Madrid: Spectral and Alive

76 and 77 years ago, the people living in Madrid were being attacked from the air and adjacent land. The city was pummeled with explosives -- bombs from airplanes, ground artillery and everything in between. Today, there are spectral traces of war still, yet the city is bursting with life -- and culture has endured.

Image: Madrid defenders firing at besieging fascist forces from the university library in 1937 - a twist in the use of library stacks. (Parapetos formados con sacos y libros de la Biblioteca. Link here).

My guess is that 99% of all sentient people now on Earth live within an hour of, by foot, horse, boat, ship, train, zeppelin, automobile or aeroplane, a battleground or battlefield -- places of war remaining from the past, unfolding in the present or coming in the future. If you don't think that's true where you live, look harder. If today you live in Palestine-Israel, Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, South Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen or one of many other such places around the world, you don't need to look at all.

From a little brochure about the Internationalist Brigades stationed in Madrid during the Spanish Civil War, I learned that our hotel (Hotel Europa) was a hangout for the troops and their supports -- what's now the Café Restaurante Europa was, in 1936-1939, La Cerveceria Española (cerveza = beer). On November 16, 1936, the nearby metro station at Puerta del Sol suffered a direct hit from German and Italian aerial bombers. 

Tío Pepe sign now, in Puerta del Sol -- how about some nice sherry instead of another war?

Today's Rune: Partnership.    

Defining Lines at the Nasher

Much to see at three thoughtful, absorbing exhibits at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. "Lines of Control: Partition as a Productive Space" is one of them. ". . . [C]o-curated by Iftikahr Dadi and Hammad Nasar, brings together art across many genres . . . that have their common theme a preoccupation [pun intended?] with borders, boundaries and lines that divide and demarcate. . . " The British Empire, for one, "brought in its wake the geographic and cartographic division of much of the inhabited world . . ." Obviously, we're still living in the fallout zones from "the Middle East" to Africa and everywhere else in the world as we know it -- or really know it not. 

"Defining Lines: Cartography in the Age of Empire" takes a similar look at dividing lines, focusing on maps as cultural artifacts that carve up the world in ways that favor certain groups over others. "No matter . . . their claims to 'objectivity,' 'accuracy' and 'authority,' maps never simply show the world as it is; they are . . . 'a construction of reality, images laden with intentions and consequences.'" In the end, it's mostly about culture, power and economics. 

A third exhibit revolves around Doris Duke's spectacular "Shangri La" project in Hawaii, replete with beautiful Islamic-themed signs and wonders.

Very impressive all.

Today's Rune: Journey.   

The First and Last Casualties

Coverage of wars and poverty, of competing ideas and political conflict is all over the map.  Attention Deficit Disorder and entropy on one hand, pre-existing ideological prejudices and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder on the other.  Avoidance on the one hand, oversaturation on the other.

Some of the most memorable wartime investigative journalism can be epitomized by the work of Seymour Hersch, who has, during his career, written a number of penetrating stories for United Press International (UPI), the Associated Press (AP), The New York Times, The New Yorker, and more. Prime examples: exposing the My Lai Massacre (1968). Investigating the context of what led to the shooting down of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 (1983). Digging into the false pretenses and cynical manipulation of public perceptions by the Bush-Cheney Administation that led to the Iraq War (2003-2011). Delving into the ghoulish facts of the Abu Ghraib POW scandal. And so forth. This is not to say that Hersch is always completely accurate in his reporting, but rather that he's done more good investigative work relating to war and abuse of power than most. Under the banner of the First Amendment, we need more people doing this kind of work.

Today's Rune: Flow.

Blood and Rockets

Here we go again. No negotiated settlement, endless bloodletting -- in cycles. Without the will for successful negotiations, there can be no successful negotiations. Without a live-and-let-live attitude on all sides, there cannot be a live-and-let-live reality on the ground, in the air or on the high seas. And the destruction continues.  A tit-for-ten-tats, ten eyes-for-an-eye, another slaughter in the making for the "Holy Land."  Way to go, peoples.

  





















Today's Rune: Gateway.

