran is thawing to the West will come from policies the Islamic Republic of Iran implement and allow to function for a reasonable amount of time. That isn't happening. Indeed the opposite is occurring. The IRI has broken and will continue to break every promise it makes to its people and the International community unless it is compelled by force of arms to live up to their promises. The U.S. military presence in the region has softened some inside Iran but hardened others. Think in terms of evolution my friend. When a protectorate retreats, the hard devourer the soft. A positive U.S. influence in Iraq and Afghanistan must be cemented to prevent Tehran's irresponsible government from destroying the lives of millions, including your willfully ignorant friends.

HUMINT: Political Illusion

2007-05-12T06:08:00.000+03:30

POLITICAL ILLUSION: When the supportive architecture of a democratic society is misinterpreted and subsequently portrayed to be tyrannically suppressive.

POLITICAL VISION: The empowerment of officers in society to protect and serve all citizens’ liberties without infringing on existing democratic architecture.

ESSAY: Optical illusions are visually perceived Images that trick our senses into seeing what may or may not exist. For example, Rubin’s Vase is a popular, two dimensional illusion. Indeed, it’s a perfect specimen to illustrate the major premise of this essay. For the uninitiated, the curves of Rubin’s Vase double as a silhouette of two opposing human faces. If you are familiar with the illusion, it’s easy for an average observer to flip from a visual perception of a vase, to two faces. Rubin’s Vase is a relatively simple optical illusion. Most illusions are more complex. The origins of optical illusions probably derive from the way we choose to communicate with each other. Letters and numbers are paramount examples. Two dimensional representations of abstract concepts are rudimentary symbols. Inherently, all symbols are open to ambiguous interpretations. Therefore, symbols are a blessing with seemingly harmless, if not entertaining, illusionary side effects.

It is reasonable to believe, mankind’s first illusions came about when we started abstractly remembering our needs. Utilizing speculative anthropology, assume memories of prey tracks represent the origins of two dimensional communication techniques. Paws and hooves, acting as stamps in sand and mud, took information pertinent to tribal needs out of the time domain. We should infer ancient hand prints on cave walls were liberating their makers from the time domain in the same way they understood tracks liberate information about prey from the time domain. The obvious difference between cave paintings and tracks is the subtle difference between art and nature. If cave paintings are indeed art, these graphics represent another human epiphany in time. The transition from cognitively manipulating information in one’s environment to satiate survival needs, to manipulating information for social expression was an important leap. Clearly, the change ripped the lid off Pandora’s Box.

In terms of perception, optical illusions are an important part of the past, present and future of human communication. In fact, optical illusions only represent the tip of a proverbial iceberg of possible misperceptions and miscommunications. Optical illusions are more familiar to society because academics can easily observe and study them. Natural bias for optics aside, what about more complex sensory illusions? Human beings actually see with their brains, not their eyes. Look at a variety of optical illusions carefully and it becomes clear; optics have very little to do with most optical illusions. Human vision is a complex sensory system that can be tricked at various stages. The illusion actually takes occurs in an observers brain, not in their eyes. Indeed, neuronal perception is the easiest stage to bamboozle. We are in fact talking about cognitive illusions, not optical illusions. Therefore, every human perception is susceptible to some form of illusion.

To explore the impact or existence of illusion on other areas of perception, we’ll need to take speculation further. Persistent illusions among a populous eventually reveal themselves through some legislative body. The resultant policy will speak for itself. In the worst cases, such illusions have led to incredible cataclysms, including, but not limited to world war. A common myth is, history is written by the victors. The outcome war is never a coin toss. History’s dust bin is littered with political illusions. Hitler’s 1000 Year Reich, Stalin’s Communist Utopia, and Ayatollah Khomeini’s Islamic Empire are just a few recent examples. Each illusion has failed to live up to their most ardent champion’s mirage. But, what separates these political illusions from legitimate political vision?

The patterns inherent in mankind’s pursuit of a successful, sustainable and stable society are revealing themselves with every successive attempt. Political illusions inevitably destroy individuals most able to actualize success. The most likely reason for repeated failure of political illusionaries exists because utopian success, by definition, is forever unattainable. On the other hand, legitimate political visionaries leverage every member of society, to iteratively achieve goals that inevitably lead to success. Alternatively, legitimate political vision inevitably empowers officers who serve and protect society. Legitimate political visions are self sustaining processes, while political illusions are self defeating processes. Worst of all, political illusions systematically undermine society’s legitimate officers to protect and sustain the illusion.

It is not unusual for some individuals to get it wrong. Utopian illusions may even gain traction among democratically minded individuals. Even when individuals or organizations are resisting corrupt dictators and tyrants, they may or may not subscribe to a legitimate political vision. To be sure, all visions and illusions deserve severe public scrutiny. When an entire society subscribes to an illusion, mankind will inevitably correct the transgression, or parish as a whole. Have no doubt; confronting strong proponents of illusions requires eternal vigilance. Vigilance in this context can only mean; confronting a persistent political illusion with a legitimate political vision.

HUMINT: Worth Fighting

2007-05-11T05:10:00.000+03:30

INTRODUCTION: This is a short story called “Worth Fighting”. It relates to America’s Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. If this piece works, it will not need further explanation. If it doesn’t work, I’ll try a different approach. The point being, America’s wars in the Middle East are justified and should therefore be popular among Americans and Middle Easterners. What appears to be lacking in America today is the appropriate context to defend any military conflict under any circumstances. While I can understand anti-War emotion, Americans should not be paralyzed by it. Pacifism belies a universal truth. Some causes are worth fighting for.

WORTH FIGHTING: Today, you’re attending a local county fair in a small town in rural America. It’s a beautiful clear day with the sun shining brightly. You’ve parked your car in a makeshift parking lot located in a farmer’s recently mowed hay field. Everyone with you is ready to explore attractions. The fair grounds are busy with a variety of attractions but something near the fair’s center stands out. In the middle of the fair grounds is a colorful tent. Its pronounced presence is highlighted like no other attraction at the fair. Pyrotechnics boom, flashing lights dazzle and swirling dry ice smoke confuses all of your senses at once. The tent is big. It looks Bedouin and the un-watered tan grass field where it’s pitched could easily be mistaken for the Arabian Desert. A dark figure dressed like Lawrence of Arabia is standing outside the tent in the sun. For your reference, you silently name him Lawrence of Arabia. It works because it fits the stereo type he plays professionally. He looks disheveled and hot. His presence is as offensive as it is entertaining. Smelling of stale cigarettes and sweating, you can see he’s been exchanging tickets for cash all day long. About every minute or so, with an unidentifiable accent, his voice is heard loud and low throughout the fair grounds exclaiming, “Tickets Here – See Show before TOO LATE!”

A sign next to Mr. Arabia claims you can “volunteer to be in the show or remain an anonymous member of the audience”. “YOU CHOOOZ” it facetiously asserts. Participating in something as mysteriously inviting as this feels irresistible. You approach Lawrence with cautious optimism. Reaching into your wallet, you pull out enough cash for your family and friends to join you. “Seven tickets please,” you say to Lawrence with a polite but business like demeanor. A wide grin breaks free from Lawrence’s thick mustache and beard. He appears genuinely happy that you’re there to see his show. Without any regard to your personal space, a big sweaty hand grabs your cash with one quick swipe. Shocked, you do not move before his hand returns to grab yours. Without an ounce of protest from you, Lawrence has oriented your hand to receive the seven tickets you ordered. Slapping the tickets into the center of your palm with his other hand, you realize the show started and you’re already part of it.

Distributing the tickets to your friends and family, they all seem to huddle together with nervous excitement. You’re ready to enter the tent. The tarp door is covered by a pattern that resembles a chess board. You lift it to enter the tent. It’s hotter in the tent than out. It’s dark and smells of earth and hay. A figure in a full burka takes your ticket. You assume the ticket taker is a woman but you have no indication other than a seemingly feminine nod of recognition. She does not invite conversation when you meet her and you aren’t inclined to start one. Moving towards the center of the tent, you pass through rows of empty folding chairs that point like a ghost audience at a stage. Items on the stage are shrouded by a curtain. Cool smoke rises up from buckets of dry ice and water to obscure your view and heighten the drama. Your curiosity has gotten the better of you. Unaware of them, members of your American tribe have moved into the tent behind you. Following your lead as closely as they could, experiencing an equal dose of curiosity, they forfeited their tickets one by one to the woman in the burka guarding the tent flap door.

Claiming the front row, you sit with your tribe and begin talking with them about the heat. Waiting for the show to start, you wonder out loud together what life would be like growing up in the Middle East. Your wife mentions the mosque in your neighborhood near your supermarket. She says “it’s always busy on Fridays”. - “That’s a mosque?” you say. For some reason, you thought your neighborhood mosque was a library or a community center. Unsure how you missed such an important aspect of your own community, the show starts. On stage, the curtain lifts to reveal your ticket selling friend Mr. Lawrence Arabia.

“My friends!” he says with a barrel laugh. “In this theater we have a show to remember! My name is Ali Kirubi and I am the King of this land – I have conquered it, subjugated its people and rule it with an iron fist! As my guests you will receive the most decadent hospitality a king can afford…” he boasts to you and your family with unparalleled confidence. His laughter trails off as he looks to the side of the stage and sighs. At that moment, a teenage boy enters from stage left, running to meet Ali Kirubi. When he arrives, he wraps his little arms around the man you named Lawrence… Ali Kirubi– BANG, a military flash grenade detonates. You and your family are stunned as manikin arms and legs are thrown over your heads, clanging into the empty metal chairs behind you. When you recover your composure, and realize the stage is empty, a young boy enters from stage right and says, “I am from Kurdistan. My family and I were murdered by Saddam Hussein’s chemical weapons. He coughs twice and lays down on the stage. Another boy walks onto the stage with a plastic key and two manikin legs. He shouts, “This key opened heaven’s gates to me. I cleared a land mine for Allah and my Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini.” He then throws the key on the stage and drops his two manikin legs off the stage in front of you. He says “Ouch” and lays down on the stage next to the Kurdish actor. From behind your seats, the ticket taking woman begins to scream hysterically. She shouts – “I was shot in the head by the Taliban in a soccer stadium in Afghanistan.”

