The Canadian Manifesto 7: From the Book of Genesis

The idea of a "new conservatism" took root after World War II, ignited by the fear of Communism. But it was Irving Kristol, a former Trotskyite, who first promoted the idea of creating a political movement under the banner of Neoconservatism.

A confirmed Straussian, it was Kristol who suggested that they team up with the Religious Right, following Leo Strauss's axiom that religion was necessary to control the masses.

According to Shadia Drury in her book , Leo Strauss and the American Right:

...Kristol shares Strauss's view that a healthy dose of religious enthusiasm is indispensable for transcending the nihilism that is at the root of America's troubles. He is so convinced of the political utility of religion that he is blind to the immoderate nature of groups such as the Moral Majority of Jerry Falwell or the Christian Coalition of Pat Robertson and Ralph Reed. Kristol has encouraged the Republican party to embrace the religious right; and the party has been listening. (1)

Stephen Harper has also been listening, telling his followers to forget the tired wish list of the fiscal conservatives, and embrace the ideology of the social conservatives, or what he calls "theocons", as a route to holding on to power. (2)

It's important to understand that the tenets of religion are immaterial. Both Kristol and Strauss were Jewish, and Strauss himself claimed not to understand Christianity, believing it to be rather foolish.

Says Drury: 'Strauss believes that a healthy society is one that is bound together by a single authoritative truth that provides the citizens with shared values and a common way of life'.

He saw an irresolvable conflict between the interests of the individual and the interests of society, and felt that the conflict could only be resolved,

...by lies and deceptions, and that the greatest among these is religion. The reason is that human beings are selfish and self-centered and will not be willing to sacrifice themselves for others in the absence of belief in a god who punishes the wicked and rewards the just. Further, Strauss believes that the existence of such a god cannot be established by reason or philosophy. The gods of "shuddering awe" are necessary to civilize humanity and to turn natural savages into husbands, fathers, and citizens. What is needed is something grand enough to capture the human imagination, something magnificent and majestic, something splendid and sublime, such as Judaism, Christianity, or Islam.(3)

And yet we are witnessing the results of too much religion that has manifested itself in terrorism, both foreign and domestic.

Following Francis Schaeffer's belief in the necessity of a Northern European* (which includes Canada, Australia and New Zealand) revolution to turn this cabal of states into a Christian theocracy, the Neocons have selected that particular religion, while bringing Judaism along for the ride, with both fighting the forces of Islam, in what they call "a clash of civilizations".

Recently, Stephen Harper claimed that 'Islamicism' is the biggest threat to Canada. The religion. And he promises to bring back tough Patriot Act style legislation, no doubt targeting all who practice the faith.

In Canada.

It breaks my heart.

So What's Wrong With a Christian Nation?

Nothing. Many former leaders have been guided by faith. Tommy Douglas was Evangelical and gave us universal healthcare. J.S. Woodsworth was Evangelical and gave us prison reform. Lester Pearson was Evangelical and gave us the peacemakers.

Harry Stevens, a cabinet minister in the government of R.B. Bennett, followed what he referred to as "Christian economics". (4)  He fought against corporations who were destroying small business, and headed a Parliamentary Committee and Royal Commission, investigating the practices of chains like Simpsons and Eatons, referring to them as "big shots".

William "Bible Bill" Aberhart, also embraced the war on "big shots", lamenting so much "poverty in the midst of plenty", during the Great Depression.

But today's Christian Right movement is different.  It is embraced by "big shots" and defined by corporate greed, war profiteering and righteous indignation.  They hate any form of liberalism, socialism and even democracy, which they believe is over rated.  Instead, it is being replaced with what they call "authoritarian democracy", where you must not demand, but obey.

The National Citizens Coalition, that Stephen Harper left to run for the leadership of the Alliance Party, not only promote a free market (with no pesky regulations or need to pay taxes), but endorse the notion that government should only be responsible for foreign policy and defense. (5)  The religious side of our government, led by men like Ted Byfield, feel that the only thing government should regulate is morality.

I can't imagine living in a country like that, though I suppose we might have to get used to it, if the left can't get their act together.

But What if We Don't Go to Church?

There are many radicals in the movement, who would like nothing better than for "Northern Europe" to become a church-going nation (?), led by the United States.  Jeffrey A. Eisenach, formerly with the now defunct,  Progress and Freedom Foundation, takes it even further, as they must reclaim the world for Christianity.

Should the world fail to understand this messianic role of the USA, there will be need of recourse to “compelle intrare,” based on which Saint Augustine approved forcible joining of heretics to the Church.

However, Strauss suggested that political leaders didn't really need to go to church or practice any faith, so long as they understood the importance of using it to manipulate.

When researching his book, Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada, William Johnson interviewed Harper's former fiancee, Cynthia Williams.   When asked about his faith she became embarrassed and said that they never went to church or anything.  (6)  Harper's VP at the National Citizens Coalition, Gerry Nicholls, confirmed this, but said that Harper did have strong "spiritual" ideas. (7)

Ezra Levant has denied that Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, was a Christian fundamentalist, because he never went to church.  But you don't have to go to church to believe in something, and the manifesto he created made it clear that Europe must return to it's Christian roots.

The New York Times referred to this new doctrine as a "civilizational war that represents the closest thing yet to a Christian version of Al Qaeda." 

I suspect that Harper's Evangelism is more political than ecclesiastical.  He is one of The Chosen.

OK.  So Whose Version of Christianity Do We Obey?

Ronald Reagan moved Evangelicals into his government at an alarming rate.  Stephen Harper has done the same.  The idea is to restructure our laws to fit with The Old Testament.  I get it.

But Christian sects are often at odds with each other, in how they interpret the Bible.

In his book, Faith in the Halls of Power, D. Michael Lindsay discusses this, using as an example, the Aids crisis.  Gary Bauer, Reagan's family values czar, felt that Aids was God's punishment for homosexuality.  However, C. Evertt Koop, partner of Francis Schaeffer and Reagan's Surgeon General, disagreed.  He thought it his Christian duty to help, and the Koop Report promoted safe sex, including the use of condoms, anathema to many in the movement.

