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Posted August 29, 2002
Volunteer
While you and others are being distracted by this possible war in Iraq, the Bushies have laid the groundwork: political, military, financial, for a disastrous US involvement in war in Colombia, Peru, Bolivia. I think you should pay more attention to the Andes, because this one will not be a Desert Storm.
Managing editor Eric Garris replies:
We have tried to keep up with it, but please send along (egarris@antiwar.com) additional stories you find. We are reliant on volunteer researchers.
Why the Anonymity?
Yesterday [August 24] here on Backtalk I read a letter signed by Patrick B., US Navy (retired). It was titled "What Happened?"
Mr. B. asks what has happened to America? Why do we silently let Mr. Bush step on international law, etc? I think I know the answer. Mr. B, a Navy man, who most probably risked his life during his service, was brave and bold at the time. Why is he so timid now? Why the anonymity? And it's everywhere -- people do not sign their real names, hiding behind some abbreviations. Some time ago I posted here on Backtalk with my real name and address and guess what? Backtalk removed it! I am sure they meant well, but I had to complain to get them put it back!
If the government sees that the voices of opposition are so timid that they are afraid to sign under their own words, they know they can push further. I know that as a former Soviet citizen. If we are afraid to sign our names below our words, we do not fulfill our obligation to support and protect the US Constitution. One cannot protect Freedom without boldly taking a stand and also taking a risk that the enemies of Freedom may attack you for that. If we are not ready to take that risk and be ready to sacrifice everything, including our lives, for Constitution and Freedom, we deserve the treatment that they give us now. The words of B. Franklin on Liberty and security are well known (or should be known): They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.
~ Alex Chaihorsky, Reno, Nevada
Backtalk editor Sam Koritz replies:
We gladly include last names, location information, and, when requested, e-mail addresses, but we do tend to err on the side of privacy when a letter-writer's intentions are in doubt.
Incidentally, assistant webmaster Jeremy Sapienza will be managing this section for the next couple of weeks while I'm on vacation, so replies to any letters regarding Backtalk policies may be delayed until mid-September.
Concoction of Cultures
[Regarding Mladen K.'s letter of August 24, which stated that:]
"Just because we speak Slavic that doesn't mean we aren't Macedonian, Egyptians speak Arabic which is not the same as ancient Egyptian; I don't see anyone questioning them."
...Indeed, the Macedonians are as much ethnically Macedonian as the Egyptians are ethnically Egyptian. No serious historian would say the ancient Egyptian civilization was created by a single ethnos. Rather, they would say to you that they have no idea what the ethnicity of the Egyptians was and whether it had anything to do with the modern Egyptians (same with the Hellenes and the modern Greeks), but they would say one thing for sure: that the unique civilization was definitely the result of a concoction of cultures and traditions, just as the civilization of Babylon. It was no single ethnos that created them both.
The idea of a pure ethnos as surviving and standing against all others, and at the same time creating a unique culture, is a twentieth century invention (and an illusion), and I guess you know where it led us all. So although you would like to believe in something else, the culture of your people is based on the cultures of all the peoples that preceded it on this territory while ethnically you are clearly most strongly related to the Bulgarians. I hate to say it, but your language is not quite Slavic -- it has too many ancient Indo-Iranian words and too much of a Protobulgarian, non-Slavic grammar to be called clearly Slavic. The Greek influences are, of course, also not excluded, but they hardly reach the kernel of your language. ...
Smokescreen for Intervention
Steven Small (["Public Goods,"] Backtalk, August 24) continues to misapprehend the issues involved in discussing the nature and legitimacy of the State. He simply asserts that government is akin to a corporation because, just as we can choose from a multitude of products on the market, we can choose from a multitude of candidates in elections. As such, he confuses the market, which involves voluntary exchanges of (presumably justly-held) property, with the political arena, which involves in essence a competition for the property of others, coercively obtained. He does not explain how things can become property in the first place, and how government is consistent with that process.
It is irrelevant whether "we" can freely vote in elections if the government itself retains a monopoly on judicial and protective services. Changing the face of the beast does not change its nature. ...
He again provides a false analogy: his landlord increasing his rent does not involve the landlord unilaterally deciding that Mr. Small is in violation of the contract between them, as Mr. Small is not entitled to access to the landlord's property without the landlord's consent. Indeed, Mr. Small has not even addressed the main point: that contracting presupposes the justifiable use of property, and it is invalid to simply assume, as he does, that the government justly holds any property simply on the basis of people consenting to its dictates. Labeling certain goods "public" may provide a smokescreen for government intervention, but it does not establish any sort of "contract." (Mr. Small should also note that the point is not that public goods have "no value," but that the very concept of a public good is vacuous.)