Homeland Insecurity: Israel Palestine

Fraught with emotion, turmoil and global complexity: the nexus of the "homeland" concept with two overlapping, conflicting realities, Israel and Palestine.

The Google Ngram above (created by simply plugging in the terms "Israel" and "Palestine") very clearly indicates that the nation-concept of Israel became, in the corpus of American English texts digitized by Google,  the more widely used one, starting in or around 1948, the year Israel became first recognized as a modern nation state, and the concept of Palestine became phantomized.

In British English texts, there's a little more lag time. Why? Probably because, until 1948, the British Mandate for Palestine was the externally accepted narrative, then displaced by Israel-Palestine. Even so, by 1950, Israel overtakes Palestine in textual discussions.

The British Empire's direct influence in the region peaked from near the end of the First World War (1914-1918) until around sometime in the 1950s. British economic and political interests remain, though, at the beginning of the 21st century.  

The proposed partition of Israel-Palestine in 1947 looks like a mess even at a rearview glance. As of 2011, Humpty Dumpty has yet to be pieced together again, but a globally recognized State of Palestine is in the pipeline.

Today's Rune: Movement.  

Blood and Oil: The Middle East in World War I

Blood and Oil: The Middle East in World War I: A Film by Marty Callaghan (The Minutes of History Series, 2006) gives a rare and helpful overview of the catastrophic human disaster called variously the Great War, the First World War and World War I -- from the perspective of the "Middle East" and "Near East." With so much ground to cover, it focuses on the Turkish Ottoman Empire and its regrouping as modern Turkey; the British Empire; the Russian Empire; the Arab revolt; the geo-strategic fight over resources (Suez Canal, Dardanelles, Persian Gulf, fresh water sources, petroleum); and to a lesser extent, the French Empire, the German Empire, Persia-Iran, the Kurds, Greeks, Italians, Armenians, Jews and Indian troops.

Even a cursory watch will help viewers trace the connection of 1914-1918 and continued warring into the 1920s as set-up for today's turmoil in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Israel, Gaza, Libya, Egypt and so on, including Kurdish guerilla activity. Blood and Oil does a fine job showing why Turkey remains an important regional power, though it never directly deals with the Armenian Genocide, and it might have been expanded to include North African fighting in places like Libya. 

Today's Rune: Possessions.  

Decoration Day: Im Westen Nichts Neues

Coming at you from Saxapahaw, a salute on Decoration Day. Despite long wars of dubious worth fought in multiple tours by volunteer military forces supplemented by better-paid latter day Hessians; the Seaborne Toxic Event; and disarray, mayhem and general global weirdness -- all in all, it's been a good day in the here and now. Hope all are well out there, fighting the good fight or peaceably assembling something for the ages. Until next time, adieu. I made it!













These days, things are quiet not in the West, nor in the East, not in the North nor in the South.  Stay strong: there are many more fights to come, and on all fronts.  George Orwell and Aldous Huxley called it, both.

Today's Rune: Growth.

Dark Star: Full Spectrum Dominance

We live in a chilling world where nobody really knows what exactly is going on or where we're going. Economically, militarily -- or personally. A dog cloned for $155,000. Secret operations, psyops, super-hacking, disruptions in the food chain. Post-traumatic stress syndrome, military suicides. Vaporized investments.

Full Spectrum Dominance: dominating a battlefield, a zone, a region, an occupied territory. Toy robots, Dark Star, remote-controlled Predator drones, Hellfire missile systems, Global Hawk. Even the names are chilling. And what country produced these infernal systems? The USA. Look at Israel's "operations" in Gaza, and wonder who's who.

What do enemies do? Hide in the rubble, hide among civilians. Why? Because they would be slaughtered in a conventional fight, like Iraqi soldiers on the Highway of Death in 1991. Counter with primitive means -- suicide bombers, an endless supply of individual kamikazes. Their most effective weapons over the long-term? Tenacity and economic attrition. Entropy. For the rest of our lives. Unless peace can be found with equal tenacity, plus a tinge of the miraculous -- as in Northern Ireland. Who would have thought those "Troubles" would ever end? So, too, it could happen in and around Israel and Palestine. If there's a will, there's a way.

