Harper appears to have painted himself into a corner on this issue.  He refused to attend an International Aids Conference and scrapped plans to build an Aids vaccine plant, in favour of bullet factory, though he cashed in on a photo-op with Bill Gates, who was willing to help finance the former.

Part of this neocon/Religious Right mandate, is to remove the teaching of evolution from classrooms, and replace it with Creationism.  But again, whose version?

According to John Baldock (Women in the Bible), there are at least two versions. 

In weaving together two accounts of the creation of the universe from different traditions, the opening chapters of Genesis offer us contrasting images of the nature of the relationship between man and woman. In the first account, which dates from C-400BC and is the more recent of the two, the relationship is seen as one of equals for we are told that God 'created humankind asleep he removed one of his ribs and made it into a woman. Whet the man saw her, he said, 'she shall be called Woman [Hebrew] in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them'. ... However, in the second account, which is dated to I000-900BC, we are told that God first created 'the man', then the plants, animals and birds. He then caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and while he was asleep he removed one of his ribs and made it into a woman.

This is why we need the separation of Church and State.  It's that simple.  And we need the truths of science, not "noble lies".  Everyone should be allowed to practice their religion freely without being put on a list.

The neocons tell us that they are doing "God's work".  But looking at the Tea Party and the new right's addiction to war and greed, have they ever considered that this might just be the devil's handiwork?

Just a thought.

Footnotes:

*The idea of a 'Northern European' Christian movement, comes from the Reformation when Northern Europe, with the exception of Ireland and pockets of Britain, turned Protestant, and southern Europe remained Catholic, while Central Europe fought holy wars for the remainder.  The belief is that the "colonies" were won by the Protestants.

Sources:

1. Leo Strauss and the American Right, By Shadia B. Drury, St. Martin's Press, 1999, ISBN: 0-312-12689-1, p. 19

2. Stephen Harper and the Theo-cons: The rising clout of Canada's religious right, By Marci McDonald, The Walrus, October 2006

3. Drury, p. 11-12

4. Reaction and Reform: The Politics of the Conservative Party Under R.B. Bennett 1927-1938, By Larry A. Glassford, University of Toronto Press, 1992, ISBN: 0-8020-7673-4, p. 139

5. The Myth of the Good Corporate Citizen: Canada and Democracy in the Age of Globalization, By Murray Dobbin, James Lorimer & Company, 2003, ISBN: 1-55028-785-0, Pg. 200-203 2

6. Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada, by William Johnson, McClelland & Stewart, 2005, ISBN 0-7710 4350-3

7. Loyal to the Core: Stephen Harper Me and the NCC, By: Gerry Nicholls, Freedom Press, 2009, ISBN: 978-0-9732757-8-0

The Neoconservative Passion for Alexis de Tocqueville

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Neoconservative doctrine was written by academics and based on the writings of scholars, from Plato to Aristotle, Locke to Rousseau, and everything in between.

But one of the scholars often quoted, is Alexis de Tocqueville, a nineteenth century political thinker, who like many shaping the minds of young neocons, was born into wealth as a member of the aristocracy.

And he wrote of poverty as a man who had never known it, only observed it, yet his 1835 Essay on Pauperism, is used to justify the right's reluctance to help the poor.

What Tocqueville saw as a basic problem, was the definition of poverty.

"Among civilized peoples, the lack of a multitude of things causes poverty... In a country where the majority is ill-clothed, ill-housed, ill-fed, who thinks of giving clean clothes, healthy food, comfortable quarters to the poor? The majority of the English, having all these things, regard their absence as a frightful misfortune; society believes itself bound to come to the aid of those who lack them.... In England, the average standard of living a man can hope for in the course of his life is higher than in any other country of the world. This greatly facilitates the extension of pauperism in that kingdom."

So poverty is a state of mind? A comparative?

If our poor people are better off than the poor in central Africa, are they really poor?

Imagine going to your boss and asking for a raise and she tells you that you are already overpaid when compared to workers in Third World countries.

But workers in Third World countries aren't spending $1.30 a litre for gas to get to work, or 8 bucks for a box of cereal.

The definition of poverty has to be relative to how the rest of the population lives.

I'm not a socialist, and don't believe that if one family has a wide screen TV, then all families should have a wide screen TV.

However, I do believe that in a country with such vast natural resources as Canada, that everyone should be clothed, fed and housed. And everyone should have equal access to healthcare and education.

Neoconservatives do not.

David Frum is right when he says that government should never protect us "against the miseries caused by idleness", but is wrong when he says that only the indigent, or most destitute in society should be helped by government.

Remember the old Chinese proverb: “Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime.”

Neocons believe in the power and responsibility of the individual. Striving for equality will only bring those better off down to the level of those with very little. And they use that philosophy to justify pandering to the rich and ignoring the poor. A plantation mentality where the rich, (whose wealth is proof that they are smarter and more deserving than most), will in turn, take care of the poor.

What rot.

But it's that rot that determines Stephen Harper's actions.

“These proposals included cries for billions of new money for social assistance in the name of “child poverty” and for more business subsidies in the name of “cultural identity”. In both cases I was sought out as a rare public figure to oppose such projects.”(Stephen Harper, The Bulldog, National Citizens Coalition, February 1997)

I'm very concerned with the approaching perfect storm in Ontario. A Harper majority (with a cabinet of many ex Mike Harris disciples), Harris protege Tim Hudak, (whose wife Deb Hutton was Harris's gatekeeper), as premier of the province and Rob Ford as mayor of Toronto.

Like most neoconservative governments, Mike Harris's created the highest number of homeless people in the history of our province. And what was worse, he didn't care. One of his henchmen, Jim Flaherty, simply suggested that we throw them all in jail.

And if a person froze to death living in their car, at least they had a car.

Ford is already talking about selling off public housing in Toronto. Maybe he hopes to drive the poor out of his city, but will only drive them into the streets.



Hudak wants to eliminate or drastically reduce the public service, suggesting that because they make a good wage, small businesses can't compete with government in the labour market. What the fool doesn't realize is that those good wages keep many small businesses afloat.

When Mike Harris ran Ontario, we had a Liberal government federally. When Brian Mulroney was prime minister, we had Liberal and NDP governments in Ontario.