Your wife is in tears at this point… your children are scared and nothing is making sense to you. When you entered the tent, you expected to be entertained; possibly belly dancing, but not this. You remember that you were invited to participate in the show. HOW? You ask yourself… this is insanity. You want no part of it as you stand to gather your tribe and leave. Just then, the actors and actresses make there way onto the stage for what looks like a finale. They all hug and start laughing with each other. Mr. Kirubi says, “We are the Kirubi family from Iraq. We wanted to bring the good, bad and ugly of the Middle East to America, in a play. You know… Hollywood! Emreka loves violence. No really… We’re all excited about the future of our two countries but nervous about the past. You are Americans and your country is waging a war against terrorists in mine. Americans and Iraqis are forever married now, by blood and by destiny. We invite you to come onto the stage, while we sit as your audience. Act out Western history for us, the good, bad and the ugly – if you have the spirit worth fighting.”

Do you have the spirit?

HUMINT: Crowd Theory

2007-05-10T07:29:00.000+03:30

CROWD THEORY: If you want to understand crowds, you’ve got to immerse yourself in them. Not just one kind of crowd, but all kinds of crowds. There are a number of cross cultural similarities between crowds. As an observer, I’ve always enjoyed watching crowd mechanics in action. Concerts, demonstrations, games in stadiums, lines, speeches and parties are just a few examples of situations where crowds coalesce. Why study crowds? Why not? We move through them every day. Every crowd is a microcosm of society. Case in point, your government represents an institutionalized manifestation of crowd control theory.

CROWD MEMBERS: When observing crowds, most of the people you’ll observe will consciously avoid you. Don’t take it personally. Members of crowds are not ignoring you on purpose. Instead, they’re hiding behind synthetic boundaries, probably to remain focused on less transient subjects than you. I refer to the behavior as tunneling. Under different circumstances, some tunnelers discard their usual social inhibitions. Behaving like tourists, every detail, including other members of the crowd matter. Tourists are inherently erratic and complicate crowd dynamics. To keep order and some modicum of discipline, crowds have to have officers. Unofficial and official officers readily accept responsibility to protect and support their crowd in any unusual event. Therefore, by my observations, there are three distinct categories of crowd members.

* TUNNELERS
* TOURISTS
* OFFICERS

TUNNELERS: When in crowds, many people tunnel through them. Tunnelers emotionally avoid the crowds they cannot physically avoid. Tunneling is a kind of dissociative behavior that is so common, it must be normal. Tunneling behavior is best described as dispassionately transiting through a crowd without attempting to influence it, or to be influenced by it. Tools help tunnelers. Tunneling tools might include but are not limited to a novel, a newspaper or an i-POD. In any case, each escapist device serves a similar purpose. If no physical tool is available, imaginary ones work almost as well. A tunneler might focus on their destination. More recent but increasingly popular tunneling tools are devices that connect a tunneler to an external, more familiar, more friendly, “virtual crowd”. This form of tunneling can be achieved through a cell phone, blackberry or laptop. These devices are particularly intriguing to fellow tunnelers. Diverse tunneling tools might render other escapist devices ineffective. In that case, the least effective tunnelers may turn their attention to the most effective tunnelers. The distraction may or may not be received positively. In other types of crowds, mimics are tunnelers too. Immersed in an audience, members who adopt similar behavior exchange their own identity for that of the crowd.

TOURISTS: These crowd members want to learn about the environment they’re immersed in and share what they’ve learned with tunnelers, tourists and officers. They read signs out loud. They ask questions. They make notes, create recordings, take pictures and make videos. There are a number of industries that manufacture tourist tools. A professional tourist is a classic journalist, constantly uncovering the Who, What, When, Where, Why and How of their situation. Some tunneling tools have merged with tourist tools allowing spontaneous transformation from tunneler to tourist. Digital cameras embedded in cellular telephones allow tunnelers and officers to seamlessly leap from category to category.

OFFICERS: Official officers identify themselves clearly. Uniforms are common tools of an officer. Hand signals given to other crowd members might identify an unofficial officer. Like a mother watches over her child, officers pay close attention to the crowd and its surroundings. Unlike a tourist who is looking at everything, officers are looking for something specific. They are looking for ominous signs, from within and without the crowd. An officer’s toolbox includes sensors and detectors calibrated to detect specific threats. Interestingly, no mechanism is more effective at detecting ominous signs than an officer’s combined natural senses. In addition, memory of is paramount to the effectiveness of an officer. Without a clear understanding of recent history, officers are easily distracted by their misperceptions. Every crowd has perfectly innocent statistical outliers. An officer may be distracted by a tunneler who is unusually nervous. Inversely, confident tunnelers, tourists and officers are sufficiently camouflaged in crowd. In some situations, officers may become suspicious of tourists who are innocently interested in what an officer is charged with protecting. As shepherds, officer’s first impressions are critical. The more confidence an officer has when they are testing for threats, the better.

CONCLUSION: Crowd theory explains a great deal about social behavior precisely because crowds are a microcosm of society. Crowd theory is an articulation of observable group phenomena not dependent on time, technology or culture. Looking to world history for answers, it is reasonable to believe every government that ever existed is an institutionalized permutation of an individual’s crowd theory. If true, we can say Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Khomeini and Pol-Pot, among other mass murderers perceived a similar crowd theory. They used their knowledge of crowd theory to find and exterminate tourist and officers not loyal to their utopian vision. Inversely, America’s founding officers; Washington, Jefferson and Franklin understood the inherent danger of strictly imposing utopian fantasies on crowds. These men incorporated what they knew they could not know about the future into their perception of crowd theory. To create an extremely successful society, they sought to empower officers whose ambition was to serve and protect tourists and tunnelers. Interestingly, the only way to serve and protect a crowd is to guarantee each member’s individual liberties. Therefore, it is no coincidence individual liberty is the core concept of the U.S. Constitution.

HUMINT: Resignation Please

2007-05-03T23:36:00.000+03:30

For high crimes and misdemeanors, proceedings resembling impeachment are long over due. Start the process now! If it cannot be done domestically then Americans must turn to the international community. The United Nations Security Council must be compelled to authorize action. Everyone in the United States knows it, but surprisingly few will stand up to support it. None of this is secret. The leadership of this regime is guilty of inciting and committing terroristic violence. Add to that; its flagrant abuses of spirituality to consolidate power, institutionalized misogyny, racism and sectarianism. This administration does not respond to its people. It is a farce to assert this administration was elected by the people for the people. In fact, the system that operates today was never beholden to the people. Layers of bureaucracy shield this leadership from opposition, yet, that fact has never prevented it from destroying the careers of men and women who do not parrot its narrow vision.

This leadership coerces allies through intimidation, lies and bribes. Global economics are the only thing keeping this administration from imploding. Every worldwide financial equivalent to Wall Street gives this regime their tacit support. It could be said that these leaders are little more than oil men in fancy dress. With pomp and ceremony, these arrogant figures threaten the existence of other nations. They do imagine a utopia without strife that will come, not through compromise, not through democracy, but through an ideological war. Almost everything they do is rotten. They facilitate terrorism through targeted acts of humanitarian assistance. Do not be distracted by what they say. Look at what they do. Watch their political and military moves. They are buying loyalty in strategic communities only to advance their narrow interests. Instead of empowering women and minorities throughout their country, they treat them like chattel.

The opposition they abhor most derives from people who understand them best. Quietly, members of this regime’s own family have defected. Through them, the ocean of political apostates grows. This regime’s opposition is coalescing, yet it stands nearly alone in exile. Even those that should echo the opposition, publicly reject it. As witnesses to this regime’s repetitious crimes, the opposition announces the core problem clearly, consistently and loudly. The dogmatic script that these men follow justifies every act of aggression. Undeterred, the opposition continues shouting fundamental truths about this regime. Unfortunately, the world behaves as though it has no ears. To be sure, this regime’s truck bombs render the world deaf. Likewise, blood and guts spilled by this regime make for a pathetic mess, but an effective distraction. What is it about these ultra-violent men that renders the world blind to their crimes. Wake up! Wipe the gore off of your mind, regain your composure and stop appeasing this regime. It is long past time to listen to the most coherent voices resisting this regime.

It’s time to increase the pressure, not back off. At a time when this regime is demonstrating the most heinous diplomatic behavior in modern history, there are some who think it’s a good idea to relieve political pressure. Political pressure has been mounting against this regime for years, and for good reason. Backing off now is antithetical to everything democratically minded citizens stand for. The regime I’m referring to is the Iranian Government. The man who deserves some form of impeachment is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.

HUMINT: Follow us Home?

2007-05-03T02:08:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: If we quit our wars now, will terrorists follow us home? In other words, will terrorists attack Americans in the United States, IF the U.S. Army precipitously withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan? It’s a simple, YES or NO question. If YES, the U.S. Army should stay to win the wars we’ve started. If NO, we have already won our wars; let’s end the fighting by bringing the troops home now. Sounds simple, right? But it isn’t that simple. The repercussions of wars are never simple. Indeed, the question is terribly misleading. By asking it, the inquisitor creates two faux alternatives. No matter which side you choose, the two politically charged answers are so emotionally distracting that they both eclipse the question’s irrelevance. Let’s assume, for the sake of this essay, American journalist, politicians and historians have relinquished their occupational responsibilities and deconstruct the question ourselves. To do so, let’s break it down into more manageable questions. After that, we can subject each component to a – who, what, where, when, why and how – test.

QUESTION: Will terrorists attack Americans in the United States, IF the U.S. Army precipitously withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan? ANSWER: see who, what, when and where below.

