tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58623281951347383172024-03-13T04:10:48.636-07:00futurePoliticalmusings and occasional analysis on a postmodern world...cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.comBlogger123125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-16770808793501732642018-03-03T13:06:00.000-08:002018-03-03T13:06:05.956-08:00What's postmodern about President Trump?Not a few articles have emerged claiming that Trump is the first postmodern president or the postmodern president par excellence. This January, Edsall sums up what Heer and Ernst have suggested in other recent publications. Folks are dusting off their copies of Derrida or Foucault to put this presidency in context. But Baudrillard is more helpful because Foucault envisioned a deeply intrusive type of productive power that combined expertise with the political. Derrida traced the often contradictory practices that enabled ostensibly unbiased political ideals. But Baudrillard's focus on the media and networks reflects what commentators are sensing. The massive echo chamber of the media is like a super-saturated crystalline solution awaiting the tiniest morsel of solidity (e.g. notice how news organizations have gutted their investigative reporting bureaus) . Trump tosses in that morsel and more into that soup and the reverberations then expand far and wide. Baudrillard predicted that we would all be 'linked in' or plugged in to the web. Its <i><b>pure connectivity </b></i>is what allows Trump's even most narrowly focused messages to expand across communication networks like a tsunami. Critical thinking is impossible under conditions of pure connectivity (thank you, Mr. Zuckerberg for denying users the dislike button!). But it is unclear to what degree the former reality show host understands how postmodern media functions or to what extent the mass media relates to him. For example, it is possible that Donald Trump's mercurial style is a factor that allows him to float free from any particular ideological stamp. That allows his 'name brand' to reach every outlet. One implication of this analysis is that only a candidate with similar, postmodern capacity can win the presidency.cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-44756315508816898892017-12-14T01:41:00.001-08:002017-12-14T01:41:24.497-08:00Border adjustment tax and Trump (?)Where did he go? Where is the President, you know, THE guy? With all of the tax talk in the U.S. today, including reducing the corporate tax dramatically by the way, there is no talk of the border adjustment tax (BAT). This was the President's minimalist approach to addressing the trade deficit, a key campaign promise. Instead the tax reductions being tweeted are old fashioned policy dreams that any Republican, from Rick Perry to Jeb Bush, would have offered. How droll.<br />
<br />
THIS is the moment to throw a real monkey wrench into the establishment with the BAT. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-37970903630347923902017-12-10T13:16:00.001-08:002017-12-14T01:33:39.760-08:00On Trump, Jerusalem and losing control of the message<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml><w:WordDocument><w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel><w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery><w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>2</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery><w:DocumentKind>DocumentNotSpecified</w:DocumentKind><w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>7.8</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing><w:View>Normal</w:View><w:Compatibility></w:Compatibility><w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom></w:WordDocument></xml><![endif]--><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">The President's recent decision to move the embassy will not have the intended effect, not even for its biggest backers. Said to be a long time coming and to help the peace process, it will instead muddle if not change the main Sunni versus Shiite narrative that has dominated the media airwaves. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">There was recently more media focus and thus growing pressure on Hezbollah, on Iran, and even on the Houthis. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">Now there will be a slow, drip drip, media focus on the move of the US embassy. The media will watch surveyors, pundits will debate locations ('east Jerusalem, west Jerusalem, or right in between?'). Every aspect of the construction of the huge complex will be monitored, as will every incident involving it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">Trump has just started a new narrative that will dominate Medieval minds from Tel Aviv to Karachi (Medievals believe their religion drives politics but postmoderns think it is the media/networks). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">Better build the new embassy quick if you want to restart the Iran versus Saudi narrative! </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 12.0000pt;">BTW, the winners, beyond the usual suspects like Putin, will be the greatly suffering, Yemeni people. No longer a sunni-shiite war but simply war, it should become harder to maintain the farce of response to a threat with the focus now back to the holy city. </span></div>