The US needs to continue supporting Israel, but it must also use its support as leverage. As with Ireland, the US must play heavy to broker a negotiated settlement. Because Full Spectral Dominance may win in the short term, but it probably cannot in the long-term. Grinding attrition trumps technological edge, and demographics favor the now weak in the long run. Empires rise and empires fall. What is left is a rump state, or nothing at all but cultural diffusion, or a lingering spectral presence.

(Pictured at top: Rahul Mahajan, Full Spectrum Dominance: U.S. Power in Iraq and Beyond (2003).

Today's Rune: Wholeness.

Tunnels and People

Tunnels for hiding, tunnels for smuggling. Tunnels for sneaking, tunnels for trading. Tunnels to get under things, tunnels to keep things running. Tunnels to hide from ice and snow, tunnels to move people from point A to point B. Tunnels that move water, tunnels that go under water. Tunnels that go through mountains, tunnels that collapse mountains. Tunnels for escaping, tunnels for blowing things up.

In my lifetime to date, I've seen tunnels constructed by French people, Germans, Americans, Romans, British. I know about tunnels built by Palestinians, Vietnamese, Japanese. I've seen the surface reminders of coal mines, kinds worked in by members of my own family. I know of the salt mines below Detroit. I've seen catacombs in France and Italy. I've seen underground tunnels and fallout shelters under Duke University, and connecting tunnels under Macomb Community College in Warren, Michigan. Somewhere there's Super 8mm footage of me and some friends under Duke, a sort of short science fiction film shot more than thirty years ago. I've seen underground caches of food, water and Geiger counters, enough for a long siege if not a nuclear holocaust. Tunnels never cease to amaze me.










Tunnels are examples of human ingenuity equalled or surpassed only by human stupidity, insanity, and misery in their use and/or in their destruction. Little wonder that human ingenuity is sometimes called infernal; certainly its uglier ramifications often come out that way, whether they were intended to or not.

Today's Rune: The Mystery Rune.

Welcome to the Working Week

The Israeli-launched "Operation Cast Lead" reminds me of the Second Seminole War of 1837-1842 in its existential dimensions. We know how that one ended eventually -- with the Seminole Indian Tribe of Florida acquiring the Hard Rock Cafe chain in 2006. Seminoles still abide in Florida, along with Miami and Disney World.

Israel has nowhere like Oklahoma (aka Indian Territory) to remove many Palestinians to via a Trail of Tears. They will have to cut a deal right in Gaza, right in the West Bank. They will not destroy Hamas. The best approaches are political ones, and economic revitalization. Maybe there will be casinos there, too, one day, only with an Islamic tinge.

Here's to the Obama Administration doing better than the Bush-Cheney people. Jimmy Carter managed to help broker a sort of peace between Egypt and Israel, and Obama is undoubtedly aiming to do the same on a more comprehensive scale once he takes office. Which the Israelis obviously realize, given the timing of this military "operation."

Hamas wins 1) if they can still lob rockets on the last day of fighting; 2) more than one hundred Israelis are killed during this window of warring (as of this post, five Israeli soldiers have been killed) 3) Hamas survives as a political entity. My prediction: Hamas achieves at least two out of three of these.


















Today's Rune: Warrior.

One More Bloodbath for the Road

Right up to their last days, everything the Bush-Cheney people and their allies touch turns into blood and shit.

I don't know which is worse, Bush's bufoonishly naive "beliefs" or Cheney's depraved and utterly destructive "we good/they bad" worldview.

Does anyone else remember this gem? "President Bush Predicts Middle East Peace Deal" (Telegraph, January 11, 2008): "President George W. Bush has predicted that a Middle East peace treaty will be signed by the time he leaves office, while on a visit to Israel. . . 'I'm on a timetable,' he told reporters. 'I've got 12 months.' . . . 'I believe it's possible - not only possible, I believe it's going to happen - that there [will] be a signed peace treaty by the time I leave office (in January 2009).'"