WHO: Indigenous and foreign terrorists are flowing to the Iraqi and Afghani battle fronts to attack Americans and their interests there. Individually, the terrorist or insurgent represent an amalgam of national origins, motivations and affiliations. Precise statistics on the level of foreign vs. indigenous insurgents are not readily available to the general public. Certainly any percentage of foreign terrorist influence in Iraq and Afghanistan is disconcerting. Foreign contributions to terrorism in Afghanistan and Iraq are central to the question of what will occur when these two fronts dissolve. As they operate off the battle field, foreign organizers will undoubtedly live through these wars. What decisions these organizers are likely to make after these wars is an important variable. If the United States cannot interdict these individuals during these wars, there should be no confidence among policy makers that allied agencies would be able to do so after these wars.

WHAT: Terrorism is an asymmetric manifestation of aggression. Raw aggression, regardless of its excuse, is a return to jungle law. Jungle law does not adhere to academic conflict resolution formulae. Starting it and stopping it has everything to do with fundamental human behaviors and effective communication. If terrorists and insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan were fighting for independence, as was the case with the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War, the insurgent enemy would be attacking more coherently. Instead, the enemy’s raw aggression is directed in nearly every direction. Incoherent or seemingly random acts of violence raises anxiety among the populous subjected to it. Self sustaining violent trends in Iraq and Afghanistan must be mitigated or stopped to prevent regional or global leakage.

WHEN: The time scale terrorists operate on is very different than the West’s. Western Democracies are open systems. They are cyclical, transparent, reliable and inherently predictable. These qualities make the West successful but simultaneously represent serious security gaps. Despite the rhetoric of government officials seeking more and more authority, there is little they can do to protect their citizenry from suicidal mass murdering terrorists. They can try to disrupt terrorist recruitment, try to infiltrate, and try to engage vociferous agitators and will occasionally succeed in their own jurisdiction. Unfortunately, their level of success has more to do with the mistakes a terrorist makes than their own efficacy. Groups of people can legally organize and educate individuals within a Western democracy. They can do the same in regions of the world that exist seemingly without law. In either scenario, successful democracy or perpetual violence, Iraq and Afghanistan will remain havens for terrorist recruiting for their next generation.

WHERE: Terrorist and insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan reportedly migrate from province to province, establishing safe houses. Iraq and Afghanistan are two diffuse fronts in a regional war. Politically, these two wars extend well beyond the Middle East and influence government efficacy on every continent – hence the phrase Global War on Terror, GWOT. Terrorists violence has touched but not plagued Spain, Britain, India, Pakistan, Algeria, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Israel have all experienced and or thwarted terrorist attacks since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Lebanon, Syria and Iran have all been involved in stoking violence. In some cases, terror attacks directly referenced the U.S. led invasion of Iraq. Given its history as an international phenomenon, where it occurs is not as key a variable as the question implies. Would be terrorists are already in the West.

CONCLUSION: Iraq and Afghanistan are central fronts in a regional war. Trends toward greater globalization and increased reliance on fossil fuels will continue to provide Middle Easterners with indirect resources to attack Western interests. This analysis suggests that “the likelihood of terrorists following us home” is high, even in the best case scenarios. The window of opportunity to win in Iraq and Afghanistan is short and the enemy was aware of it at the outset of this war. The next six months will show if the American people and the United States Government that represents them, including the Army fighting their wars, have learned enough in the last four years to win. In situations like these, there is no alternative to optimism. Failure is not an option.

HUMINT: Industrial Complexities

2007-05-01T20:17:00.000+03:30

Relax America. There is no Military-Industrial Coup underway in Washington DC. Despite the inherent secrecy and subsequent mystery of national security projects, no one should presume the American Military-Industrial Complex is guilty of sedition. American politicians remain essential and relevant to the daily lives of American citizens. The President of the United States is not a sock puppet who simply parrots Multinational Corporate CEO memorandums. If you don’t believe me, read along as I empirically prove the point.

American democracy is about individual liberty. The United States Government was formed and currently exists to represent citizens. Therefore, think about your capacity for representation as a citizen of the United States. By guaranteeing individual Liberty, the Constitution of the United States affords Americans unparalleled capacity for representation.

Surprisingly, it is not necessary to read or even understand the U.S. Constitution to leverage its benefits. This is not to say Americans shouldn’t read it. They definitely should. Every person in the world should read and understand their nation’s constitution. As a direct result of the freedoms the U.S. Constitution guarantees, Americans are free to represent themselves in many unique ways.

The mechanism by which Americans represent themselves includes, but is certainly not limited to their electoral process. Indeed, a healthy democracy requires more than an actively enfranchised population. National security, self respect, tolerance for dissent and a solid education system all do their part to facilitate democracy. Here’s the exciting part. Once in place, democracy tends to improve their community’s quality of life.

Like a chain reaction, what flows from free minds tends to fosters more freedom and greater liberty. As a result, American industry has evolved to sustain, protect and advance individual liberty, not suppress it. Understandably, the more complex a nation is, the more likely it is to be misrepresented or misunderstood.

Industries and the corporations that compete within them are subject to the same sorts of complexities. By its very existence, the so called “Military-Industrial Complex” is inherently mysterious. As a result, it is subjected to insatiable public scrutiny. The way to empirically prove that the Military Industrial Complex has not rendered citizens and their representatives irrelevant is to observe the overall increase in civil liberties.

Ask yourself, do you feel free? Citizens exchanging ideas with other citizens and their representatives remains an extremely influential practice. These days, it is easier to exchange ideas and manifest influence than it ever has been in the history of mankind. That’s freedom! The Military-Industrial Complex was created to protect and serve citizens. Look around you… it’s doing an outstanding job.

America at a Crossroads

2007-04-29T06:27:00.000+03:30

Muslim Americans are free to practice Islam in the United States whenever and however they choose. These are not just high-minded ideals. Freedom of religion is practiced in the United States precisely because it is guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.

Amendment 1 - Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression. Ratified 12/15/1791.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The PBS broadcast of America at a Crossroads demonstrated freedom of religion in the United States as it pertains to Islam. Unfortunately, some Americans who practice Islam here suggest that they have experienced cultural anxiety in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

The legitimacy of that anxiety, however, was not altogether clear. The documentary showed normal searches of a non-Muslim woman in Muslim attire at an airport security checkpoint. To address that anxiety, it should be made absolutely clear to all Americans; standard security procedures if preformed in accordance to law should not be taken personally – no matter how many times those procedures are performed. America at a Crossroads developed the exact opposite impression. Instead it validated a sense of victimization that shouldn’t exist in that situation. Enhanced security should in fact, reduce anxiety because they increase safety.

Likewise, America at a Crossroads showed a Muslim woman who felt so insecure about her post 9-11 environment that she stopped attending services at her Mosque. She did so in favor of practicing her religion at home. Unlike her faith, or the practicing of it, her surrender to her insecurities represents un-American behavior. As an American, she should not only attend her Mosque, she should practice Islam in the United States openly and proudly, regardless of the perceived risk or insult.

Where the documentary truly excelled was with its clear demarcation between fanatics who want to hijack Islam and rational practitioners of the faith.

Unfortunately, the documentary’s presentation of Muslim Fanatics appeared awkwardly dramatized. America at a Crossroads asserted it was Osama Bin Ladin’s, AKA, OBL’s great plan to mire the United States in a ground war in the Middle East. The documentary implied the United States rushed into OBL’s 9-11 trap with unprecedented arrogance and cowboyish haste. Nothing could be further from the truth. OBL’s staged attacks were ignored by too many for too long. No amount of criminal genius should be assigned to OBL for his geopolitical arithmetic. OBL’s coffee house politics would have remained benign had they not been fertilized with petroleum wealth. What ever brilliance we all garner from hindsight; in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, impudent political responses from Middle Eastern leaders demanded a calculated and articulate response.

In all, I felt the topic of Islam was covered well. The whole exceeded the sum of its parts. I found it surprisingly hopeful and uplifting.

Inversely, the most destructive scenes to my morale were the blend of writers from America’s Vietnam War and America’s current War in Iraq. It was as if the narrative of Vietnam is interchangeable with Iraq’s narrative. It begs the question; is history repeating itself because we are being made to believe it should?

These scenes left me with the feeling that all wars are lost causes. Indeed, the juxtaposition of Vietnam and Iraq implied that any spirit to win at war must be sufficiently humiliated. Why? I don’t know exactly. The answer is probably less complex than I would like it to be. God must have forsaken those of us who believe that winning a justified war is good for mankind. Any hope one may have in war exists in what comes after victory. In the midst of it however, war is about punishment. Democracy, freedom, liberty are all concepts that may or may not live in that space and time after the two sides agree to stop killing each other.

Right now I’m at a loss. Maybe the message about America’s war in Iraq was; Iraqis have suffered enough. Maybe it was; Iraqis are more capable of punishing each other than the American military ever could. Either way… permutations of punishment are likely to foster OBL’s script. Democracy, freedom, liberty on the other hand, could lead to sustainable peace. Maybe that’s the real crossroads where Americans stand. Do we validate the Middle East’s coffee house political perceptions or do we stay the course until democracy, freedom and liberty are palpable in Baghdad and beyond?

HUMINT: Khomeini’s Script

2007-04-27T22:53:00.000+03:30

For the sake of this essay, liken Hezbollah’s operational doctrine to a geopolitical script. It was written as high drama by one of the most ambitious men of the 20th century. While most Westerners remain oblivious to this virulent Middle Eastern narrative, the author’s infamous name is highly recognizable. His name is Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

To his follower’s dismay, few scenes have lived up to Khomeini’s script. In hindsight, it’s clear his plot was intellectually corrupt and spiritually bankrupt. Oddly, when Khomeini’s actors took the world stage, performing their first dress rehearsal, their actions were not dramatic at all. Instead they were and remain grotesquely tragic actions. Khomeini’s script is in fact an amalgam of bad ideas uncomfortably organized to form a geopolitical tragedy. [Geopolitical TRAGEDY not STRATEGY]

Despite the fact that Khomeini’s script was a befuddled political mistake, some Middle Eastern actors still sign up to act it out. To find out why, I’ve spent hours discussing Khomeini’s ideas with anyone who does not deeply regret their resultant theatrics.