If Hudak takes Ontario, there will be no counterweight.

It's absolutely terrifying.

Media Pay Attention. I'm Only Going to Tell You This 546,678 Times

Now that Stephen Harper has his majority and no longer has to pretend, can we please start over?

Stephen Harper is not a Tory and the only thing 'Progressive' about him is his ever changing toupee.

If you bear in mind that he is a neoconservative, in the American Republican tradition, your job will be so easy.

Just read the New York Times or any other U.S. publication, see what the Tea Party is up to and presto. Instant Harper policy. From the census to global warming, it was probably seen there first.

But if you find that too bizarre, then perhaps a word or two from David Frum, one of the architects of the Canadian right-wing movement, might help.

He sums it up nicely in his book, What's Right: The New Conservatism and What it Means for Canada.

The "end game of the welfare state," as Irving Kristol has called it, may thus present Republicans with no choice but to take a harder line against big government. If they did, what would that hard line look like? ... A Republican vision of social welfare would have to pass three tests.

To satisfy the party's economic conservatives, it must slash at government costs. To satisfy the party's social conservatives, it must eliminate incentives to personal misconduct and family breakup. And to satisfy the party's pragmatists, the vision must be attractive and politically defensible.

One principle that passes all three of those tests goes something like this: Government should protect people only from risks they cannot easily protect themselves against — unemployment, natural disasters, catastrophic illnesses. Government should not protect nonindigent people against the predictable results of their own actions or the inevitable cycles of life — against the costs of retirement and college, against the regular fluctuations of farm and factory prices, against the miseries caused by idleness and addiction. (1)

Stephen Harper failed the first test when he racked up almost 250 million dollars in self-promotion ads, on the taxpayers' dime. And when he swelled his own office with an unheard of "communications" team and demanded an increase in his own budget while telling other departments to tighten their belts. (Harper’s personal office budget has ballooned by $10.5 million, a 30% increase)

However, the other initiatives are do-able and have already been reflected in this government's cuts, and will no doubt be reflected in further "deficit fighting" measures.

They will follow a blueprint.

'It must eliminate incentives to personal misconduct and family breakup'. Defunding planned parenthood and abortions. Eliminating benefits for same-sex, common-law, single parents. All part of a long-range strategy. Read anything on the Reform Party. Anything at all.

'Government should not protect nonindigent people against the predictable results of their own actions or the inevitable cycles of life' This is a continuation of intergenerational warfare. The Reform Party believed in means testing for all government programs, including those aimed at helping seniors.

It's interesting that Frum uses the term 'nonindigent' going right to the destitute, or those living in "extreme poverty". This means that very few seniors would qualify for assistance.

He goes onto to discuss how "the nonindigent elderly" are protected "against routine medical problems", causing a drain on Medicare. It's not the government's responsibility to protect its citizens from the "the inevitable cycles of life". Again the term 'nonindigent'. Only those we pull out of a ditch or scrape off the sidewalk, would qualify.

Journalist Murray Dobbin mentions going to Reform Party assemblies when they were first organizing, and how, many seniors jumped ship when they learned of Reform's policies regarding things like CPP and public healthcare. (2)

[No protection] against the miseries caused by idleness and addiction. Neoconservatives believe that most unemployed are only unemployed because they're lazy. And we see their opposition to help for addicts, in their enormous pressure to close down Vancouver's Insite, the fear being that if this works, we can expect the same in all major Canadian cities.

So if you want to guess what social programs will look like under a Harper majority, you will have to ask yourself the same questions that Frum asked Republicans.

How will they fit in with the social conservative (religious right) agenda, and will they help anyone not completely destitute? Seniors or children living in poverty will not get a free pass.

Welcome to Neoconservatism 101.

Sources:

1. What's Right: The New Conservatism and What it Means for Canada, By David Frum, Vintage Canada, 1996, ISBN: 0-679-30858-X, Pg. 12-13

2. Preston Manning and the Reform Party, By Murray Dobbin, Goodread Biographies/Formac Publishing, 1992, ISBN: 0-88780-161-7 4

My Conversation with Irving Kristol on the Welfare State

In an attempt to break through the neoconservative ideology, it's important to understand why they are so successful. Simple messages, repeated over and over, laid the groundwork.

And with that simple messaging, they target, what they would refer to as the "average" or "ordinary" citizen. The "ignorant masses". The "wandering herd". Because they were needed to sell the message. These were the people that political strategists would refer to as "the base".

Karl Rove used a play-to-the-base strategy when directing George Bush. And when Guy Giorno, Harper's former chief of staff, made the decision not to include abortion as part of the maternal health issue, he used the same philosophy:

Perhaps more than any issue that’s arisen in Giorno’s nearly two years as Harper’s top adviser, outlawing overseas abortion funding threatens to drag him unwillingly toward the centre of media attention. (Giorno declined to be interviewed for this story.) Montreal’s Le Devoir reported a few days ago that an unhappy Harper wants the matter defused before world leaders, many of whom disagree with his stance, arrive in Ontario for the summits. But Giorno is reportedly worried about how Conservative supporters would react to any retreat and is urging Harper to “protect the base.”

"Protect the base". All decisions are made to protect that base, because they are the ones who can help you achieve, and stay in power.

It's telling that the simple messaging is being crafted by academics. Academics, like Irving Kristol, who called himself the godfather of the neoconservative movement (see video below). They are the ones who intellectually construct simple messages. As Kristol himself said: "There are different kinds of truths for different kinds of people. There are truths appropriate for children; truths that are appropriate for students; truths that are appropriate for educated adults; and truths that are appropriate for highly educated adults, and the notion that there should be one set of truths available to everyone is a modern democratic fallacy."

I've been reading his essays, compiled in book form, and am immediately struck with how very wrong he is on a variety of topics. He probably knew that. But he didn't write them to be scholarly. He wrote them to sell an ideology. But I am going to challenge him anyway.

This time on the "Welfare State".

By now it is obvious to all who wish to see that we are experiencing a profound crisis of the welfare state. Several crises, in fact. There is the financial crisis now evident in all the Western democracies, where all governments, whether left or right of center, are trying desperately to limit government spending and government commitments.