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cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-40663699012517994092015-11-21T13:29:00.002-08:002015-11-21T13:29:17.565-08:00Mama Merkel fights War with pure PeaceCynics, say what you will about Angela Merkel's welcome to the refugees (e.g. undercuts local wages; revives German moral standing). She is waging a one woman peace struggle against the forces of and for war. What a wonderful deployment of political power! Her sort of Image of welcome is the key to victory.cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-38037067811031207812015-07-08T15:14:00.002-07:002015-07-08T15:14:51.630-07:00Greece and ambiguityEurope's fight to make Greece. pay in full seems stupid to me. I have heard the political complexities involved in a 30-50% haircut in their debt. But the risks to the European project (which is also mysterious to me) seem greater.<br />
<br />
The EU is at the same place now as the old Articles of Confederation but without a James Madison to light the way forward.<br />
<br />
The best solution for stability is a grand compromise, which is what the Obama wants.<br />
<br />
But in a world increasingly without trends, it seems likely that Grec-ambiguity will continue and worsen.<br />
<br />
If there is no grand compromise, then I expect the Greeks to begin printing and digitizing their own euros and nationalizing their banks to keep them from being under the thumb of the ECB. <br />
<br />
Or there could also instead be a little compromise that gives all parties to this squabble more breathing room. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-12807597312702509932015-06-08T10:28:00.002-07:002015-06-08T10:28:21.494-07:00What the Federal Reserve really wants (besides helping big banks)It is a brave new world, of many worlds that have come before and which can irrupt again. Point? There are no sustained trends. Last quarter the Main Street economy neared recession. Now jobs and growth are supposedly bouncing back. Next quarter, who knows? For almost any object of analysis today there are innumerable possibilities, all of which fizzle out.<br />
<br />
The Federal Reserve knows this or sees it.<br />
<br />
What they want to do however is bring back what postmodern theory long ago said would be ended: <i>mastery </i>over the <i>Object World</i>, of finances, money, economics, even politics (Remember the don't fight the Fed saying?). The subject does to the object world, or so it was said in the old, Modern era. <br />
But without clear trends to guide or to ride, the Fed is out of a job.<br />
<br />
So it is now trying to <i>simulate </i>mastery over events by talking about rate hikes. Yellen wants to do so and probably will. But she will not be able to gain the mastery over events that the Fed. would like. The bond market is already way ahead of the Fed.<br />
<br />
The mastery game is over.cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-91802185751071799182015-05-22T08:14:00.001-07:002015-05-22T08:14:56.073-07:00Dear Oil Market: Welcome to Uncertainty, Regards, OPECIn a recent article, commodities monitor Saefong on Marketwatch writes that a long term oil glut, over a span of years, is likely if OPEC continues its present course. Interestingly she does claim that the price of petroleum will decline as a result, which the so-called 'laws' of supply and demand would suggest. Wisely, she knows that the price is no longer guided by such laws but by an inscrutable mix of fear, externalities, politics, wars, potential wars, and so forth. OPEC has introduced the oil markets to greater uncertainty. The price could go up or go down, and back again. It is not necessarily under the control of OPEC.<br />
<br />
This will still hurt the shale drillers in the US (unless the government supports the industry) because the uncertainty will wary investors will stay away.<br />
<br />
The idea that this is about maintaining market share is unclear. The greater uncertainty may make some buyers turn away from unstable suppliers or potentially unstable ones like Saudi, which could surprise them. It could even make some buyers turn to the US or Canada or Venezuela for their supply. Yes, only Saudi can supply oil and still make a profit at low prices. But the new uncertainty does not guarantee that win.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-21916519382241843852015-04-24T12:01:00.002-07:002015-04-24T12:30:04.969-07:00Our Ant-Trends world: the case of oil pricesIt all looked so good...price of oil was falling in large part thanks to Saudi Arabia pumping furiously. Their goals: hurt Russia and Iran who back Assad in Syria (also but maybe not primarily, to slow shale oil in the U.S.). With Iraq, Libya, etc. also online, prices seemed destined to fall dramatically., <br />
<br />
But then came Yemen, Saudi bombs, and the laughable Iranian navy. Or not. By merely stationing Iranian vessels nearby, the potential for a wider clash seems greater.<br />