The villains in Khomeini’s script exist precisely because of the hatred they can invoke in any Middle Eastern crowd. Positive history and relevant facts are consciously dismissed as distractions, erroneous to any final solution. Indeed, progressive realities are a distractive to milking a crowd for all the hate it can produce.

Therefore, villains are relegated to cartoonish roles, given fewer lines than, for example, Arnold Schwarzenegger in his classic film, Commando. These villainous cartoons are always played by some combination of the following actors:

American officials
Israeli officials
Their allies
Any Middle Eastern official who could be accused of colluding with them.

Heroes in Khomeini’s script are particularly boring. One would think that their irrelevance contradicts the starring role Khomeini gives them, but apparently it does not. Khomeini’s heroes are almost always an archetypal youth; mostly male but occasionally female. They are given more lines than villains but even less substance. The scope of their commentary is always confined to grievances and the principles of social cohesion they are kidnapping, murdering or committing suicide for.

The obvious fact that their actions dissolve all manner of social cohesion is yet another distraction. In their scene, the heroes climax achieves little more than a pathetic mess. Counter to their purpose, acts of violence always harden the resolve of the innocent community or security services attacked. More relevant to the script, is the villain’s response. All reasoned responses result in perpetuating the tragedy, ad infinitum.

The real meat of Khomeini’s script exists in the interplay between leaders and martyrs. A leader wields real power in Khomeini’s script because he or she is both an actor and director. This character’s job security depends on a frenzied crowd fuming with hate. The high energy hatred of a crowd nurtures otherwise normal minds into performing martyrdom scenes in front of a global audience.

The real question should be, Q: how do Middle Eastern leaders develop a hate filled crowed in the first place? A1: One sermon at a time. A2: One family at a time. That’s how, over time, an entire society either becomes actors or willing audiences to a seemingly relentless pursuit of Khomeinist carnage.

To win back Middle Eastern society and pull the final curtain down on Khomeini’s tragedy, agents of the West will have to do as Hezbollah actors do. Disarming Middle Eastern crowds of their hate requires a vigorous -One sermon at a time, -One family at a time, approach.

IF my American friends believe the sermon should consist of a terrorist tip-line phone number, they are bound to mire Americans in a perpetual war. It doesn’t matter what the war is called; The Long War, The Global War on Terror, The Regional War. What then, would the –One sermon at a time, –One family at a time, approach look like? By my estimation, it would look like a census operating continuously on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan…

Have you read our mission statement?
Do you know why we’re here?
We are here to help you…
Are your children healthy?
Can we help you get them the medicine they need?
How many brothers, sisters, cousins… do you have?
Are they all healthy, happy, in school?
Are you working?
Why not?

And so on… When this American message reaches every corner of both countries, over time it will replace Khomeini’s script. It will disarm the hate and eventually replace Al-Qaeda’s script. It will replace the Taliban’s script. And so on…

To burn down the empire Khomeini’s script and its malicious spin offs… Americans are going to have to take their old fashioned neighborliness with them to their unfinished wars. The United States Army, State Department and other agencies in Iraq and Afghanistan must be good neighbors before they can ever hope to win back the Middle East.

POLICY: Sustainable Peace

2007-04-26T23:29:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are hell on earth. All wars are. Every sane person in America wants to see them both come to an expedient end. Unfortunately, the quest for peace cannot and should not overshadow America’s relentless pursuit of sustainable peace. Sustainable peace throughout the world is not only a legitimate American foreign policy; it is the only legitimate foreign policy. Irrespective of the violence we are witnessing in Iraq and Afghanistan today, the pursuit of sustainable peace is the ultimate American foreign policy objective.

It is a fact that the United States Government is working hard to achieve sustainable peace around the world today. If you do not believe it, try seriously asking yourself what any person, organization or government might actually do in order to attain sustainable peace. When you’ve answered that question for yourself, consider all of the successful international programs the United States either operates or fosters around the globe.

To be sure, any organized effort to achieve sustainable peace around the world would be ambitious, dangerous and difficult. That fact exists regardless of how any one of us answers the question, what policy should a nation adopt to help achieve sustainable peace? This question is extremely hard to answer in today’s overheated political climate.

Set aside partisan political debates engineered to increase network ratings. Those arguments represent little more than background noise. It is imperative that we, as a nation, remain focused on helping our leaders find solutions to serious international problems, like America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Speaking generically, to find a solution to any problem requires a thorough understanding of the problem. Unfortunately, understanding complex problems is never easy. Nevertheless, the difficulty of a task is not a reason to abdicate America’s national and international responsibilities.

Now, take a moment to consider what America’s national responsibilities actually are. Americans are inundated almost every day with proclamations from President Bush and his Administration about national security. But how does America’s security relate to its foreign policy? In other words, how does an American foreign policy geared to achieve sustainable peace support national security? These two ideas are inextricably linked. U.S. national security is directly improved as the international community approaches sustainable peace. Inversely, national security is an unattainable objective without a citizenry that accepts its national and international responsibilities.

Therefore, it is the duty of American citizens to support an American foreign policy that fosters sustainable peace. Throughout American history, Americans have witnessed wars far more devastating than the Iraq and Afghanistan war, including the Revolutionary War, the American Civil War, WWI, WWII, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. However, the measure of violence in a given war is not indicative of the morality of its purpose. Once committed to a justified war, there can be no other purpose than victory. It is the duty of the President of the United States to engender the will to persevere toward victory throughout war. On this front, President George W. Bush and his staff are failing. Make no mistake, Americans cannot afford for him to fail on this front.

The seemingly unending waves of political attacks on this Administration are hurting its ability to perform duties. The role of Commander and Chief deserves a respect that is independent of the personality of the Commander. The legitimacy of America’s political chain of command is at stake. Certainly, every political, diplomatic and military situation is unique. Some situations afford greater room for dissenting opinions. In crisis however, a competent chain of command is essential.

Right now, American service men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan represent the only competent chain of command in those two countries. President Bush and his Administration are leading both. Without their presence, without their perseverance, without American confidence in them or support for them – the inherent social fissures in both countries will combine with unscrupulous foreign influences to perpetuate horrific violence there.

Historically, American foreign policy in the Middle East has played an indirect role in regional crisis. History however is a reference from which to learn and grow. American history cannot explain America’s current or future intent. Evidence suggests the contrary. The current wars raging in Iraq and Afghanistan represent a clear break from Soviet and American Cold War policies. Those policies exacerbated conflict in the Middle East.

Following events on the ground closely one can see that the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq represent new policy in the form of an appeal to regional leaders. The appeal; they should abandon despotism and religious zealotry as their primary instruments of government. Every word spoken by American officials on the subject of Middle Eastern crisis today implores Middle Eastern leaders to stop wasting their resources, stop bleeding each other to death and begin working in concert to achieve sustainable peace.

Unfortunately time is running out. If Americans, their President, their Congress and the foreign policy they simultaneously project cannot work in concert, they will fail. They will fail to sufficiently influence Middle Eastern leaders to achieve sustainable peace and eventually they will be faced with only alternative, sustained war.

HUMINT: Iranian Bollox

2007-03-30T05:16:00.000+03:30

Iranian kidnapping of soldiers: the boundary debate.

Language of a draft at the UNSC is currently under debate, right now. From what I hear, Tehran is thinking that this sailor snatch might lead to a prisoner swap - Brits for Iranians in American custody. That sounds like an incredibly unlikely three-way to me. Nevertheless, the pattern of Iranian ops in Iraq leading up to this incident suggests they were trying to abduct American service members but were unable to do so. While the Shatt AlArab border dispute is mildly relevant, there are three reasons why this operation took place. The Global War on Terror, British rules of engagement and Iran's recent history with Britain --- converged to form a perfect storm. A similar event played out once before in 2004... That 2004 conclusion is undoubtedly expected to occur again in the very near future. But at what cost? A repeatedly humiliated Royal Navy? An emboldened Iranian theocracy? Anyway, Iran-Contra lessons learned, the Iranians are far more likely to get a taste of the USS Stennis this time. What is clear, the Iranians are in a hole and are only digging themselves in deeper thinking they can get out that way.

Is a U.S.-Iran War Inevitable?

Baer's thinking on Iran is brutally obvious.

The Iranian Government misbehaves – Domestic human rights abuses, international terrorism
West increases diplomatic pressure – Threatens military response
The price of petroleum rises – boosting a paranoid government in Tehran

1, 2, 3 repeat until the quake takes down civil society in Iran. It’s an unstable cycle Robert…

Britain is Taking Right Approach with Iran

S/RES/1723 (2006)

Calling upon the international community, particularly countries in the region and Iraq’s neighbours, to support the Iraqi people in their pursuit of peace, stability, security, democracy, and prosperity, and noting that the successful implementation of this resolution will contribute to regional stability,

Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War - Article 17

Every prisoner of war, when questioned on the subject, is bound to give only his surname, first names and rank, date of birth, and army, regimental, personal or serial number, or failing this, equivalent information. If he wilfully infringes this rule, he may render himself liable to a restriction of the privileges accorded to his rank or status

Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson

1797 was a full year for Nelson. On 14 February he was largely responsible for the British victory at the Battle of Cape St. Vincent. Here he showed his flair for dramatic and bold action. Under the command of Sir John Jervis, the British fleet was ordered to "tack in line," but Nelson disobeyed these orders and wore ship to alter course and prevent the Spanish fleet from escaping. He then boarded two enemy ships in succession, an unusual and bold move which was cheered by the whole fleet. Nelson himself led the boarding parties, which was not usually done by high ranking officers. In the aftermath of this victory, Nelson was knighted as a member of the Order of the Bath (hence the postnominal initials "KB"). In April of the same year he was promoted to Rear Admiral of the Blue, the ninth highest rank in the Royal Navy.