Though it is this crisis that grabs most of the headlines, it is probably over the long term the least serious. That is because of the two basic laws of eco­nomics: what can't happen won't happen, and what must happen will happen. Government will succeed in edging the welfare state back from the brink of bankruptcy, though at a considerable political cost. That cost will be seen in political convulsions that can be quite scary. Still, after the dust has settled, the welfare state will have been sufficiently trimmed to avoid national bankruptcy which would be the worst convulsion of all, and one that no government can contemplate as an option.

This argument was used to suggest that it is the 'welfare state" that is causing the economic woes. Social programs that Kristol already implied only made people lazy.

What he doesn't mention is why governments are finding it difficult to maintain important social programs, that protect a nation's citizens. It's been misguided tax cuts, and lots of them, especially to the rich. And wars paid for on the credit card.

At the peak of the economic crisis, we heard a lot about John Maynard Keynes, and the "Keynesian" philosophy of using government money to stimulate the economy. It helped to take our minds off the corporate bailouts and who really created the crisis.

But there is something of Keynes that was overlooked. In his book, How to Pay for the War, published in 1940, he argued that the war effort should be largely financed through higher taxation. This was not a new concept. Special taxes always paid for war, as well as the promotion of war bonds, whereby workers loaned the government money to offset the costs.

But in today's conservative logic, as we saw with George Bush, the government lowered taxes, while at war. And they encouraged spending, not saving. And yet they blame the financial problems on the people.

But Kristol doesn't stop there. He also blames the welfare state for the destruction of the family.

There is also a social crisis of the welfare state. Fifty years ago, no advocate state could imagine that it might be destructive of that most social institution, the family. But it has been, with a poisonous flowering of those very social pathologies—crime, illegitimacy, drugs, divorce, sexual promiscuity—that it was assumed the welfare state would curb if not eliminate. This has come as such a shock to welfare statists that they have been busy explaining it all away. Their most common hypothesis, by now a dogma of the Left, is that the persistence of economic inequality and the absence of economic opportunity are the root causes of it all. But only those who have succeeded in repressing all historical memories can actually believe that. There are just too many people still alive who can testify that in times past when economic inequality and lack of opportunity were certainly no less evident than today (and for most people were probably much greater), such social pathologies were far less widespread.

What a lot of hokum. I was living during some of the period that Kristol refers to, and see things quite differently. Divorce may not have been as prevalent, but unhappy marriages, that can be just as destructive to their notion of family, were. And educated women who were expected to stay home, or were failures as mothers, created a Valley of the Dolls society.

And things like promiscuity, were not less common. They were just hidden. Popular television programs, which is often what the right believe constituted typical family life then, were for the most part fairy tales. You can't handle crises in 22 minutes and a teenager's bed is not always made.

And the idea that men had to marry virgins, put all of the pressure on the women to fight desires, because they were the only ones who faced the consequences.

The problem is that neoconservatives believe that a family must be mother, father, children. But the modern family has many different dynamics. Same-sex, single parents, blended families. And children raised in these situations, no longer have to wear the stigma. Societal acceptance has neutralized those prejudices.

Canada's neoconservative movement was crafted in part by William Gairdner and his book The Trouble with Canada. According to author and journalist Murray Dobbin, this book "functioned as ‘the de facto manifesto for Preston Manning’s Reform Party’" (2) Gairdner sold copies of his book at Reform Party assemblies.

I read The Trouble With Canada, and it is eerily similar to the writings of Irving Kristol, using the same arguments to convince us that we should abandon the welfare state. Maybe they have a template. I got his new book, The Trouble With Canada ... Still, for Christmas, and "look forward" to reading it.

William Gairdner is also the founder of the Civitas Society, that plays an integral role in determining Conservative Party policy. Their list of founding members is also interesting. See how many Harper insiders you can identify:

Founding President: William Gairdner

Other Past Presidents: Tom Flanagan, William Robson, Lorne Gunter and Brian Lee Crowley

Founding Directors: Janet Ajzenstat, Ted Byfield, Michael Coren, Jacques Dufresne, Tom Flanagan, David Frum, William Gairdner, Jason Kenney, Gwen Landolt [REAL Women of Canada], Ezra Levant, Tom Long, Mark Magner, William Robson, David E. Somerville [National Citizens Coalition], Michael Walker [Fraser Institute].

So What do we do Now?

We have to start, not only framing our message, but selling it. That has been the biggest factor in the rise of the far-right. PR. It doesn't hurt that they have huge amounts of corporate money behind them, but it doesn't take money to just talk to people. You might meet with some opposition, but you'll probably also be surprised at how many people agree with you, but feel that they are in the minority.

I watched a rerun of Bill Maher last night, and while everyone assumes that the latest Republican success, was because people were now looking to neoconservatism to get them out of the mess they were in, statistics show otherwise.

Obama ran on a message of hope. Hope for fiscal sensibility, a plan to address climate change, and provide public healthcare. But once elected, he spent too much time worrying about the right-wing echo chamber, instead of following through on his promises. Of course, he had to deal with the corporate funded Tea Party and AstroTurf groups like Americans for Prosperity, which also has ties to the Harper government.

But he should have stood his ground. Because the Democrats who held their seats, were the progressives. Not the ones who pretended to be right-wing, and refused to discuss healthcare or global warming. But the ones who stuck to their liberal values.

That's the lesson here.

We can debunk neocon ideology, but it's up to the parties representing the left to offer an alternative, not just more right-wing nonsense, like the notion that corporate tax cuts will help the poor.

The Harper government is currently on a massive spending binge. Fighter jets, prisons, and yes more corporate tax cuts. They are selling these enormous expenditures as "job creation", and claim that they won't have to raise taxes to pay for them.

So where will the money come from? We are already in a deficit and heavily in debt.

And they suggest that they can't afford to address climate change until the economy improves, despite the fact that a "green economy" will actually create jobs, not just produce some abstract notion of job creation.

So maybe the best way for us to frame that message is to simply ask "how is that possible"? How is taking out a 30 year mortgage on new prisons and prison expansion, going to help in the long-term? How will fighter jets, deemed to be a maintenance nightmare, pay for themselves?