<br />
Point: the reality of more oil is almost less important than gestures or statements made which threaten the supply. Fostering trends today and later takes huge effort but can be easily upset. Expect vacillation between the impacts of reality (e.g. so-called laws of supply and demand) and virtual reality.cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-56113636825514777272015-02-21T12:52:00.001-08:002015-02-21T12:54:16.250-08:00What is ISIS or Daesh? And what should be done?Would you believe me if I claimed that Daesh were not real in the main. They are not Islamic because they put their own desires first. They are mostly internet warriors. If the US (and recently Jordan) rains down fire and horror through bombs from the sky, ISIL does so through astounding staging of online events. Around them is nothing but destruction so they aim to win through more destruction...of viewers' sensibilities. They win the war (which has no expected aim) because Coalition bombs destroy and burn but without witnesses. (Has anyone seen their Syrian capital today on TV?) Their staged events also make everyone wonder what to do against them. The real destruction of the Coalition will not work (although whether killing the leaders might work is a solid question). They also cannot be matched in online warfare (should Jordan draw and quarter a captive online?).<br />
<br />
Suggestion: Kill them with kindness. They expect bombs, lies, and misrepresentations. Pure kindness (real and virtual) is not expected. Use the same amount of funding now deployed to destroy their region to instead 'kind their region.' It is the only way to win.cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-7455738052353832132015-01-12T07:21:00.001-08:002015-01-12T07:21:04.605-08:00Terrorisms: On the Other Terrorists of FranceThe victims of the much discussed attacks in Paris are those French people who lost their lives. But there are two perpetrators according to Baudrillard. On the one hand there are the 3 or 4 gunmen involved. On the other hand is the French government. You see they sacrifice their population to their power games in which Western elites connect with each other in profitable attacks on the Arab world. This is the other terrorism, the one not talked about by the talking heads. France on Libya (what did Libya ever do to them?), Spain on Iraq, Kenya in Somalia, and so on. These governments know that they are putting their populace at risk. It all seems so far away, so harmless. What matters an air raid here, a special forces attack there? And so when the blow comes, like in Paris, it seems to arise out of the blue, which is precisely the definition of terror. Witness the recent raid by US forces in Yemen. A private ransom deal was about to be worked out the next day. Instead, in a cynical move, the US tries to free the hostages by force and they die instead. Sacrifices all; often for causes that are not even in the national interest. This is the other terrorism citizens face. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-63652707518461686392014-12-14T20:57:00.001-08:002014-12-14T20:57:53.357-08:00War of Peoples: On the new violence in Palestine<link href="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Owner/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msoclip1/01/clip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List"></link><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The
war of peoples is on (in contrast to the old clash of civilizations idea)! The
recent spate of clearly <i>unofficial </i>acts of war between Palestinians and
Israelis signals a war of peoples. These governments do not want total war (if
you can call these strange entities governments, the PA and Likud). But the
Peoples are not so disciplined and some want and draw upon the idea of war to
act out.<span> </span>The War of Peoples is the
effect of the End of Representation. It stems from the effect that the myth or
illusion or possibility of representation is finally dead. Just as delegates no
longer represent constituents (not with districts so gerrymandered) and votes
no longer register preferences (votes are stoked through data mining) nor
purchases represent desires (consumers purchase a thing due to advertisements)
and governments no longer represent interests, people are no longer represented
by ‘their’ government. Peoples have then become an independent, even hostile,
political force. Governments will do and seek one thing (no war, in this case)
and Peoples will do and seek another outcome. The war of peoples, which takes
the apparent form of tit for tat murders, is one effect of the End of
Representation. This is true divergence and nothing that governments can do anything
about. Unlike Machiavelli’s modern notion that government should initiate or be
aggressive as a general rule in their acts and policies, governments must now
also be regularly reactive and backpedal out from the dizzying ‘out of control’