HUMINT: Smile for Effect

2007-03-04T22:28:00.000+03:30

A PREQUEL TO “THE AMERICAN STREET”.

Months ago I wrote a post about the American Street. In it, I describe a verbal exchange I had with a communist propagandizer. Despite the obnoxious T-Shirt this snake oil salesman was wearing, and despite the fact he was trying hard to attract attention – almost everyone around him was doing a good job of ignoring him. I however could not ignore him. You might be asking, why did humint notice a subversive newspaper salesman among an ocean of busy bodies, shuffling diligently from point “A” to point “B”? The answer is ridiculously simple. I noticed him because of a game I play when I’m in the street. It’s a game I call SMILES.

Here’s how the game works; The next time you find yourself walking down the street, in New York City, Tel Aviv, London, Riyadh, Paris, Amman, Los Angeles, Cairo, Munich or Tehran, look passers by in the eye and smile at them. If they smile back, give yourself a point.

I made up the game SMILES a long time ago but still catch myself playing it today. The premise of the game is so simple you’ll quickly forget you’re playing it. Regardless of the game, it’s a regular habit of mine to be friendly and smile at strangers. I’ve found that one can learn a great deal from sparking up random conversations. Some of the best conversations I’ve ever had were predicated on nothing more than a friendly smile. Over the years, I’ve come to realize, playing the game has subtle benefits for all players.

While it would be easy to fill a book with the various responses I’ve received from men, women, young people, old people, happy people, sad people, punks, freaks, businessmen, politicians, students, professors, janitors and many more… I’ll just share one rather interesting story about playing the game in Manhattan a few summers ago.

What’s fascinating about the streets of Manhattan is that walking there; you’ll bump into every kind of person you can imagine in just a few minutes. Despite any preconceived notions you may have about New York City, (Hollywood’s disinformation campaign), it is very easy to get a high score playing SMILES there. What invariably happens to me when I’m there; people immediately start asking me for directions.

That said I’m not from Manhattan. It doesn’t matter though. Manhattan is easy to navigate on foot. Traveling by car through the caverns of concrete and steel is a different story though. I’ve done my share of driving in New York City which is another game entirely. I call that game – Lahore Cab Driver (LCD). LCD is probably the most frustrating game on the planet. Avoid it if you can. But I digress.

Some might find lost inquisitors looking for their destination annoying, but I don’t mind helping them out at all. It’s a great opportunity to guess the origins of their accents, age and ask things like, “how long they are staying?” or “what restaurants they’ve enjoyed visiting?”. What SMILES will teach you, if you play it right, are that people are always complex, usually beautiful, sometimes brilliant, often funny and constantly busy. Try it sometime, but be subtle about it. I don’t want to bump into someone who asks me if I’m playing SMILES. I’m probably just being friendly anyway.

HUMINT: Dear Ahmadinejad

2007-02-15T08:51:00.000+03:30

Dear Mahmood Ahmadinejad;

With your permission, given by your attention, allow me to lead this discourse. Let me open my letter to you with a form of leadership you are familiar with; leadership by example. These words are simply text on an html page, but be aware, they represent much more. I am writing to you, not out of any hope for reconciliation between us, nor fear of your imperialist ideology. I am writing to you as a demonstration of spiritual and intellectual will, in honor of my nation’s first President, President George Washington.

My reasoning for engaging you is complex. The purpose of this letter is best explained by historical analogy. George Washington’s responsible abdication of power was a prerequisite for the democratic prosperity the United States enjoys today. His abdication guaranteed his immortality in the American mind. His singular abdication of supreme authority is the root cause of America’s Super Power Status today. With his faith in God, Law and Philosophy, Washington’s permanence will last for as long as the United States proudly bares its flag at home and abroad.

In remembrance of Washington – My words represent my thoughts and only my thoughts. In this letter and in this forum, I purposefully abdicate all symbols of my authority. In these words, I am standing up for what I as a lone citizen believe, nothing more. While my countrymen may find solace in my opinion, these are my words, not theirs. I do not profess to speak for them. Let me emphasize, that in America, Americans are free to make up their own minds about the differences between your nation and mine.

While it is clear that my nation is not planning a war with yours, my country is prepared to destroy yours. Why do you suppose that is Mr. Ahmadinejad? While you may assume, and therefore assert that the United States is an aggressor, you are dead wrong. You have made strides at convincing other world leaders of your opinion, and in so doing, only making you more wrong. I could list the transgressions demonstrating your guilt, as if I was an international lawyer, but this is neither the time nor the place. You know what your national policy must become in order to transcend all existing international punishments.

Where does your confidence come from? The evidence contradicting your rhetoric is as clear as the nose on your face. No one in America chants “Death to Iran”, but in Iran your countrymen chant “Death to America”. Officials within your regime consistently disorganize the brains of your nation’s youth by sending them into the streets to throw stones and the embassies of my nation’s allies and burn my country’s flag. Your behavior as an authority figure is hypocritical at best and criminal at worst. Is it not clear Mr. Ahmadinejad, why the people of these United States do not respond in kind?

If you’ve never considered why, please allow me to explain it to you. In the United States, American authority figures empower citizens to be the best they can be. They do so with the explicit demand that citizens not subtract from the spiritual, ethnic or racial value of their American neighbors. Think about that for a minute. Who are our neighbors here in America? As a land of immigrants, Americans hail from every corner of the planet. Yes Mr. Ahmadinejad, this means Americans have neighbors who were once your neighbors. Invariably, some of our neighbors here in America are the flesh and blood remnants of your so called Islamic Revolution. It is through their stories and your own bombastic assertions that I know you. Only concrete actions exercised immediately by you and your government can redirect the trajectory of our two countries.

Is it any wonder that our nations are at odds? The United States demonstrates peaceful coexistence everyday. Your ignorance of our history is hard to endure. To that end, do not mistake the American marathon of tolerance for your spiritual bankruptcy as weakness. Freedom of religion was born in America more than two centuries before your Ayatollah Khomeini manifested the Islamic Republic. Be aware, you are allowing opportunity after opportunity to slip by. To the contrary, you and your government abandon opportunity at a reckless pace. In every prayer, sermon or speech that you defame my country, you are denying peaceful coexistence.

In closing, I recommend you seek the council of rational minds. Sit down with them and make a two column list. In the first column, write down your diplomatic choices. In the second column, write down the most likely result affiliated to each choice in column one. Once you’ve compiled a list you are proud of, send it for review to the best minds you have access to. Do not let those minds praise you for it. By my measure of your words and reasoning to date, I estimate your first list will be absurdly emotional and woefully incomplete. Once compiled, make your choice. Make it a choice worth living for.

Sincerely,

HUMINT: Iran Malaise

2007-02-13T19:07:00.000+03:30

West Adds to Strains on Iran's Lifeline

To curb demand, which has been driven in part by subsidies that keep the domestic pump price at a mere 35 cents a gallon, the government plans to begin rationing gasoline in March, a measure so unpopular, and potentially explosive, that rationing plans have been put off several times in the past.

Iran uses petroleum (and other) subsidies to manufacture consent. That's why such a rich country can hardly breath. The economics of the situation are straight forward. International demand is the only complicating factor. The West is inadvertently paying for the lifestyles of the ayatollahs who are indeed their enemies. What to do? Hmmmm, nothing sounds like a good plan, but we've been trying that for years and it hasn't worked yet. Maybe we should try to do "nothing" even harder than we are doing "nothing" right now. The only one who can really help the West do "nothing" are defeatists who are also journalists. All they have to do is scream bloody murder when a soldier of the West acts like the soldier he or she was trained to be. Oh yeah, and I almost forgot... the Press should also scream bloody murder when the President of the United States has the audacity to behave Presidentially. Orders to kill the enemy on sight are anathema to everything they stand for as a defeatist.

Iran seen as key to untangling Iraq

Indeed, Iranians say, their image of an ideal settlement in Iraq looks remarkably like America's: a strong, democratically elected government in Baghdad — that would, by dint of Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority, be a natural ally of Tehran — an end to the violence, and preservation of territorial integrity. But with one important exception. "The difference is Iran doesn't want to see the U.S. claim victory. The U.S. shouldn't come out of this battle victorious. And Iranians perceive that the dominant part of that objective has been achieved," Tehran political scientist Nasser Hadian said. "It is no longer plausible for the U.S. to claim victory in Iraq."

Indeed, Iranians say they practice democracy when the opposite is true. The difference between U.S. and Iranian visions for democracy in Iraq are the differences between securing American interests in Iraq and securing Iranian interests in Iraq. Ask yourself, how does influence spread in the Middle East? Now ask yourself, do enemies peacefully compete in the ME or do they slug it out in bloody death matches? Now ask yourself about the interplay between blame and responsibility in the [Persian | Arab] mind. I don't know what your answers are telling you, but mine are screaming. If the U.S. does not secure a democratic Iraq (democracy as understood by those of us in America who actually practice it) Iran will envelop it. Subsequently, Iran will have huge market share at OPEC, so huge indeed that the leverage represented by Saudi Arabia would be gone...

Hmmmm, that should start ringing some alarm clocks for people unable to see through the morning fog of a great big war. If Iran secures its interests in Iraq, - Neighboring states will organize a response to counter the Iran-Iraq alliance. That's why some analysts are predicting a nuclear arms race in the region. I for one, am predicting a regional war that will lead to the targeting of Israel as well as oil wells in Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Take those three nations out of our global energy portfolio and we are talking about WWIV.

There is however one hope... it's not one that I usually count on, but it is hope in an otherwise hopeless situation. Imagine, if you can - every important figure in the geo-political equation of the Middle East is sufficiently shortsighted to make the entire problem disappear into a quantum singularity. To make this plan work, we must all agree to forget everything we have learned about Iran over the last quarter century. I'm willing to try if you are? Ready, set GO! ---- Did it work for you? I could name a few politicians it appears to work for but I won't. No matter how hard I try(drink), intentional forgetting just doesn't work for me.