So we just ask "where will the money come from?" And don't accept rhetoric. Hand them a pad and paper and ask for some figures. They won't give them to you because they can't. Their decisions are not based on studies but simple ideas.

And focusing on things like military hardware and crime and punishment, means they won't be forced to address more important issues like homelessness, child poverty or healthcare.

But if they are willing to go further into debt for jets and prisons, why not instead go into debt for more doctors, clinics, and hospital expansions? They create jobs too and are more beneficial to society. And yet hospitals are closing beds while prisons are opening them.

And the increase in prison beds is coming at a time when our crime rate is the lowest in our history, but an aging population is producing a need for more hospital care.

Maybe as part of our Army of US's or WE's, we should launch a campaign called "cut the crap". Just how stupid do they think we are?

Sources:

1. The Neoconservative Persuasion, By Irving Kristol, Basic Books, 2011, ISBN: 978-0465-02333-2, Pg. 96-97

2. Preston Manning and the Reform Party, By Murray Dobbin, Goodread Biographies/Formac Publishing, 1992, ISBN: 0-88780-161-7

My Conversation With Irving Kristol on Welfare and Wages

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

The late Irving Kristol (d. 2009) was a self-proclaimed Straussian and by his own labelling, the "Godfather of Neoconversation". He wrote a series of essays and books that became the basis for the movement.

In one he discusses "welfare" or "relief" and why he finds the concept absurd. I would like to challenge Mr. Kristol, because I find his arguments absurd.

Leo Strauss often had "conversations" with Plato, or at least at times his challenges and insights read like conversations, so I would like to converse with and challenge Irving Kristol.

I realize that he was an intellectual and certainly out of my league, but I'm going to invoke Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition. "What I propose, therefore, is very simple: it is nothing more than to think what we are doing."

There is too much compliance to what we are told is good for us, and not enough thinking. Because when you break it down, it's pretty simple.

We are continually transferring huge amounts of money to a government who is supposed to be using that money for the betterment of all citizens, and instead are using the money for the betterment of a chosen few.

And that is something, I "think" about often.

Essay on Pauperism

"In terms of the unemployed, of which we have over a million-and-a-half, don't feel particularly bad for many of these people. They don't feel bad about it themselves, as long as they're receiving generous social assistance and unemployment insurance. " - Stephen Harper (1)

Irving Kristol begins his musings on welfare by invoking Alexis de Tocqueville's, 1835 Essay on Pauperism. Tocqueville asks why, in the most "opulent" nation in the world [England], was there such an extraordinary problem of "pauperism". (The "problem" of pauperism, not necessarily a solution to.)

Concluding that too much public assistance can create idleness, he and Kristol also see a problem with the definition of poverty or pauperism. To the peasant, the ultimate goal was to have enough to eat. There was no desire to accumulate wealth. The only concern was survival.

However, in a modern city, the standards were different.

... in an "opulent" society, the idea of poverty itself undergoes a continual redefinition. The poor experience not only the need for a guaranteed minimum; they also suffer from what a modern sociologist would call "relative deprivation." Tocqueville puts the matter this way: "Among civilized peoples, the lack of a multitude of things causes poverty... In a country where the majority is ill-clothed, ill-housed, ill-fed, who thinks of giving clean clothes, healthy food, comfortable quarters to the poor? The majority of the English, having all these things, regard their absence as a frightful misfortune; society believes itself bound to come to the aid of those who lack them.... In England, the average standard of living a man can hope for in the course of his life is higher than in any other country of the world. This greatly facilitates the extension of pauperism in that kingdom." (2)

So the definition of poverty in the city, is different than that in the country.

The reasons for that, at least when this was written almost two centuries ago, was first off that those living in poverty in the city, had no land to work for food. But also their impoverishment was visible to those who took so much for granted.

How can you live conscience free, in a society with so much disparity?

The Welfare Explosion

The next body of work that Kristol critiqued was Regulating the Poor: The Function of Public Welfare by Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward. He calls their book "simpleminded", and "so crude in a quasi-Marxist way, that one is embarrassed to summarize it."

He scoffs at the notion from Piven and Cloward, that "Relief arrangements [under capitalism] are not shaped by the impulse to charity ... [they are] created and sustained to help deal with the malfunctions inherent in market economies."

Poverty in a modern society is often created by unemployment, and unemployment is often created when the "market economy" is in turmoil. The first to be cut by the corporate sector, during hard times, is the labour force, which creates a downward spiral.

The misguided notion that by giving more money to the corporate sector, jobs will be saved or created, has been proven over and over to be a myth. When companies were bailed out at the beginning of the latest "downturn", much of the money was used to give bonuses to executives and to buy up other companies that had gone bust.

Unemployment is still high, yet headlines in financial sections of newspapers, repeatedly include the words "record profits".

Piven and Cloward also wrote:

Relief arrangements are usually initiated or expanded in response to the political disorders that sometimes follow from the sharp economic downturns or dislocations that periodically beset market systems. The purpose of relief-giving at such times is not to ease hunger and want but to deal with civil disorder among the unemployed. (2)

Revolutions are often ignited by the lack of bread, real and metaphorical. And since Canada's crime rate is now at the lowest in our history, could this be why Stephen Harper is so intent on building more prisons?

"Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?" - Ebenezer Scrooge

So My Dear Mr. Kristol. This is What I "Think"

“These proposals included cries for billions of new money for social assistance in the name of “child poverty” and for more business subsidies in the name of “cultural identity”. In both cases I was sought out as a rare public figure to oppose such projects.” - Stephen Harper, (The Bulldog, National Citizens Coalition, February 1997)

Tocqueville also wrote that "There are two incentives to work: the need to live and the desire to improve the conditions of life." The basis of Neoconservatism or Libertarianism, is that everyone should look after themselves. But how can you find work when you have no clothing to wear, no food to eat, or no roof over your head?

Maybe if we take care of the first incentive, the second one will have a better chance of prevailing. We can always find money to give to Big Business or war, so there is no excuse not to channel a bit to our nation's disadvantaged, who might actually want to get out of the cycle of poverty.

Apparently the NDP and Conservatives are negotiating terms for the acceptance of the January budget. NDP finance critic, Thomas Mulcair, wants "future corporate cuts to be more targeted to ensure companies are investing in jobs and productivity."