We have a little over two more weeks to go and can only hope that Prick Cheney doesn't have his way. He'd have a U.S.-approved Israeli air strike against Iran before he heads back for the cowboy hills. If such was the case, Gaza would merely be a diversion (albeit a savage and brutal one) for even bigger fireworks to come.




















These idiots have ineptly sponsored wars from Somalia to Pakistan, from Georgia to Iraq, from Lebanon to Afghanistan -- all of them epic disasters now and unpardonable clusterfucks. Condoleezza Rice is a worthless Secretary of State, a feckless stooge. What a gargantuan shit storm the incoming administration will have to deal with! God help the civilians caught in the crossfire in Gaza and everywhere. Indeed, God help us all.

Today's Rune: Opening.

Ten Eyes for an Eye

And so the sickening cycle continues. Happy freaking holidays, world. Violence and more violence, and the Earth does not yet stand still. An Israeli assault on Gaza, operation ten eyes gouged out for every one and no peace in sight.











Conflict from Somalia, which may revert to square one just two years after a U.S.-backed Ethiopian blitzkrieg intended to permanently topple the Islamic Courts; through the Middle East and Afghanistan; through the Khyber Pass to Pakistan and India, where armies as large or larger than that of the US (still, itself, mostly bogged down in the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan) face off in an exercise of saber rattling or downward-spiraling miscalculation. And so it goes to Sri Lanka, former home of Arthur C. Clark, where Tamil Tigers fight on against government onslaught. And so it goes.









Where are the peacemakers?




















Today's Rune: Initiation.

RoboCop Now: The Militarization of "Homeland" Police

The dystopian security situation of Metro Detroit depicted in RoboCop (1987) is getting way closer to reality. Thanks to Department of Homeland Security grants of tax payers' money (and Chinese creditors), local police are acquiring high tech weapons systems like the General Purpose Vehicle (GPV) pictured above and recently in the Detroit News. Cost per unit: $542,000. Forget the Hummer, this cumbersome contraption gets 7 miles per gallon but supposedly could operate in NBC (Nuclear, Biological and Chemical) conditions. Doesn't that bring joy to the hearts of struggling ordinary citizens? The Warren Police Department has already deployed "The Sergeant," even while the number of human officers there and elsewhere have been reduced since 9/11. Now we can live in trepidation just like ordinary Iraqis! We can enjoy technologically enhanced harassment at border crossings coming back from Canada (which as we all know has been a constant menace since the War of 1812) or flying to another city within the USA. Land of the free, home of the brave. And WTF, the Macomb County Sheriff's Department also has on hand an M-1 Abrams Main Battle Tank. . . . .


RoboCop posits police and security operations privatized and controlled by Omni Consumer Products (OCP) and damn if this doesn't seem eerily like the present (who can tell the difference between the government and "private security" enterprises any more?). Just make sure you aren't labelled a "criminal" or "bad guy" a la the moronic language used by US and Iraqi military mouthpieces. Let's not forget that one of the black letter signs of fascism is, in Umberto Eco's words, "impoverished vocabulary." (Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt, 1995).

For more on such real life RoboCop developments, see: Francis X. Donnelly and Charles E. Ramirez, "The Sergeant: It's one mean fighting machine, but some police departments would just like to have more officers," The Detroit News, 4/24/2008 and Norb Franz, "Force is with cops. Built in New Haven, armored rig seats 12, costs $542,000," Macomb Daily, 4/3/2008: ("To some criminals, the 33,000-pound vehicle that seats up to 12 may appear imposing: a battering ram on the front, 24 feet long, 8 1/2 feet tall, flat black paint with no decals and 10 weapon ports, all sitting on six wheels.")

I don't mind the idea of behind the scenes special operations (as in 007 tales) when necessary -- but when excessive force gets thrown in our faces, one must wonder whether 1) "The terrorists have won," and 2) Is this another example of squandering finite resources? I certainly don't want to see Predator Drones firing Hellfire missiles in my neighborhood. Detroit is already too close to being treated like the Gaza Strip. Enough is enough. Back it off, man.

Today's Rune: Growth.