Iran rejects U.S. accusations it armed insurgents in Iraq with roadside bombs

Iran rejects U.S. accusations it armed insurgents in Iraq with roadside bombs

How about providing the U.S. access to investigate the evidence of Iranian munitions manufactured inside Iran? It looks as though Iranian officials have serious trouble comprehending the basic mechanics of international diplomacy. Iran Rejects the U.S. by attacking the United States wherever and whenever it can; through inflammatory rhetoric about the United States and through its collusion with dictatorships in Asia and Latin America. At every turn, Iran is turning the notion of responsible government on its head. The trajectory toward greater human freedom in the world is supported by the United States today, like no other nation in the history of our planet. It is an affirmation of the American mission in this world that Iran - in all of its spiritual bankruptcy - stands opposed to freedom's march. Tehran, under its current leadership, will find itself compared to the worst of the worst in the annals of human history if it fails. If Tehran under its current leadership succeeds... without freedom, what point would there be to read about history at all?

Diane Sawyer's Interview with Ahmadinejad

AHMADINEJAD TO SAWYER: Are you trying to solve the American problem in Iraq? These things need to take place at a diplomatic level. You are just a journalist.

Dianne did an outstanding job interviewing Mahmood. She stayed on point but he managed to dance around her questions. It's obvious he never intended to answer them. That's how things work in Iran. The government there doesn't answer to any democratic constituency as we in America understand it. Every time an American journalist interviews Iranian officials, and is willing to ask tough questions, they will see first hand how diplomatic progress with them is highly improbable if not totally impossible. This interview, and recent changes in both tone and language used by Ahmadinejad, suggest that he is being coached by the Supreme Leader's office. They are most likely telling him to use the language of peace to divide Iran's enemies in Europe, America and the Middle East. It worked for Khatami, but Iran had more options back then. Now, it is clear that Iranian officials feel threatened. They must realize that they have finally been backed into a corner. They are gambling everything they have on their hope that there is no bight underneath an American bark.

My favorite part of the interview was when Mahmood invoked the rational procedures of American jurisprudence to assert his country's innocence. He basically told Dianne, "prove it". When she (who is just a pathetic journalist according to Mahmood) asked about Iranian culpability in the deaths of 170 American service members, he expected her to prove it. In Dianne's context, she had evidence worthy of journalistic investigation. In war, evidence worthy of investigation followed up by Mahmood's distractions and denials, is tantamount to proof. What Mahmood really meant to say was, "prove it to the American public by the judicial standards Americans are accustomed to".

In the history of the United States, American leadership tended to allow sufficient time for emotional tensions to cool before making difficult decisions about foreign policy. U.S. diplomatic efforts with Tehran have followed that same model. The fact is, Iran was given more than a quarter century to cool off and begin the tried and tested process of joining a community of nations who work together everyday for peace in the world. At every turn, Iranian officials squander their opportunities to become constructive partners. At every turn, they shift the blame and responsibility to the United States or Israel. The day Americans finally take responsibility for Iran instead of simply barking at Iran for its habitual transgressions, will not be as Ahmadinejad imagines it.

HUMINT: Contagious Behavior

2007-01-20T07:48:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: The best economic theory of the day suggests human behavior is contagious. It follows logically that what the article "IRAQ's NATURAL STATE" says about human nature is that"empowering figures" build self sustaining societies whereas "power consolidators" slowly descend into hell, taking every body else with them. The idea that Iraqis will reject violence sooner if more of them have jobs is a legitimate argument only if those jobs are sourced from free market investment. The entire country needs some version of Milton Freidman's Negative Income Tax. If on the other hand, tribal chieftains and theocratic oligarchs are put in control of the country's natural recourses (the only viable revenue stream based on international trade and investment at this time) the country will continue to decay. No matter how many jobs that policy would create, the country would still descend into an even worse hell than now because no faction would be happy until they control all of Iraqs resources.

I don't want to second guess any American law maker decisions (I'm probably the only one) but U.S. investment in Iraq should be from the ground up... Indeed, the entire Middle East should be looked at from that perspective. The root cause of the hell we see today is because of the suggestion offered by the authors of IRAQ'S NATURAL STATE that I excerpted. Iraq's future, and many secondary and terciary futures, are dependent on empowering populations, not elites. That's how societal transitions are made from:

Primitive
Limited Access
Open Access

Macro and micro social dysfunction usually begins when elites start to think they matter far more than the population that authorizes their elitism. American geopolitical stability and prosperity, along this logic, can be found in our aggregate worship of everyday underdogs who become heroes by being themselves. Do Europeans do that? Not really. Instead they find themselves admiring Americans and realize that their society is far less likely to reward real heroism, they curse America for revealing their own social dysfunction. The same is true of the Middle East who are simply the economic bastard children of the U.S. or Europe anyway. Should we be surprised about the cost of social change in Iraq - or Europe...? No, not really, unless we seek a policy of empowerment. Empowerment policies are the least expensive and most effective, so I say "BOLLOCKS" to the expensive policy of dividing Iraq's natural resources between competing elites.

Patriarchal fascists have no intention of empowering their populations. They'd rather go down fighting in an exchange of nuclear weapons than lose their grip on power. What then do we do to save ourselves from them? We must save the fascist's societal children - their sons, daughters, wives, brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers... We have to empower them to overcome their social dysfunction in order to save ourselves. Any other approach is delaying the inevitable WMD dual between - Limited Access and Open Access societies.

These comments are inspired by "CLUB AMERICA" By Victor Davis Hansen

TOLIK: In case you missed it, take a look at Arnold Kling's article in TCS on difficulties of transition from the limited access order (that is more or less a natural state) to open order society - democracy in our understanding. The logic of article is the best argument against hopes of succeeding in building democracy in Iraq. Nevertheless, he also put force many interesting open-ended questions that require more thinking. New and intriguing angle (at least for me).

IRAQ'S NATURAL STATE: EXCERPT --- If we want to set up a limited-access order, then we have to determine which factions we want to have in the governing coalition, and we must give each of them something of value in return for maintaining peace. To put it crudely (so to speak), one could imagine giving each major party in a coalition government control over a particular set of oil wells. Factions that we do not want in the coalition (Al Qaeda in Iraq, for example) would have to be hunted down and killed. Factions that receive an allocation of oil wells but continue to engage in violence would have to be declared outlaws and deprived of personal security, with their oil resources confiscated and redistributed to other factions.

HUMINT: Emulating MLK

2007-01-16T10:43:00.000+03:30

I dedicated my day to Martin Luther King Jr. not only to remember him, but also to emulate him --- Nobody suggested I do it, but I did the best I could. When I simply remember MLK, and I do often, I listen to his Mountain Top speech more than any other. April 3rd 1963 in Memphis Tennessee, king took his audience with him to the Mountain Top and it was, in my opinion, the best speech ever delivered in human history. That evening in 63 his spirit spoke to directly to the audience. It hardly mattered what he had to say because Martin’s real power was oration. He could seemingly connect his spirit directly to his voice and articulate the values, objectives and ideals of his movement. The message he gave to the world was easy to amplify with passion. His message was “love”. He was fanatical about it. The conclusion of his Mountain Top speech is clear evidence.

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land! And so I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!

If King was an uncompromising fanatic as I’ve described him, with love and oration as his weapons, what was his mission? Who or what was King trying to conquer? I realized early this morning, around 9:30AM that I wouldn’t be able to emulate the man in a lifetime much less a single day if I didn’t understand the essence of his life’s mission. So I went back to his writings, interviews and speeches to look for the answer to my question. What I found was striking. King was unquestionably one of the most ambitious men of his day. His intent was clear. He wanted nothing less than to save the world from itself, with love! That was his mission and it’s no surprise at all that the world adores him for it. With that realization around 11:00AM, I was ready to start the emulation process. With my best ball point pen and an 8.5X11 piece of paper, I started labeling it with mission statements:

HOW TO SAVE THE WORLD FROM ITSELF, WITH LOVE!
HOW THE WORLD CAN SAVE ITSELF, ~~WITH LOVE~~!
HOW LOVE CAN SAVE THE WORLD, WITH MONEY!
HOW MONEY CAN SAVE THE WORLD, WITH GOOD IDEAS!
HOW GREAT IDEAS CAN SAVE THE WORLD AND MAKE MONEY DOING IT!

Submission to the perception that the world is ill is a prerequisite to emulating King. For the entire day, I’ve believed the world needs a mortal savior. The idealistic and utopian seeking mission statement I attribute to King’s life required drastic alterations before it could approach plausibility against today’s conundrums. In any case, to emulate MLK is to pursue his goals, but not necessarily by the same methods he used. Love has its place in bringing people together in order to make positive social change but love cannot stand alone as the singular solution to the world’s ills. Where love might not last, great ideas are sure to, until they are replaced by better ideas, hopefully. By 12:30PM I had made a list of the world’s (America's) perceptual ills that follows:

Terrorism
Illegal immigration
Global Warming

primarily from nations rich in fossil fuels
primarily from Mexico
atmospheric carbon dioxide presumably from industrialized nations burning fossil fuels

After flipping my ballpoint pen around for more than an hour, around 2:00PM a flood of ideas came to me in the form of an elaborate scenario. It was the only intellectual product that had anything to do with my emulation project so here it is:

The Saudi Royal Family [among other petro-wealthy philanthropists] finds it in their hearts to fund the construction of solar powered desalination plants in Mexico along the Gulf Coast and Baja. Money not spent funding terrorism is money well spent… right? In addition to the desalinization plants, the largest ever solar power plant is built just south of Arizona with the singular goal of producing solar panels, mirrors, solar ovens, solar pumps and wind mills for use by developing nations. Think about that for a second, a solar power plant that produces solar panels… nice huh? That really might save the world and make money doing it.