vortex that disrupts their carefully laid goals.<span> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-44070369937294737052014-10-19T08:08:00.003-07:002014-10-19T08:08:39.177-07:00Why Kobani? It's all about the Image, stupidThe role of image and its interplay with power is a major theme of postmodern thought. Image is Power.<br />
<br />
Kobani is interesting only because for once in this peculiar war the world can see it. Kobani is located on the border between Syria and Turkey. So unlike Raqqa or Hit or these other places that have supposedly been bombed by the United States, Kobani can have big cameras on it (not only little phone camera which allow videos to be posted somewhere online for a few terror experts and enthusiasts to watch). There are networked cameras that can transmit the image broadly.<br />
<br />
This puts the contending parties in an interesting, postmodern war. One side or the other may win this worthless border crossing. It will at that point be demolished and essentially useless to the victor. But the fight and the image of this fight can go on for some time. At a low cost to ISIS, the long-running image of fighting for that particular place can be spun usefully in many different ways. <br />
<br />
How this war-event is interpreted over time will be what matters, not who has more jets. The battle for Kobany is entirely image, notwithstanding the carnage. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-1041161479505510262014-09-30T13:05:00.003-07:002014-10-07T14:47:18.210-07:00On Exploratory WarsIR specialists are confounded today by the actions of nations not following their national interests. This is especially required, they say, in cases of war. But now and in the future, war will happen for a different, non-rational reason. <br />
<br />
Instead war will be exploratory. It will be waged to shake things up. Because the postmodern age offers no grand ideals, not even nationalism, to fight for (yes I know of Ukraine so don't contradict yet). There is little to guide big moves in a postmodern world. Random shocks can arrive but they will not be new. Progress as Hegelian rationality is well done.<br />
<br />
Postmodernism is a fast world but a slow one too. Change becomes the result of accretion of mass, of events unrelated which gather but which press history forward in no particular direction. Postmodernism condemns us to repetition of familiar events that pop out of the mass briefly (witness the terribly derivative Hong Kong occupy movement). <br />
<br />
Wars are now efforts to effect desired change in an era that works against such desire. In the face of the ongoing, massive accretion of many, less weighty, events, then wars will be waged to shake loose the status quo in a favorable direction. But be assured that national interests will not be served by it today. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-62463729327170356952014-09-11T04:57:00.002-07:002014-09-11T04:57:33.676-07:00Obama's World War preparationsDon't believe for one minute the narrative that the USA is threatened by ISIS and seeks to destroy it. The real target is Assad's Syria, a Russian ally. (Why? some say that Assad/Russia is what prevents a gas pipeline running from Qatar to Europe but that seems farfetched to me).<br />
<br />
The stupid concentration of NATO/Saudi forces plus Israel is going to provoke Russia and Iran to concentrate their forces there too. They are not going to let Assad get Gaddafied. <br />
<br />
And the compelling national interest reasons for this buildup are nonexistent. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-67170108070399172062014-09-10T02:33:00.000-07:002014-09-10T02:33:25.825-07:00Ferguson as the end of politics<link href="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Owner/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msoclip1/01/clip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List"></link><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt;">Ferguson:
An event that signals the emptiness of a political system. One of the most
surprising features of this event was the escalation of force. Much has been
made of the use of military hardware by the local police. But that has been
known for awhile and merely accelerated since the Patriot Act. But it was
shocking to see this duel on the streets at night grow and grow. Like a cancer
it had no rules to regulate its growth. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt;">Is
this the kind of duel envisioned by Baudrillard, the seduction of a new politics
born of a politics that otherwise proceeds nowhere?<span> </span>You could say that local police provoked a population under siege
to rise in anger; a siege that had become too blatant to be tolerable. Race issues too. That
narrative was part of it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 14pt;">But I was taught that martial law, which this
was, is always the signal of the failure of politics and I read Ferguson as
such. There was nothing left to say or rather nothing left to represent or believe, for both
sides. I think more of such unexpected events, based upon the same premise, will
be forthcoming. It will not take the same form of an uprising...that’s done.