A Way of Escape

It's one of the damnedest things I've ever seen images of: before dawn today, Palestinians facing the Egyptian side of the Gaza Strip blasted holes through borderline retention walls and poured into Egypt for food and other supplies. The Egyptian government turned the other cheek and let them come through. The Israeli government on the other Gaza border had cut electricity in the territory amid aggressive military forays throughout the rest of Gaza: to those Palestinians living there, enough was enough.


Above: Like in some science fiction escape from alien invasion, Palestinians pour through a breach in the Gaza Strip boundary wall. (Source: Naaman Omar, Bloomberg News; map source: CIA)

Leading up to today's wild action, the Israeli government had violated a basic tenet of Sun Tzu's Art of War: "To a surrounded enemy, you must leave a way of escape." Instead, the Palestinians blasted out their own way of escape. Now the Israelis are complaining that weapons will be smuggled into Gaza amid the turmoil unless Egypt "cracks down" . . .

In 2006, Israel's top leadership violated several other tenets of the art of war when they tried to destroy Hezbollah in Lebanon without considering the backlash. I guess with their pals Bush and Cheney still in the White House, reckless behavior is the norm. Most Americans probably don't know that Israeli President Moshe Katsaw was forced to resign his post last year in the face of rape charges. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's approval ratings in Israel are even worse than the Bush-Cheney duo's in the USA -- last year, they dipped to 3% (Source: "Olmert Under Fire," Time, May 3, 2007).

Why are these jerks still running countries? Luckily there's a potential way of escape for many Americans -- the 2008 election cycle. Israelis will have to find their own way out via parliamentary politics. As for the divided Palestinians and Lebanese, who knows what's next?

Today's Rune: Wholeness.

The Ides of June

In case anyone hasn't noticed the Hamas (Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya) vs. Fatah (Harakat al-Tahrir al-Watani al-Filastini) civil war in the Palestinian territories, Hamas just seized power in the Gaza Strip, leaving Fatah to attempt consolidating what's left of their power in the West Bank. Meanwhile, Lebanon is anything but stable, with Hezbollah still very much in position after fighting Israel to a standstill last year; while today in the Nahr Al Bared Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon, the Al Qaeda-aligned Fatah Al Islam crew continues to entangle Lebanese Army troops in ferocious combat. Palestinian fighters of the more radical variety must feel all proud now, proving that when sufficiently armed and trained, they can fight as well as anyone else.

What does it all mean? These latest developments in the Middle East are more symptoms of festering, unresolved struggles over land, resources, and raw power. But you know, the invasion of Iraq solved everything, yes? Let's not forget Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey, the Kurds, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Somalia, and the rest of the blood-soaked daisy chain. Clearly, it's going to be a long summer.

Today's Rune: Harvest.

Birthdays: Edvard Grieg, Ramón López Velarde, Erik Erikson, Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov, Lash La Rue, Alberto Sordi, Mario Cuomo, Waylon Jennings, Harry Nilsson, Xaviera Hollander (b. Vera de Vries), Nicola Pagett, Michèle Laroque, Helen Hunt, Idalis DeLeon, Pia Miranda, Elizabeth Reaser, Nina Liu, Cara Zavaleta.

Where's the Beef?

There are two things we Americans hold dear to our hearts: TV and mobility.

Sick of all the smoke, mirrors and general b.s. about all the changes in the works, I did a little research and came up with a few essential facts according to the latest policies.

Traditional analog TV broadcasts will end "no later than February 17, 2009." This means that everyone who wants to watch TV in the USA will need to convert to digital TVs or have digital converters within the next two years. I'd wait until they make us do it in 2009 or later (if there are political delays).

New passport laws: According to the U.S. State Department (verbatim):

Beginning January 23, 2007, ALL persons, including U.S. citizens, traveling by air [emphasis added] between the United States and Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and Bermuda will be required to present a valid passport, Air NEXUS card, or U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Mariner Document, or an Alien Registration Card, Form I-551, if applicable.