"Future corporate tax cuts"? What happened to the NDP? Those terms should have been compulsory 50 billion dollars ago. From the day that Stephen Harper invited his corporate backers to slurp from the public trough. That is our money and we don't want "corporate tax cuts" that promise so much and give so little.

That money could have gone, and should be going, to actual job creation. If the NDP buy into this, they are going to lose most of their base.

Maybe they need to read Linda McQuaig's column: The growth of extreme inequality in Canada

The massive upward flow of income has largely been invisible to the public, even though it may well amount to the most significant change in Canadian society in decades. The impact on Canada's social fabric is huge and likely to grow. Recent research -- particularly the work of British epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett -- shows that less equal societies almost always have more violence, more disease, more mental health problems, higher infant mortality rates, reduced life expectancies, as well as less social cohesion. The effects are most pronounced at the bottom, but are evident throughout the society.

Or John Grace's review of the new book, Spirit Level, by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, that he wrote for the UK Guardian.

They say, it's not just the deprived underclass that loses out in an unequal society: everyone does, even the better off. Because it's not absolute levels of poverty that create the social problems, but the differentials in income between rich and poor.

That is the only issue that the NDP should be raising. Not what to do with "future corporate tax cuts".

Irving Kristol speaks of the fact that welfare payments were based on the poverty level, which means that they are at the same as the lowest wage earner's income. But the problem is not the amount of "relief" but the fact that wages are so low. There's no reason for it.

And if he felt that this meant that people wouldn't work, as a result, he might want to think about a national childcare plan, because often those on assistance are single parents, who can't work for poverty level wages, and pay someone else to look after their children while they work.

He also felt that welfare took away a man's masculinity: "... welfare robs the head of the household of his economic function, and tends to make of him a "superfluous man." And he suggests that if single mothers are paid to raise their children, they will stay single or get rid of their male partner.

Notwithstanding the inequality of that notion, the problem again relates not only to unemployment, but the ability of people to work. Food, healthcare, clothing, shelter and childcare. Those needs must first be met.

And jobs paying higher than the poverty level, provide revenue from income tax, that can go to helping others to abandon their pauperism.

Yes, there will always be cheats, just as there will always be Big Business demanding more and more of our tax dollars, in some perverse sense of entitlement.

So my dear Mr. Kristol. Neoconservatism is failing society, but thanks for playing. And to my dear Mr. Mulcair. Give your head a shake.

"Courage, my friends; 'tis not too late to build a better world." - Tommy Douglas

Continuation:

1. My Conversation with Irving Kristol on the Welfare State

Soures:

1. Full text of Stephen Harper's 1997 speech, Canadian Press, December 14, 2005

2. Neo-Conservatism: The Autobiography of an Idea, By Irving Kristol, The Free Press, 1995, ISBN: 0-02-874021-1, Pg. 43-49

The "Clash of Civilizations" or the "Smash of Civilizations"? The True Nature of This War

On January 24, 2003, a group of New York-based collectors and dealers; members of an organization called the American Council for Cultural Policy, met with the Bush administration and Pentagon officials.

The purpose of the meeting was to encourage Bush to ignore international laws, by allowing the treasures of ancient Mesopotamia (now Iraq), to fall into the hands of private collectors.

This group of wealthy Americans, had been coveting these prized objects for some time, giving them a commercial value, rather than the historical and religious value bestowed upon them not only by the people of Iraq but indeed anyone seeking to preserve our ancient cultural heritage.

So while George Bush was promising scholars and historians that he would do his utmost to protect the ancient holdings, in the land referred to in archaeological circles as "the cradle of civilization", he had already made a commitment to the American Council for Cultural Policy, that he would make sure they got what they craved.

I mean what good was all that wealth, when they couldn't obtain the unobtainable?

And Bush didn't disappoint. According to Chalmers Johnson (d. 2010):

On April 11, 12, 13, and 14, 2003, the United States Army and United States Marine Corps disgraced themselves and the country they represent in Baghdad, Iraq's capital city. Having invaded Iraq and accepted the status of a military occupying power, they sat in their tanks and Humvees, watching as unarmed civilians looted the Iraqi National Museum and burned down the Iraqi National Library and Archives as well as the Library of Korans of the Ministry of Religious Endowments.

Their behavior was in violation of their orders, international law, and the civilized values of the United States. Far from apologizing for these atrocities or attempting to make amends, the U.S. government has in the past five years added insult to injury. Donald Rumsfeld, then secretary of defense and the official responsible for the actions of the troops, repeatedly attempted to trivialize what had occurred with inane public statements such as "Democracy is messy" and "Stuff happens." (1)

During those five years, thieves had stolen at least 32,000 items from some 12,000 archaeological sites across Iraq with no interference from the occupying power.

In 2006, the World Monuments Fund took the unprecedented step of putting the entire country of Iraq on its list of the most endangered sites. The torching of books and manuscripts in the Library of Korans and the National Library was in itself a historical disaster of the first order. Most of the Ottoman imperial documents and the old royal archives concerning the creation of Iraq were reduced to ashes.

... about a million books and ten million documents were destroyed by the fires of April 14, 2003. Robert Fisk, the veteran Middle East correspondent of the Independent of London, was in Baghdad the day of the fires. He rushed to the offices of the U.S. Marines' Civil Affairs Bureau and gave the officer on duty precise map locations for the two archives and their names in Arabic and English, and pointed out that the smoke could be seen from three miles away. The officer shouted to a colleague, "This guy says some biblical library is on fire," but the Americans did nothing to try to put out the flames.

At a conference on art crimes held in London a year after the disaster, the British Museum's John Curtis reported that at least half of the forty most important stolen objects had not been retrieved and that of some 15,000 items looted from the museum's showcases and storerooms about 8,000 had yet to be traced. Its entire collection of 5,800 cylinder seals and clay tablets, many containing cuneiform writing and other inscriptions some of which go back to the earliest discoveries of writing itself, was stolen. (1)

Notwithstanding the murder of a million people, the destruction and theft of Iraq's archaeological treasures, represents one of the most horrific acts in world history.