But they will surprise.</span>cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-9427546896489050382014-09-10T02:04:00.001-07:002014-09-10T21:43:01.811-07:00War on Islamic State: What is President Obama really up to? <link href="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Owner/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msoclip1/01/clip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List"></link><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt;">[Just heard the O. speech...yes indeed Syria/Assad/Putin is THE target NOT ISIL, stopping the 'bad guys' is just an excuse to get more involved there. Proof? Obama's claim to arm the Free Syrian army and other 'moderate' Syrians to take on ISIL...but they are ISIL] </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 14pt;">Prediction:
The United States government will push Islamic State back into its hole in
Syria so it can wreak its terror there. It is not that the US cares deeply for
Iraq, mind you. Iraq for US policymakers has now been classified as lost to
Iran, a part of their growing Shiite empire. Expect the US Air Force to 'persuade'
IS to go back into Syria and do its pro-Sunni thing there. It will be a tricky
move because Saudi Arabia probably likes what is happening, more or less. But
Kerry will have to convince them to give up on their dream of a Sunni recovery
of Iraq, for now. Expect more refugees, more distraction from domestic
problems, and more US sales of armaments. In short, what was once called a
jolly good war. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt;">This
is the zeroth degree of politics. The hateful but prescient Carl Schmitt said
politics is defined by the friend-enemy distinction. But the Islamic State is
not the natural enemy of the US the way France was for Schmitt’s Cromwell. And
moving against IS has little to do with national interests of the US. So this
seems to be ‘play politics’ or politics for its own sake with NATO opening up a
new Southern front against Russia, to best Putin perhaps. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-76250619857979720832014-08-08T13:34:00.003-07:002014-08-08T13:34:44.242-07:00To Help Yazidis is to help Satan?Yes I know people trapped on a summer mountain top is sad. But Yazidis are perceived throughout Mideast, especially in Sunni-land, as devil worshippers. True or not that is the perception. Now the US is their friend? Or does perception not matter? Probably the latter...have we entered Rousseau's final cycle of civilization? Alternatively, in a postmodern space, none of that matters overly. Everything contributes a bit maybe, but not enough to tip any scales in a definite direction. Ukraine will test this theory because if big powers can't produce big movements then no one can. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-517109567329499412014-08-08T13:28:00.000-07:002014-08-08T14:11:53.075-07:00Obama: Lord of ChaosSo today we hear that the USA is bombing ISIL in Iraq. Whatever the reasons given, keeping Iraqis and Americans safe, can also be added the<em> production of</em> <em>instability</em>. The only pattern I can see behind US policy in the Levant is to make sure no one wins...not Assad but not the Free Syrians, not Gaddafi but no other Libyan, and in Iraq not ISIL but not Baghdad either. Toss in just enough kinetics to prevent any kind of stability. So long as the oil flows now and in the future...hence the price goes down!<br />
<br />
(Check out Stephen Walt today on FP.com for this Lord of Chaos premise but with an opposite suggestion: to get out of the ME and do no more harm. Wow, is Stephen becoming an idealist?)cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-27786284505789221632014-07-22T16:35:00.000-07:002014-07-24T14:00:30.122-07:00Gaza: Obama's Rwanda?As Israelis war on Palestinians, witness the struggle between people who refuse to lose anything and people with nothing to lose. The outcome could be terrible quite quickly and what could have easily been stopped for minimal cost (like Clinton's Rwanda: Hutu with machetes were no match for Marines) becomes a historically cowardly mistake. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-90624809200305210372014-07-22T16:32:00.001-07:002014-07-22T16:32:14.434-07:00American Blowback1. foreign kids streaming across the border.<br />
2. high gas prices.<br />
3. drought<br />
<br />
These 3 phenomenon and more are blowback effects: from helping militarize Central America, to destabilizing oil-rich Iraq and Libya, to just plain old greed, some say these policies have reaped a terrible windfall (see <a href="http://www.fpif.org/">www.FPIF.org</a>).<br />
<br />
Poststructuralism? it says that identity and dominance come from the production of Others and threats. <br />
<br />
The points are not quite the same. But it does suggest that we think in terms of relations and connections. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-59442686804970798902014-07-07T12:44:00.000-07:002014-07-07T12:44:19.020-07:00Manipulation by FacebookThe Guardian recently opined that we should expect Facebook to manipulate its users. It is a profit-seeking company after all and it wants effective advertising.<br />
<br />
But this charge of manipulation hides a false, fixed ideal: Autonomy, or the idea that individuals give their own law to themselves based upon rational decision-making regarding their circumstances. Whether that ideal ever held is one question. But it certainly does not hold now.<br />
<br />