No Contract
[Regarding Steven Small's letter of August 24:]
Only one institution compels
us to deal exclusively with it under threat of force. That's government.
There is no contract, implicit or otherwise between the individual and
the state.
Voting is meaningless since it only confirms who is to rule us via the force of the state. It's like changing the safety pin and leaving the dirty diaper on. You can always get a new landlord, try getting an alternate deliverer of protection services!
Small's comments on public goods make no more sense than the concept itself.
In a free society goods are manufactured and distributed through a complex set of voluntary relationships called the free market.
Small absurdly tries to imply that advocates of the free market believe in the labor theory of value, again the exact opposite of the truth. See Rothbard's Man, Economy and State.
Small has it exactly backwards, so-called "public goods" are supported via the theft of taxation.... The free market could function fine without any "public," i.e. state, goods. That unjust practices are "currently" occurring does not mean we have to accept them. Quite the contrary. The government has no moral right to our wealth and we are justified in taking the necessary measures to secure our property from the thugs of the state.
~ Michael Hardesty, Oakland, California
Neocon Hell
It is wrong to cast Christopher Hitchens into the Circle of Hell reserved for the Neocons. He is being knee-jerk and admitting it. Besides we should all be for regime change in Iraq, just not one brought about through the expansion of empire and the destruction of international law, and countless lives.
Hitchens recent superb article in Vanity Fair on anti-Semitism hardly shows him to be a neocon. (By the way, is the antiwar party labeling someone a "neocon" the rhetorical inverse of the neocons labeling dissenters anti-Semites?)
Hot Potato
I was sent the item "What's Up With the Saudis?," it is getting more of a political hot potato, my ex-husband and father of my kids Mr. James Cottle has been imprisoned there since last June and he to confessed to planting bombs in the same rehearsed way as Sandy. It has been a battle talking to Government and FO officials, nothing but lies and cover-ups. There is an article on the world Human Rights Watch web site about Mr. Cottle and the others. They were tortured. I have the defence papers now that the lawyers are involved. I met with lawyers this week in London and trust them more than our FO now as my government didn't want me to see them. When they get released all this is going to blow the lid. We were told last year that staying silent would help but in January I sought help from the press and more has happened since that than at anytime, they have recently been able to share a cell with one other person but for months it was solitary and mistreatment -- the Saudi's have and are getting away with this and will in the future. I am glad that there are people like you to highlight this and I have also heard that Sedlack was out of the back door from people who knew him. Yes, where is he now what does he know about this?
Humongous Job
...[I'm] a member of Connecticut Peace Activists; we plan to organize a series of workshops aimed at elevating the local clergy to current events from the standpoint of the real truth in the Middle East. I know this will be a humongous job but maybe it will work. ... So much that is extremely important is happening and TV just doesn't cut it -- it's really a laugh what they air on most channels and they mean we should take it seriously!
Hope to assist financially in near future but I sent Cynthia McKinney $100 and that pretty much wrecks my immediate donations budget.
Congress's Power
President Bush's advisors claim he can attack Iraq under authority granted by either of two active congressional resolutions. Many in congress believe Bush needs congressional approval to attack Iraq. Congress should immediately vote to rescind the two questionable resolutions and replace them with a single joint resolution clearly stating congress's power. If Bush vetoes that replacement resolution, then Americans can brace themselves for an attempt by Bush to establish a fascist state.
...The U.S. refuses to allow inspection of its nuclear, chemical, or biological warfare arsenals, or to destroy the nuclear warheads it now possesses. Without inspection and destruction of America's weapons of mass destruction, the world cannot be safe. Who knows, the US might strike at any nation that displeases it. Just last week, US Secretary of State Colin Powell warned Washington "reserves the right" to overthrow all regimes it considers a danger.
As for terrorism, the US has sponsored terrorist groups here in Iraq, in Iran, Libya, Cuba, El Salvador, Congo, Nicaragua, Angola, Sudan, and Indonesia. The US tried to assassinate Egypt's president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Iran's Islamic leadership, that crazy Khadaffi in Libya. Nearly every one of American's wars were for some kind of trade advantage or money or for territory or oil! My God, how many wars have been fought in the name of freedom? ...American people are slaves too, total slaves of their government. Taxes and burdens are so heavy that they're working totally for the government half the time just to pay their taxes....
~ Ted Rudow III, MA, California