The Smash of Civilizations

In Lawrence Martin's book, Harperland, he reveals that when it comes to foreign policy, our current PM does not see the world as a global community, but as a "clash of civilizations". (2)

Those three words are no lightweights. What they represent is the Neoconservative total war strategy.

However, Chalmers Johnson instead refers to this disgraceful display as a "smash of civilizations", and I think that's a better term. Because "clash" suggests the equality of enemies. And since we are fighting those with fewer and less sophisticated weaponry, it is hardly a fair fight.

And "smash" is a better term to describe the attempted annihilation of not only a religion, but a culture.

Johnson likens the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan to the "total destruction" of ancient Baghdad by the Mongols in AD 1258, under the leadership of Genghis Khan's grandson, Hulagu Khan.

According to historian Steven Dutch:

Iraq in 1258 was very different from present day Iraq. Its agriculture was supported by canal networks thousands of years old. Baghdad was one of the most brilliant intellectual centers in the world. The Mongol destruction of Baghdad was a psychological blow from which Islam never recovered. Already Islam was turning inward, becoming more suspicious of conflicts between faith and reason and more conservative. With the sack of Baghdad, the intellectual flowering of Islam was snuffed out. Imagining the Athens of Pericles and Aristotle obliterated by a nuclear weapon begins to suggest the enormity of the blow. The Mongols filled in the irrigation canals and left Iraq too depopulated to restore them." (3)

And it's not too difficult to compare the actions of the allied forces In Iraq to those of the Mongols eight centuries ago.

The Grand Library of Baghdad, containing countless precious historical documents and books on subjects ranging from medicine to astronomy, was destroyed. Survivors said that the waters of the Tigris ran black with ink from the enormous quantities of books flung into the river. Citizens attempted to flee, but were intercepted by Mongol soldiers who killed with abandon .... Ian Frazier of The New Yorker says estimates of the death toll have ranged from 200,000 to a million. The Mongols looted and then destroyed mosques, palaces, libraries, and hospitals. Grand buildings that had been the work of generations were burned to the ground. (3)

The Neoconservatives seek to accomplish the same "psychological blow" from which Islam may never recover. This is not simply about oil, but "total destruction", with oil being a benefit, meaning that the West will never be again challenged for the crude in the Middle East.

Iraq, before the Americans put Saddam Hussein in power, was also a thriving country, and Baghdad, one of the most modern cities in the world. But what is it now?

And the "smash' was about more than just the theft and destruction of artifacts. It was something much bigger.

At the six-thousand-year-old Sumerian city of Ur with its massive ziggurat, or stepped temple-tower (built in the period 2112-2095 BC and restored by Nebuchadnezzar 11 in the sixth century BC), the Marines spray-painted their motto, "Semper Fi" (semper fidelis, always faithful) onto its walls. The military then made the monument "off limits" to everyone in order to disguise the desecration that had occurred there, including the looting by U.S. soldiers of clay bricks used in the construction of the ancient buildings.

Until April 2003, the area around Ur, in the environs of Nasiriyah, was remote and sacrosanct. However, the U.S. military chose the land immediately adjacent to the ziggurat to build its huge Tallil Air Base with two runways measuring 12,000 and 9,700 feet and four satellite camps. In the process, military engineers moved more than 9,500 truckloads of dirt in order to build 350,000 square feet of hangars and other facilities for aircraft and Predator unmanned drones.

They completely ruined the area.

On October 24, 2003, the Army and Air Force Exchange Service built its own modern ziggurat. It "opened its second Burger King at Tallil. The new facility, colocated with [a] Pizza Hut, provided another Burger King restaurant so that more servicemen and women serving in Iraq could .. get a whiff of that familiar scent that takes them back home."

... At Babylon, American and Polish forces built a military depot, despite objections from archaeologists. John Curtis, the British Museum's authority on Iraq's many archaeological sites, reported on a visit in December 2004 that he saw "cracks and gaps where somebody had tried to gouge out the decorated bricks forming the famous dragons of the Ishtar Gate" and a "2,600-year-old brick pavement crushed by military vehicles." Other observers say that the dust stirred up by U.S. helicopters has sandblasted the fragile brick facade of the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon from 605 to 562 BC.

... "Between May and August 2004, the wall of the Temple of Nabu and the roof of the Temple of Ninmah, both of the sixth century BC, collapsed as a result of the movement of helicopters. Nearby, heavy machines and vehicles stand parked on the remains of a Greek theater from the era of Alexander of Macedon [Alexander the Great]." (1)

They've ruined the area for future archaeological excavations.

This is not a "clash", but a "smash". A heart wrenching, inhumane attempt to completely destroy an adversary.

I had been going to blog on this after Christmas, thinking that perhaps it wasn't appropriate during this time, but then I realized that there couldn't be a better time. As we share a message of "Peace on Earth and Goodwill Toward Men", we might be reminded for a moment of what those words are supposed to mean.

And this isn't it.

Sources:

1. Dismantling the Empire: America's Last Best Hope, By Chalmers Johnson, Metropolitan Books, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-9303-2, Pg. 40-51

2. Harperland: The Politics of Control, By Lawrence Martin, Viking Press, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-670-06517-2, Pg. 79

3. Battle of Baghdad (1258), Multilingual Archive, Powered by WorldLingo

One-Eyed Shieks and Holy Wars. How we Got it so Wrong

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

U.S. President Obama has come out this week suggesting that gains are being made in Afghanistan, though the progress is fragile.

In other words, they have no idea what they're doing.

U.S. intelligence supports my assessment.

The Americans drew the Soviet Union into invading the country in 1979, giving them their Vietnam, and are now caught in an unwinnable war that has gone on longer than the Soviet occupation, and threatens to continue for several more years.

15,000 Soviet soldiers were killed against about 1,000,000 Afghans, between 1979 and 1988.

And when you look at the rate of casualties in the American led invasion of Afghanistan, as represented by the chart below, we sure aren't fairing much better. And these are just the coalition forces. Thousands more civilians have fallen.


If the Americans wanted to give the Soviets their Vietnam, to weaken their military build up, they are getting it back. And while Stephen Harper has Canada trapped in the Afghan underworld, his answer is that he will now be directing the war himself, from the safety of his office. Rick Hillier calls it "crap!" I agree.