In the downstream phase, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gets into the act by funding the design and construction of tools and computers that run off of the solar panels produced in the new Saudi-Mexican Solar Power Plant. The primary job for Mexicans (reducing the urge to immigrate the United States illegally) in and around these new solar energy intensive power plants is to grow bamboo (the fastest growing plant) and burry them to sequester carbon dioxide. More importantly however, the decentralization of electricity production and increased access to fresh water would open up new markets for Gate’s solar powered electronics and tools. This is where investors will really make their money back and then some. The returns on Gate’s investment would then be rolled into funding the “World Wide White Roof Grass Roots Initiative”, a painting program that paints black surfaces in urban areas white, in order to reflect solar radiation back into space, cooling cities enrolled in the program by up to 10 degrees (I just made that number up).

To summarize, there is no reason why at least some of the petroleum dollars flowing into the coffers of wealthy Arab families should not be recycled into carbon sequestration programs that could employ individuals who would otherwise become illegal immigrants to the United States. With respect to decentralized electronics for a decentralized solar power infrastructure in developing regions of the world, a great deal of money could be made in these emerging markets that will otherwise, remain stagnant. Poverty would be reduced, more value created in society and war would be less likely for all.

When I had finished scribbling By 2:45, it was Miller Time. I did the best I could without expectation of approaching MLK's commitment to his cause or strength of character. Happy MLK day…

HUMINT: Contextual Enemy

2007-01-05T08:46:00.000+03:30

HUMINT: Freedom and security may be sustained, but any threat to it in the first place represents a type of failure.

LEXBAIRD: How so? Something not 100% immune to attack is a failure? Say there is a computer program that includes subroutines to excise errors or foreign code input that is determined to be harmful to the program's function. The use of that subroutine is not a failure on the part of the program, but a built in function to help prevent failure. The lack of any mechanism to adequately cope with harmful forces is a true failure.

HUMINT: Think of a house, Lincoln did. He once said, "a house divided against itself cannot stand" paraphrasing the Bible, Matthew 12:25. Now think about what globalization is and what it's doing to the economics and demographics of nations. When considering all humanity a familial house, we are still divided and this house of ours cannot stand. My model establishes a definition of failure that does not fit the model you've chosen. When a building collapses, or analogously, society descends into chaos at the macro or the micro level, I'm calling those events structural failures. I have been saying all along that capital punishment and war are the result of failure. The social descent into chaos is the failure, and the effort made by civil society to correct it is a "clear reference" to a "specific failure". To both of our credit, both of our models are abstract analogies of how we perceive the capture, trial and execution of Saddam. Your interpretation of events (as I understand it) is that civil society took the appropriate corrective measures with a deposed Iraqi dictator. In that context, you are absolutely right, the execution was certainly not a lynching.

Given the geo-political complexities of Iraq and its neighborhood, it is blatantly clear that there are multiple contexts to the trial and execution. With each context, a series of unique perceptions and behaviors will emerge. In my opinion, your context is not likely to be the dominant one. But that's not what we're trying to determine here, are we? For the sake of this debate, your context is the only one that matters... Let's call it the "American Context". From our vantage point, there should be no pessimism at all. At the birth of 2007, new optimism was born precisely because the tree of Liberty had just been refreshed with the blood of a tyrant. But the story doesn't end there. In a way, that's were it starts. Now we have to transform your narrow context and my historical optimism into the will to win - to build a new city on a hill, without losing the one we live in today... But that's not what we're talking about either, are we?

I suppose all we are really talking about is your tagline(98% satisfaction guaranteed. There's just no pleasing some people). Either one is satisfied with the events surrounding the execution, or not. The myriad of reasons why a person might be satisfied or unsatisfied are inconsequential shades of gray in a black and white world at war. It is a fact that no one else's context is more important than your own. I don't dispute that logic. No one can. Of course I agree with you. We are on the same side against a ruthless enemy. But don't get too cocky. To find that ruthless enemy in the ME, you'll need to explore more than your own context.

HUMINT: Blame Game

2007-01-03T00:54:00.000+03:30

THORTON: The fact is, it is the Iraqi people who are failing, the Arabs who are failing, and Muslims who are failing. The same cultural pathologies that keep Palestinian Arabs sullen welfare clients, that keep Lebanon a political basket-case, that keep millions of Middle-Eastern Muslims mired in poverty and oppression and ignorance and gender apartheid, are the same forces that are keeping Iraqis in some Road Warrior dystopia. Not our blunders, or cultural insensitivity, or arrogance, or whatever other excuse concocted by self-loathing Americans. No, Iraq is failing because too many Muslims love sectarian hatred, love resentment and envy of a successful infidel West, and love their belief in their own God-sanctioned superiority and righteousness more than they love freedom and prosperity and human rights. We have spent our citizens’ lives and our money to give Muslim Arabs a chance to create a better life, and they are blowing it, all the while neighboring Muslim nations either sit on their hands or actively support the forces destroying that opportunity.

HUMINT: Blame is often heaped on societies with the capacity to absorb blame, regardless of whether or not the targeted society deserves it. From the looks of it, the current elected Iraqi government doesn't have the capacity to absorb and process blame. Honestly, I’m surprised how little thought is given to Iraqi policy. When you look at what they’re doing, they aren't really taking responsibility for the hardest questions of the day; questions only they can answer. What is amazing is that Americans will skip over the details like “who is who in Iraq, and which Iraqi is responsible for which failure”. At first glance, these observations might lead a person to think less of Americans. The pattern is pretty clear. Instead of thinking it through, Americans will accept blame for things entirely out of their control.

In fact, this kind of behavior is the exact opposite of stupid. In terms of social intelligence, accepting more responsibility is the smart thing to do, but it causes serious problems in the midst of this War. By accepting fault, Americans remain the masters of Iraq and Iraqis become near insignificant derivatives of what Americans either do, or do not do. IMO, the first act of liberating Iraq is for Americans to accept blame only when it is reasonable to do so. The second act of liberating Iraq is to specifically blame Iraqis for their faults. This second duty is impossible to accomplish if we do not know who to blame, even when we think we do.

Case in point; the enemy is portrayed, in their own words, by a media that elevates their concerns (the media’s concerns and the enemies concerns) above the objectives of allied forces. The media’s concerns are for increased ratings. The enemy’s concerns are for more influence in the battle space. Therefore the problem is systemic. There exists a naturally symbiosis between enemy action and broadcast ratings. We can rant about the media all day long and nothing will change the fact that ratings are a function of what we all do together.

So I ask the question to the ether, without expectation of reply… Who in Iraq is responsible for the problems there, beyond Maliki, beyond Sistani, beyond Talabani, beyond Hakim and beyond Al Sadr. Why is Iraqi society not taking responsibility to competently answer the most important policy questions of the day? What are the points of failure that Iraqis themselves must repair in order to transcend the hell of their own making? I have no interest in accepting faux responsibility to remain a faux master. Iraqis are not insignificant, and so deserve every bit of blame and praise befitting their unique behavior.

HUMINT: Just Vengeance

2007-01-02T19:46:00.000+03:30

KEEPING FAITH WITH A BLOODY TRADITION

HITCHENS: "And it might be no bad thing if Americans, especially those who supported the breaking of his death grip on Iraqi society, found ways of conveying their distaste for this rushed and vindictive — and partial — version of a process of reckoning that ought to have been sober, meticulous and untainted."

EARTHDWELLER: I admire Hitchen's premise but he is showing the kind of British out of touch elitism that kept Ireland in straits for centuries. In this instance let the American's, who tamed the wild wild west take care of the details of growing a civilized society from the ground up. Picture Hitchens saying "I just don't understand why these instant civilization buttons don't work any more. Mummy, can we get a new video game? I don't like this one. It's too slow and the mind control option is like on dial-up."

HUMINT: There are a number of ways to look at executions of tyrants. If we take the simplest approach, *** those who live by the sword, die by the sword *** Saddam's fate was preordained and it really makes no difference how or why. That scenario is likely, but let's think about it further. Let's say, each view of Saddam's execution is dependant in part on the commentator's interests. So who are some, if not all, of the interested?

Civilized intellectuals don't like execution at all but would have liked to see a more familiar format to the execution.
The Iranian government fought an eight year war with Saddam that was exactly the opposite of civilized. It's no wonder that they are pleased with the format of Saddam's finish.
The Sunni insurgency, by my estimation is fighting and recruiting at its peak, so despite their disappointment in seeing their former dictator's neck broken, they can't do much more about it than they already are. Talking about a spike in violence is futile anyway. This is a war! Spikes and lulls are indicative of things other than imminent victory.
the Shi'i majority in Iraq can put to rest a few conspiracy theories about Saddam coming back to power but not about Saddam's previous conspiracies with foreign governments not revealed in the awkward trial that preceded the execution.
The Kurds appear smart enough to have moved on already and are astutely mapping out their future. They realized Saddam was irrelevant to their future a long time ago.
And last but not least, anyone who regarded Saddam's execution as an old fashioned lynching; they are like any audience that gathers around to see a bad guy hang, die and piss himself. The nuance between vengeance and justice is a bridge too far for them. What they do know is fear. Deserved death was delivered to a dictator who was just one among many in the region.

I estimate, no one was more attentive in the "audience" of Saddam's execution than regional dictators, theocrats and monarchs. They probably took notes on how they themselves should act when they are handed over to the people they fear the most. Maybe, after watching Saddam die like a common thug, they even considered how not to end up like Saddam, but I doubt it.

A Beautiful New Year 2007

2007-01-01T03:13:00.000+03:30

THOMAS JEFFERSON

God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. ... What country before ever existed a century and half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

Letter to William Stevens Smith (November 13, 1787), quoted in Padover's Jefferson On Democracy

HUMINT: Iranian Bonsai

2006-12-29T23:41:00.000+03:30

M. DODGE THOMAS: There are good reasons why you don’t see modern examples of durable Theocratic regimes, and as the role of religion in public life changes in Iran reformers will at least have the advantage of living in a country that is already operating under a limited form of representative government that grew out of an authentic national revolution rather than being “imposed” from the outside.

