Republicrats Target Social Security

Written by Graeme Anfinson
Thursday, 06 January 2011



The ruling class has always been telling us that we need to make cuts in order to eliminate the national deficit. They have talked about cutting taxes and government spending in order to accomplish this. In addition to this, they are in favor of cutting "entitlements" such as Social Security and raising the retirement age, thereby making the working class pay for their crisis.

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RENEGADE EYE

Stratfor: The World Looks at Obama After the U.S. Midterm Election

By George Friedman
November 04, 2010

The 2010 U.S. midterm elections were held, and the results were as expected: The Republicans took the House but did not take the Senate. The Democrats have such a small margin in the Senate, however, that they cannot impose cloture, which means the Republicans can block Obama administration initiatives in both houses of Congress. At the same time, the Republicans cannot override presidential vetoes alone, so they cannot legislate, either. The possible legislative outcomes are thus gridlock or significant compromises.

U.S. President Barack Obama hopes that the Republicans prove rigidly ideological. In 1994, after the Republicans won a similar victory over Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich attempted to use the speakership to craft national policy. Clinton ran for re-election in 1996 against Gingrich rather than the actual Republican candidate, Bob Dole; Clinton made Gingrich the issue, and he won. Obama hopes for the same opportunity to recoup. The new speaker, John Boehner, already has indicated that he does not intend to play Gingrich but rather is prepared to find compromises. Since Tea Party members are not close to forming a majority of the Republican Party in the House, Boehner is likely to get his way.

Another way to look at this is that the United States remains a predominantly right-of-center country. Obama won a substantial victory in 2008, but he did not change the architecture of American politics. Almost 48 percent of voters voted against him. Though he won a larger percentage than anyone since Ronald Reagan, he was not even close to the magnitude of Reagan’s victory. Reagan transformed the way American politics worked. Obama did not. In spite of his supporters’ excitement, his election did not signify a permanent national shift to the left. His attempt to govern from the left accordingly brought a predictable result: The public took away his ability to legislate on domestic affairs. Instead, they moved the country to a position where no one can legislate anything beyond the most carefully negotiated and neutral legislation.

Foreign Policy and Obama’s Campaign Position

That leaves foreign policy. Last week, I speculated on what Obama might do in foreign affairs, exploring his options with regard to Iran. This week, I’d like to consider the opposite side of the coin, namely, how foreign governments view Obama after this defeat. Let’s begin by considering how he positioned himself during his campaign.

The most important thing about his campaign was the difference between what he said he would do and what his supporters heard him saying he would do. There were several major elements to his foreign policy. First, he campaigned intensely against the Bush policy in Iraq, arguing that it was the wrong war in the wrong place. Second, he argued that the important war was in Afghanistan, where he pledged to switch his attention to face the real challenge of al Qaeda. Third, he argued against Bush administration policy on detention, military tribunals and torture, in his view symbolized by the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.

In a fourth element, he argued that Bush had alienated the world by his unilateralism, by which he meant lack of consultation with allies — in particular the European allies who had been so important during the Cold War. Obama argued that global hostility toward the Bush administration arose from the Iraq war and the manner in which Bush waged the war on terror. He also made clear that the United States under Bush had an indifference to world opinion that cost it moral force. Obama wanted to change global perceptions of the United States as a unilateral global power to one that would participate as an equal partner with the rest of the world.

The Europeans were particularly jubilant at his election. They had in fact seen Bush as unwilling to take their counsel, and more to the point, as demanding that they participate in U.S. wars that they had no interest in participating in. The European view — or more precisely, the French and German view — was that allies should have a significant degree of control over what Americans do. Thus, the United States should not merely have consulted the Europeans, but should have shaped its policy with their wishes in mind. The Europeans saw Bush as bullying, unsophisticated and dangerous. Bush in turn saw allies’ unwillingness to share the burdens of a war as meaning they were not in fact allies. He considered so-called “Old Europe” as uncooperative and unwilling to repay past debts.

The European Misunderstanding of Obama

The Europeans’ pleasure in Obama’s election, however, represented a massive misunderstanding. Though they thought Obama would allow them a greater say in U.S. policy — and, above all, ask them for less — Obama in fact argued that the Europeans would be more likely to provide assistance to the United States if Washington was more collaborative with the Europeans.

Thus, in spite of the Nobel Peace Prize in the early days of the romance, the bloom wore off as the Europeans discovered that Obama was simply another U.S. president. More precisely, they learned that instead of being able to act according to his or her own wishes, circumstances constrain occupants of the U.S. presidency into acting like any other president would.