So How Did we Get it so Wrong?

The end of the Second World War brought on the Cold War, and the world's super powers spent enormous amounts of money building up an arsenal of advanced weaponry, in what Hannah Arendt described as an "apocalyptic chess game".

The technical development of the implements of violence has now reached the point where no political goal could conceivably correspond to their destructive potential or justify their actual use in armed conflict. Hence, warfare—from time immemorial the final merciless arbiter in international disputes—has lost much of its effectiveness and nearly all its glamour. (1)

It was a spy war as they all kept a close watch on each other, no one really wanting to use their weapons in what would have been a "universal suicide".

But this created another problem, because as the super powers became both omnipotent and impotent, smaller nations were left virtually unrestricted in the game of one-upmanship.

... in conventional warfare the poor countries are much less vulnerable than the great powers precisely because they are "underdeveloped," and because technical superiority can "be much more of a liability than an asset" in guerrilla wars. What all these uncomfortable novelties add up to is a complete reversal in the relationship between power and violence, foreshadowing another reversal in the future relationship between small and great powers. (1)

So the threats did not necessarily come from countries with nuclear capabilities, but from small groups "able to upset the strategic balance", by launching attacks that cost them very little.

And this bears an ominous similarity to one of political science's oldest insights, namely that power cannot be measured in terms of wealth, that an abundance of wealth may erode power, that riches are particularly dangerous to the power and well-being of republics. (1)

And since many of these new "armies" were stateless, who could the super powers wage war against? The CIA kept track of known terrorist cells, and did their best to keep them contained, but it was still presenting a huge problem for the military-industrial complex.

They had enormous weaponry but few targets, that allowed their use on any large scale.

Enter the Neoconservatives and Their "War on Terror"

In his 'Battlefields of the 1980s', General Andre Beaufre points out, that only "in those parts of the world not covered by nuclear deterrence" is war still possible, so the challenge for the Neoconservatives was to wage war in areas unrestrained by "nuclear deterrence".

But how to get Americans on board. They had already interfered in the affairs of the oil rich Middle East, but needed something bigger.

An enemy. A face. And fear.

Then 9/11 provided the perfect trifecta, though it was only the catalyst. The planning for this had been taking place for several years beforehand, when Bernard Lewis adapted Harvard political scientist Samuel P. Huntington's Clash of Civilizations, into a blueprint for war.

And through clever messaging, the American Neocons were able to sell the notion of an enormous Jihad. One launched by "savages" who had to be destroyed or their entire country would be demolished.

They "didn't start it", but they were sure going to finish it. Eyes lit up, keyboards clicked away and the landscape was awash in yellow ribbons. Meanwhile, the Bush administration used homey rhetoric to reach the masses, knowing that few intellects would find their theory of a massive Jihad against America logical.

Not that terrorism isn't real, but there are other ways of keeping it contained, without the senseless slaughter of so many.

The Blind Leading the Blind

Though Osama Bin Ladin went to his grave in 2001, denying any involvement in 9/11, he became the face of the war. Every now and then an actor would come out and make another tape, to keep fear at just the right level. It didn't make Bin Laden any less dead, but who was going to question?

However, even before Bin Laden became a household name, the Jihad against America had a leader. Omar Abdel Rahman, also called the "One-Eyed Sheik". He was apparently behind the 1993 attack on the World Trade Centre, which at the time, was not considered the work of a mastermind.

However, it did prove to be an embarrassment for the CIA and others, especially when the person who allegedly planted the bomb, returned to the rental agency requesting a refund because the van he rented blew up. (2) I know there's a lot more to that story, but suffice it to say they were not that organized.

But that didn't stop the Bush Administration from linking this incident to their notion of a massive Jihad.

In neoconservative Andrew C. McCarthy's book, Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad, we see just how they created a powerful enemy from several smaller "underdeveloped" ones, by using myths and creative language. And yes I do on occasion read books by neocons. It's the only way I can get inside Stephen Harper's head. (have you seen the movie Jacob's Ladder? It kinda' looks like that in there. I scream a lot)

He starts out complaining that the government's main focus after the 1993 incident, was handling the fall out. Aghast, he questions why, after "the most brazen attack against the American homeland since Pearl Harbour had taken place". (3) Really? Pearl Harbour?

He then fancifies Rahman, who was indeed a horrible man, and currently in prison with no chance of ever being released. But to equate him those who planned the attack on Pearl Harbour, is a bit of a stretch.

But then McCarthy reminds his readers of the seriousness of the situation. Intelligence and containment wasn't enough. This was "war".

In terms of actual national commitment, such wars translate into a somewhat higher priority than the dogged pursuit of tax cheats and corporate fraudsters. To be sure, jihad differs from Wars on Drugs, Poverty, Disease. Incivility, Intolerance, Greenhouse Gases, or whatever the next Flavor of the Month may be. Jihad, after all, actually does involve warfare: real bombs, real victims, and real death. But the distinction is lost when the side that declares only rhetorical war is exclusively on the receiving end of the blows ... (3)

America was the "victim". They had been taking all the blows, and never fought back. So forget all the other nonsense. Pardon the corporate fraudsters (as George Bush did). Forget about poverty, disease and Global Warming (as George Bush did). Heck you could even forget being civil to each other.

Every waking moment and every red cent had to be put into fighting this Jihad. (as George Bush did)

And where did it get them? Iraq is in a mess and Afghanistan has been taken over by the criminal element. They are still chasing ghosts, while all but ignoring domestic problems, that are spiralling out of control.

And to top it off, the Jihadists are more powerful than ever, because the invasion has only increased the recruitment.

Again, Neoconservatism is the god that failed and we need to rethink this war.

Sources:

1. On Violence, by Hannah Arendt, Harvest Books, 1970, ISBN: 978-0-15-669500-8, Pg. 3

2. He wanted his money back: Insistence on a Refund for a Van Led to the Arrest of Blast Suspect, by Ralph Blumenthal, New York Times, March 5, 1993.

3. Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad, By Andrew C. McCarthy, Encounter Books, 2008, ISBN: 13-978-1-59403-213-4, Pg. 5