OT: Random Notes

I don't get into "Who Shot Kennedy?" and 9/11 Conspiracy Theories and whatnot for a very simple reason: While the speculation is all very interesting, it is pure and unresolvable speculation in my view, argument, in essence, for it's own sake, that cannot lead us forward, back, or anywhere at all. I enjoy the speculation -- for its own sake -- but I don't believe the arguments put forth are the answer or even necessarily true.

For example, almost immediately after the 9/11 attacks, websites went up -- I remember one in particular in France -- that proposed that what we were being told was not what really happened at all (yes, well, that's fairly obvious, isn't it?) and that this conspiracy website had the real story. I immediately suspected a Black Op from one of the shadowy Black Budget operations our government (and other governments) so eagerly fund to... obscure the Truth, if there is any, and spread lies and propaganda all the while. Soon enough, all kinds of conspiratorial cornpone arose over the question of "What Really Happened" (including a website called WhatReallyHappened.org) on 9/11 and at every other time the inexplicable transpires. Truth? Well, there's probably some in there... yup. Sure. But we have a tough enough time decoding our Pravdas on the Potomac and on the Hudson (let alone wading through the contemptuous vomit and shit of the teevee "news") to pick out bits and fragments of Truth that show up on Conspiracy Day "news" sites.

As for 9/11, I know what I saw with my own eyes on the teevee and within the Federal employee working environment I was part of then. I know what I saw, felt, and did. Beyond that? Not a lot. I know I don't believe the Official Story, but who in their right mind would? The question is not whether the Government lies -- of course they do -- it's a question of whether there even is a Real Truth, beyond the lies, that is discoverable by you or by me. Maybe there is. But more than likely, you and I are just going down a Rabbit Hole. If that's your bliss, by all means, be my guest. Please report back! But don't expect me to go with you.

Conspiratism -- is that what it's called? -- reminds me a little bit of the British passion for such esoterica as "Ley Lines" on the landscape of Britian and the apparent geometric alignments of various things on Mars and other exotic places. The best known aspect of this sometimes obsessive interest in that which is not understood is the Face on Mars, about which a number of people were able to make lucrative careers for years.

Back in the day, one of the early websites I put up, even before Blogger came on the scene, was about Mars, and it included extensive speculation by scientists and laypeople about what might be transpiring there now, and what sort of history might have occurred in the past.

The Face figured, but not prominently. My interest lay more in the whole area around the Face, and in the nature of the landscape and Martian geology itself. Acidalia Planitia is not like anyplace you would find on Earth, and it was my position, regardless of the Face, that it should be explored and explained for its own sake.

Unfortunately, that has never happened to any great extent. I am little better informed about the nature of the landscape and highly evocative and curious geology of Acidalia Planitia on Mars today than I was 30 years ago. The obsessive interest in the Face and the various associated Cities and Forts and Alignments and whatnot and what they were and what weren't -- but not so much in what they are -- is part of the reason why.

In other words, these obsessions are distractions -- sometimes deliberately put before us, sometimes not -- that serve to obscure the truth.

Apparently the Distraction Formula is being applied with a vengeance with regard to the numerous uprisings and revolts taking place in North Africa and the Middle East as well as the Middle West of our own country, right along with all sorts of Conspiracy Theories. It really does seem to be a Formula for Dismissal of Popular Protest that every authoritarian/autocratic government and its minions engage in.

We saw it in stark operation in Egypt, during its recent revolt against the Mubarak Regime. And we see the same sort of denial and distraction and assertions of Conspiracies of All Kinds in Libya today.

But we also see it in Scott Walker's Wisconsin. He's distracting and asserting Conspiracies Most Foul by Outside Agitators, just like Mubarak and Gaddafi have done. The parallels are remarkable. That's why I say it is a Formula. But then, Walker's opponents have adopted some of the same Formula in attributing so much power over events in Wisconsin to the Koch Brothers -- Who Are Most Foul and Evil.

Almost immediately, we fall into a situation where there is no resolution because we are caught up almost entirely in minutiae. It isn't really about Scott Walker or the Koch Brothers, it's about what kind of nation we want and what we have to do to get there.

It's not about them in other words, it's about us.

All right, I've said my piece about that. Carry on.

"Exterminate All The Brutes!"

The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan (not to mention our other overseas Imperial adventures in Somalia and various former Soviet Republics) are heating up again; "fighting season" they call it, like our own crippled "summer driving season." And the Imperial answer is to kill them all. Obliterate the native foe. Exterminate the brutes.