HUMINT: Broad generalizations about what "neocons" think or want aside - external economic pressure on Iran is causing a socio-political bonsai effect on the growth of that nation. Iranians, particularly Iranian officials who survived the Iran-Iraq War, have a warped identity that is deeply influenced by anti-identity. By anti-identity I am referring specifically to anti-Americanism. More importantly, Iranian instability today has a root cause that will no go away. The effect of the 1979 Revolution is completely disconnected from its cause. I think that’s the point that most people banking on "reform" miss. What you are talking about in terms of policy change in Iran is in fact personality change. For the Iranian government to survive as it is defined right now, it has to subject its populace to blatant psychological operations while simultaneously blocking external influences.

Observing individuals approach Iran over the years I've come to realize something about all things external, in reference to Iran. We in the West are not talking about the unique nuances of diverse political platforms when we talk about reform in Iran. What we are actually talking about has more to do with Westerner's connectivity to the Iranian regime in terms of trade and influence. If you think relieving pressure on the Iranian regime is the best direction to move in, then consider these Qs. Do you think the privatization of Iran Air was because of internal pressure on the Iranian government? Do you think that had anything to do with public opinion? When a Rafsanjani figure or a Khatami figure stands in front of you, smiles and shakes your hand - what do you think he's thinking? Those kinds of people’s actions cannot venture too far from their toxic rhetoric without being labeled a “puppet” or “spy”, (remember the anti-identity syndrome) so don't pin your hopes on personality.

I've no desire to rob you of your optimism about Iran but if you look at that country in terms of what it is saying as well as what it is doing, it is the most egregious abuser of democratic rhetoric to sustain tyrannical policy in the world. Look at what Ayatollahs do for a living. You're being bamboozled by career speech making spiritualists. The can spin any event to serve their interests as well as any Sigmund Freud disciple. If you’re banking on them to reform then I beg you, put them under your finest microscope and watch very closely. If you find evidence to contradict what I’m saying, by all means, post it in bold.

HUMINT: Dream Killer

2006-12-26T22:35:00.000+03:30

THE HISPANIC CHALLENGE By Samuel P. Huntington

HUNTINGTON: Such a transformation would not only revolutionize the United States, but it would also have serious consequences for Hispanics, who will be in the United States but not of it. Sosa ends his book, The Americano Dream, with encouragement for aspiring Hispanic entrepreneurs. “The Americano dream?” he asks. “It exists, it is realistic, and it is there for all of us to share.” Sosa is wrong. There is no Americano dream. There is only the American dream created by an Anglo-Protestant society. Mexican Americans will share in that dream and in that society only if they dream in English.

HUMINT: How could anyone dictate anyone else's dream? They can't! If a person conceives of an Americano Dream, then it exists. An Americano Dream doesn't devalue Huntington's American Dream or my American Dream or your American Dream. I have to respectfully disagree with Huntington who I will now refer to as a "dream killer". Let's play a game called flip the context - Ask yourself; what does a Christmas tree have to do with Jesus Christ? Decorating the tree is a convergence of several cultures into something beautiful. The custom would've been impossible to imagine for a "dream killer" like Huntington. Analytically speaking Huntington's intuitive commentary is a self fulfilling prophecy. If you look at an American and arbitrarily disqualify him or her as a potential compatriot, besides being an asshole, you're probably arbitrary yourself. Ideas are not language dependent constructs. IMO The Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, Emancipation Proclamation and every other important American document should be written in every language ever conceived by the mind of mankind, printed at tax payer expense and the books should find there way onto the shelves of every office, library and home in the world. That's a dream to behold! IMO The most quoted man in the World should be Thomas Jefferson! But that too is a dream worthy of execution by Huntington's sociopathic conclusion. His forth coming book, "Who Are We?" might be better titled, "Who We Were!" because Huntington certainly cannot figure out "Who We Will Be!". Irrespective of Huntington's problematic conclusion, the problem he points out is very real.

To my mind, the influx of legal and illegal immigrants is a serious problem only if integration into America's dynamic culture is impossible. History shows that it's possible for people to integrate from virtually anywhere to virtually anywhere. Therefore the problem he outlines is solvable. Right now, there are points of failure in the process of integration. That's the primary problem. At this moment, it is difficult for anyone to offer a solution without good data. Hopes and dreams are important data. In fact casually dismissing an immigrant's hopes and dreams will exacerbate integration woes. One should consider hopes and dreams to be essential to evaluating the capacity of an immigrant community to successfully integrate. If the current dreams are destructive, don't murder the ones that exist, offer better ones.

RURUDYN: I'm sorry but the inescapable fact––at least for me––is that illegal aliens carry this baggage with them that should make them absolutely unacceptable:
They imagine that because of their reasons or motivations that whatever immigration laws there are, these are laws they don't feel they should have to obey.
When you cut to the chase that means they have already demonstrated that if they can justify to themselves why they should not obey any given law they should feel they don't have to obey: they will not obey it. It would be one thing if these laws were arbitrary and unnecessary; however, given the fact that the debate is now being set by those who impose themselves on us rather than those who have the right as citizens to decide the status of their borders for themselves: how can anyone say these are arbitrary or unnecessary concerns?

HUMINT: When a person breaks the law they forfeit their rights as a citizen. It is redundant to point out that illegal immigrants never had rights as a citizen. Look at what they are doing with their lives. What they’ve done by entering the United States illegally is shift responsibility for their future to the people of the United States. It's a responsibility we have no choice but to own up to. The list of options regarding what to do about their illegal act is long. Incarceration, deportation… the most cowardly decision of all is to move away. If your neighborhood is going to hell, don't pick up and move away! Clean it up! Do something about it! Quit retreating! This problem cannot be ignored. It appears as though politicians are ignoring illegal immigration because Americans are unwilling to do anything about it.

BLACKELK: The United States is a dynamic nation with a wonderful, if occasionally flawed, and proud history. The future should be likewise. We are a nation and not a museum. We are [neither] homogenized nor pasteurized as a nation. Had we been either, we would be a museum, with a brilliant past and stultifyingly boring present reality like much of what Rumsfeld accurately derided as "old Europe." The amazing thing about "old Europe" is how very much it proves day by day not to have been worth saving. Today, the Japanese are among our closest allies and strongest supporters. With the occasional exception of a Winston Churchill, a Margaret Thatcher or a Tony Blair, Europe (outside of the Vatican) has been generally useless since WW II. They want their own freedom (to some small extent) but don't care about anyone else's. When France falls to Islam, I hope we let them grovel for a few years while we throw the insolent words of Chirac and de Villepin back in their faces before Uncle Sugar comes to the rescue of the French. We should let them know it is the last time we save their useless backsides unless they closely follow our foreign policy and military lead thereafter.

HUMINT: Excellent post! The comparison between your family - German settlers raising a family on a farm - to a near relentless wave of unskilled and destitute immigrants hitting our cities, suburbs and rural zones is a stretch, but well worth the time to think about. I've started to think about the immigration problem in engineering terms of equilibrium, pressure and diffusion. In less complicated words, like human dominoes - conditions in one region degrade which results in an exodus. America's leaky borders and ambivalent citizenry have yet to resist diffusion of illegal immigrants. As noted on this thread, dense enclaves have a destabilizing effect. What happens next? The people moving out of the areas immigrants are moving into become secondary and tertiary immigrants. The more affluent of these "cowardly" movers drive up property value in areas priced out of reach of first and second tier movers. If my domino theory is accurate, where does the last one fall? It's easy enough to pick up and move now... or is it. Our children aren't going to be able to afford a home in the neighborhoods they grew up in, or their neighborhoods will become unrecognizable due to the demographic shift. To approach a solution we have to consider reducing the geopolitical pressure causing the primary wave of immigrants. Secondarily, Americans cannot treat their property and community so casually as to abandon it when their neighborhood undergoes a demographic transition. My fellow Americans, in regions overrun, hold your ground. Do what you must to make your community worth living in.

A. POLE: German and Scandinavian Lutherans were integrated rather smoothly with British Calvinists (Congregationalists and Presbyterians), so were the Episcopalians/Anglicans (despite their loyalist leanings), various more home grown groups like Baptists or Pentecostals are in sync by definition. Integration of Catholics was a difficult process, but somehow went OK at the price of redefining aspects of American culture (Orthodox could find a place in opening created by Catholics). Harder to integrate were Mormons despite of their domestic origin. The real question is if Muslims can be integrated in large numbers. Or if the large influx of Latin Americans with a very strong identity will not prevail over British element. If they do, USA will become other Latin American countries. Buddhist/Confuctionsts tend to conform and to convert. Hindu so long as they adhere to the cast tradition can remain within their own circles avoiding conflict, as they change they will be more willing to adjust or even convert. The last but not the least the militant secularists cannot fit by definition, but they abort/gay themselves out of existence.

HUMINT: When you think about the word "integrate" do you consider "merge" or "sustainable society" to be a synonym? IMO The sustainability of humanity is proportional to its diversity of culture and ideas. Cognitive clarity of the - past * present * future - is something that many minds asymptotically approach together. That's the real power of the United States! The philosophical and cultural contributions to our society do come from the Protestant Reformation but what do those ideas actually do for us? How did those ideas transform into Super Power?

The power of Reformation logic is that it makes room for diversity of culture and ideas. Do not give it uni-polar credit for creating new culture and new ideas. Agreeing to disagree opens the doors blocking progress and prosperity for all mankind. Now let's ask the question again, why are we powerful? Americans manage to live through iterative bouts of disagreements, learning from each, and finding new agreements about the mechanics of humanity. The more we know about “us”, the more able we are to face unpredictable challenges to “us”. In America, “us”, can fit any human being you can imagine.

In this work, Huntington has utterly missed the point. Why? I think he's an antisocial sociologist. Somebody needs to remind him that humans are the most social entities on the planet. Between you, me and Huntington, let's make the point clear. WASP logic facilitates society but is not directly responsible for it. WE ARE!