As early as January 1, 2008, ALL persons, including U.S. citizens, traveling between the U.S. and Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and Bermuda by land or sea (including ferries), may be required to present a valid passport or other documents as determined by the Department of Homeland Security. While recent legislative changes permit a later deadline, the Departments of State and Homeland Security are working to meet all requirements as soon as possible. Ample advance notice will be provided to enable the public to obtain passports or passport cards for land/sea entries.

Finally, here are the State Department's places to avoid. Notably, Cuba is not on the list, though you're still supposed to sneak into that colorful country via Canada or Mexico or elsewhere. And we can't, ridiculously, legally buy Cuban cigars, even though Detroiters can safely smoke them in Windsor or anywhere else in Canada. Too bad the Loyalists didn't win back in the day. We might now have a multi-party system and a truly representative parliament if they had instead of a bogus two-party farce. And the right to smoke the best cigars in the world in our own homes.

Iraq and Afghanistan are on the list. I wonder of any of the Poor Bloody Infantry have pointed this out to their commanders, and with what success?

Current Travel Warnings

Travel Warnings are issued when the State Department recommends that Americans avoid a certain country. The countries listed below are currently on that list. . . . .

Lebanon 12/22/2006
Algeria 12/20/2006
Central African Republic 12/19/2006
Saudi Arabia 12/19/2006
Congo, Democratic Republic of the 12/18/2006
Côte d'Ivoire 12/18/2006
Nepal 12/08/2006
Pakistan 12/05/2006
Chad 11/20/2006
Syria 11/13/2006
East Timor 11/01/2006
Sri Lanka 10/23/2006
Yemen 10/13/2006
Iran 10/10/2006
Sudan 10/05/2006
Uzbekistan 10/04/2006
Syria 09/14/2006
Israel, the West Bank and Gaza 08/29/2006
Iraq 08/28/2006
Nigeria 08/24/2006
Kenya 08/10/2006
Haiti 07/07/2006
Burundi 06/23/2006
Afghanistan 06/22/2006
Philippines 06/16/2006
Eritrea 06/05/2006
Somalia 06/05/2006
Bosnia-Herzegovina 03/30/2006
Liberia 03/30/2006
Colombia 01/18/2006
Indonesia 11/18/2005

Today's Rune: Breakthrough.

Bon Voyage -- if you're allowed to leave the country.

Mass Myopia

The news, dear readers, is myopic. Take one variable: population. The following are sample national estimates for 2003 (in millions) taken from UN sources and from The Economist. How should we suppose these estimates will change over say, the next fifty years? It's good to keep some perspective for our viewfinders.

China 1,304.2
India 1,065.5
USA 294.0
Brazil 178.5
Pakistan 153.6
Russia 143.2
Egypt 71.9
Turkey 71.3
Ethiopia 70.7
Iran 68.9
France 60.1
United Kingdom 59.3
Italy 57.4
South Korea 47.7
Spain 41.1
Sudan 33.6
Algeria 31.8
Canada 31.5
Morocco 30.6
Uzbekistan 26.1
Iraq 25.2
Saudi Arabia 24.2
Afganistan 23.9
North Korea 22.7
Taiwan 22.5
Yemen 20.0
Syria 17.8
Kazakhstan 15.4
Portugal 10.1
Somalia 9.9
Tunisia 9.8
Israel 6.4
Libya 5.6
Jordan 5.5
Georgia 5.1
Lebanon 3.7
West Bank and Gaza 3.6
Armenia 3.1
Kuwait 2.5

If one glances at the bottom of the list and compares the figures with recent headlines, one can see that when the Israelis lose nine killed in action in one day of fighting against Hezbollah guerillas, it is comparable to the U.S.A. losing about 450 troops K.I.A. in one day. So far, the U.S. has suffered about 2,570 K.I.A. and nearly 19,000 W.I.A. in Iraq in the last three years. The Israeli Army is facing an intense foe and are finding themselves in a nasty little war. The Lebanese have suffered worse than the Americans did during the 9/11 attacks by far in the last couple of weeks, proportionally. We'll see what happens next; but meanwhile, let's not lose sight of the rest of the world. There's a lot more going on than Israel and Lebanon. And just wait until 2025 or so, if we make it!

Hasta La Vista!