After a NATO outpost was overrun by "Taliban" in Afghanistan killing 9 American troops, wounding 15, (oddly only a day or so after yet another wedding party was exterminated by air power, 50-60 dead, dozens wounded, all civilians, all headed to a wedding) the first stories I heard about it on the radio suggested that revenge was swift, that the village where the insurgents had supposedly come from had been leveled, and all its inhabitants killed. Never heard that story again. No, later stories said the outpost had been abandoned and there was no hint of "revenge."

But these are Imperial times, and the Empire is not to be denied; we can be certain there was swift and brutal retaliation, many natives slaughtered, and so it will go until the slaughterers are exhausted, the slaughterers on both sides, for resistance to Imperial assimilation has become a very serious cause among the jibbering natives of far away lands. And they have honed their resistance efforts to cause maximum discomfort to their Imperial foe, with minimal outlay.

It's been plain for some time that a slow-motion depopulation of Mesopotamia is a desired outcome of the 2003 American-led invasion; there is no Imperial need for a "population" there in any case, only some workers to man the oil industry, and that's about it. Everyone else is superfluous, so, let them go away or die, since they have no appreciation for their Liberation, no language, no culure, no religion that would permit them to become Civilized through the gentle ministrations of chain-guns and AC-130 gunships; let them be gone.

And so it is. Millions -- millions -- of refugees; a million or more dead; many, many wounded; orphans, widows everywhere; the smell of death is the first thing people notice when arriving in Iraq. The whole place stinks of carnage.

And they call this "progress." Of course they do! The fewer Iraqi devils they have to deal with, the less time it will take to consolidate the tribute and the treasure that is the Imperial due.

The same treatment has been applied in Somalia; soon, there will be similar moves in Afghanistan, since once again, the jibbering natives don't appreciate their Liberation sufficiently to be allowed to live.

And make no mistake: this is the policy of the United States of America. You may not agree with it, but you have no effective say in the matter. Your voice will not be heard, even if your voice rises with tens of millions of others, an outcry from the deepest soul of America, it doesn't matter. Your objection is of no consequence.

The Empire is not to be denied.

But, bbut, bbbut elections!!! More and Better Democrats! O-ba-ma!

Sigh.

The naivete of "Progressives" is sometimes striking. After all these years of experience -- how can "Progressives" still believe that "elections" and/or charismatic Leaders will somehow alter the course of Imperial expansion?

Well, they say, we have to give it Time; we didn't get in to this mess quickly; we won't get out of it for many years, decades, generations, centuries. We have to keep at the task of supporting and electing More and Better Democrats and Pushing Our Agenda. Eventually this dreadful phase will be over.

In fact, we did get into this Imperial mess at home and abroad very quickly indeed, and we can get out of it almost as quickly, but there is a narrative in Progressive Blogistan that overrides everything else. It is a narrative in which losses are "wins" -- because every loss is a Learning Experience; there was no Knowledge before Progressives began to become active in politics. It is a narrative in which the metaphor of the Task We Face is "turning the ship of state" -- which obviously cannot be done quickly; it must be done in "inches" and "baby steps," ever so slowly, ever so cautiously, and it will take many, many, many years. It is a narrative in which people who are not satisfied with the pace of positive change are called "childish" for wanting everything NOW, and not "understanding" -- like adults do -- that it takes time to accomplish objectives, and there hasn't been nearly enough time for all the things we ALL want to have a chance of coming true; it is a narrative which proposes that we are up against a "Village" of gasbags and chatterati and compromised electeds who gossip and preen for one another, but who we make allowances for and gently mock and ridicule, but it's just a "Village," so there's no real reason to take it all that seriously. What can they do, after all but gossip and preen? And what's the real harm in that?

Our warriors are to be pitied for the abuses they suffer. Our banks are to be -- gently -- reregulated for their own good. The economic catastrophe yawning before us is to be parceled into discreet segments to be dealt with in turn, eventually, but a wholistic approach is to be avoided at all costs. Those who suffer are to be empathized with -- or blamed for their own misfortune -- depending on who they are and what their specific situation is.

The Constitution is to be fiercely defended, though there is no popular constituency for it.

And above all, the narrative elevates the Argument to the pinnacle of endeavor. The Argument, the Rational Examination of Opposing Views, can -- and must -- go on forever, passionately but rationally, an endless scrutiny, with never a decision or action beyond it.

While we're arguing, the Brutes continue to be exterminated.

The Perfect shall never again be the enemy of the Good.