Facebook users expect to have their feelings changed, whether by their friends, responses to Likes, or their tailored newsfeeds. Facebook just happens to momentarily dominate that effect. But soon it will fade into one of many such feeders.<br />
<br />
That researchers changed the feeds deliberately to test their effects only proves that users were not autonomous as according to the old model. This does not mean that users will accept any program. Luckily, there are too many incoming messages for any one message to predominate for long. Put another way, paradoxically, people can no longer be manipulated into being only autonomous. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-8593355365997177482014-06-20T14:45:00.002-07:002014-06-24T14:22:26.793-07:00A Serious Suggestion for Iraq: The Middleman A source told me that the Arab world often uses middlemen to coordinate outcomes. I suppose since you can't trust others (rightly so said Hobbes) then the use of a middleman can come in handy.<br />
<br />
Maliki need not and should not go right now. No leader should step down under such conditions.<br />
<br />
What is needed is the right diplomacy. Example: the US or the UN should use an ambassador to Iraq or a special one to shuttle between the various contenders. With some initial confidence building measures at first and then leading to something like an Office of the Purveyor to continue the Middleman role. <br />
<br />
More likely is a de facto partition of Iraq with ongoing low level violence.<br />
<br />
Sending in US spotters or spies will piss off someone. If they spy on Iran from Baghdad to see what it is doing in Syria that will piss off Baghdad too. If they spy on Sunniland to bomb targets that will piss off the Gulf States.<br />
<br />
You see the goal of the US is instability: don't let anyone win, not Maliki (would help Iran), not Assad (helps Russia), not ISIS (helps Saudi and ould scare Israel).<br />
<br />
But the backers involved want these factions to WIN. Unlike the USA, they dont want the pot to just keep on simmering forever.<br />
<br />
Keep in mind too the track record of the US in that region has been a general failure. Things always seem to backfire over there. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-57717959512015911352014-06-08T11:01:00.001-07:002014-06-08T11:01:34.068-07:00The Bergdahl Event<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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In postmodern thought, an event is singularity, either of
one major theme or (more likely) of them all. It would be for example the
coming together in thought or politics or writing all of the extant ideologies
at once…i.e. a hot mess. The Bergdahl debate is such a happening. It has all that
can be thought about war and POW’s in one spot. Traitor or patriot? Was too
much given up for the trade? Were the exchanged only Taliban officials or
warriors? Can Qatar be relied upon? Let’s look past the truth of these questions for a moment. <span> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But Bergdahl will mean nothing in terms of the outcome in
Afghanistan. He will not provide much help either on the campaign trail. No
Republican will talk it without undermining the ‘support the troops’ idea. No
Democrat will talk it without the worry of what the exchanged might do. A wash.
But a fluorescent one. A singularity which fits perfectly in no one narrative. </div>
cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-78218673584510144212014-06-07T16:33:00.001-07:002014-06-07T16:33:46.829-07:00dumb Goodluck, dumber boko haramThe location of the 200+ Nigerian girls was not known. But the CLAIM that that location was known elicited 'chatter' from the kidnappers, the location of which was then triangulated. Cool. The mere use of publicized speech did the trick, not physical sleuthing nor tracking.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately while the Nigerian army is good at burning down Hausa villages, it is not able to do a surgical operation. And most of the girls have been married off or ransomed by now anyway. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5862328195134738317.post-50523586569524778022014-05-29T14:10:00.001-07:002014-05-29T14:42:39.275-07:00Edward Snowden wasted his lifeSorry to say but the NBC interview with Snowden shows a technically savvy guy but an historically idealistic and naïve one. He sacrificed his life for an America that no longer exists. <br />
<br />
No one cares about privacy anymore! Has he not heard of Facebook and Twitter? You might counter that we intentionally share in such forums while the NSA scoops up our secrets or even incidents from our seemingly banal, everyday life. But so does Google and all the rest. And so too would any observant person you meet downtown or in Home Depot.(However, neither Google nor Home Depot can slap handcuffs on you and throw you into a dungeon, unlike a government apparatus). <br />
<br />
Baudrillard says we are in a world of obscenity....if so, we would like to flaunt ourselves more if we could. As the age of Metanarratives fades, including Snowden's beloved ideal, it becomes more and more necessary to prove that we are real or that we exist. <br />
<br />
It is about time to think about enjoying life without privacy. For example, we should consider legal immunity from prosecutions or being fired for our cyber profiles. Otherwise the potential of cyberspace will be stifled. cosmocathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02578254792246881225noreply@blogger.com0