Campaign rhetoric notwithstanding, Obama’s position on Iraq consisted of slightly changing Bush’s withdrawal timetable. In Afghanistan, his strategy was to increase troop levels beyond what Bush would consider. Toward Iran, his policy has been the same as Bush’s: sanctions with a hint of something later.

The Europeans quickly became disappointed in Obama, especially when he escalated the Afghan war and asked them to increase forces when they wanted to withdraw. Perhaps most telling was his speech to the Muslim world from Cairo, where he tried to reach out to, and create a new relationship with, Muslims. The problem with this approach was that that in the speech, Obama warned that the United States would not abandon Israel — the same stance other U.S. presidents had adopted. It is hard to know what Obama was thinking. Perhaps he thought that by having reached out to the Muslim world, they should in turn understand the American commitment to Israel. Instead, Muslims understood the speech as saying that while Obama was prepared to adopt a different tone with Muslims, the basic structure of American policy in the region would not be different.

Why Obama Believed in a Reset Button

In both the European and Muslim case, the same question must be asked: Why did Obama believe that he was changing relations when in fact his policies were not significantly different from Bush’s policies? The answer is that Obama seemed to believe the essential U.S. problem with the world was rhetorical. The United States had not carefully explained itself, and in not explaining itself, the United States appeared arrogant.

Obama seemed to believe that the policies did not matter as much as the sensibility that surrounded the policies. It was not so much that he believed he could be charming — although he seemed to believe that with reason — but rather that foreign policy is personal, built around trust and familiarity rather than around interests. The idea that nations weren’t designed to trust or like one another, but rather pursued their interests with impersonal force, was alien to him. And so he thought he could explain the United States to the Muslims without changing U.S. policy and win the day.

U.S. policies in the Middle East remain intact, Guantanamo is still open, and most of the policies Obama opposed in his campaign are still there, offending the world much as they did under Bush. Moreover, the U.S. relationship with China has worsened, and while the U.S. relationship with Russia has appeared to improve, this is mostly atmospherics. This is not to criticize Obama, as these are reasonable policies for an American to pursue. Still, the substantial change in America’s place in the world that Europeans and his supporters entertained has not materialized. That it couldn’t may be true, but the gulf between what Obama said and what has happened is so deep that it shapes global perceptions.

Global Expectations and Obama’s Challenge

Having traveled a great deal in the last year and met a number of leaders and individuals with insight into the predominant thinking in their country, I can say with some confidence that the global perception of Obama today is as a leader given to rhetoric that doesn’t live up to its promise. It is not that anyone expected his rhetoric to live up to its promise, since no politician can pull that off, but that they see Obama as someone who thought rhetoric would change things. In that sense, he is seen as naive and, worse, as indecisive and unimaginative.

No one expected him to turn rhetoric into reality. But they did expect some significant shifts in foreign policy and a forceful presence in the world. Whatever the criticisms leveled against the United States, the expectation remains that the United States will remain at the center of events, acting decisively. This may be a contradiction in the global view of things, but it is the reality.

A foreign minister of a small — but not insignificant — country put it this way to me: Obama doesn’t seem to be there. By that he meant that Obama does not seem to occupy the American presidency and that the United States he governs does not seem like a force to be reckoned with. Decisions that other leaders wait for the United States to make don’t get made, the authority of U.S. emissaries is uncertain, the U.S. defense and state departments say different things, and serious issues are left unaddressed.

While it may seem an odd thing to say, it is true: The American president also presides over the world. U.S. power is such that there is an expectation that the president will attend to matters around the globe not out of charity, but because of American interest. The questions I have heard most often on many different issues are simple: What is the American position, what is the American interest, what will the Americans do? (As an American, I frequently find my hosts appointing me to be the representative of the United States.)

I have answered that the United States is off balance trying to place the U.S.-jihadist war in context, that it must be understood that the president is preoccupied but will attend to their region shortly. That is not a bad answer, since it is true. But the issue now is simple: Obama has spent two years on the trajectory in place when he was elected, having made few if any significant shifts. Inertia is not a bad thing in policy, as change for its own sake is dangerous. Yet a range of issues must be attended to, including China, Russia and the countries that border each of them.

Obama comes out of this election severely weakened domestically. If he continues his trajectory, the rest of the world will perceive him as a crippled president, something he needn’t be in foreign policy matters. Obama can no longer control Congress, but he still controls foreign policy. He could emerge from this defeat as a powerful foreign policy president, acting decisively in Afghanistan and beyond. It’s not a question of what he should do, but whether he will choose to act in a significant way at all.

This is Obama’s great test. Reagan accelerated his presence in the world after his defeat in 1982. It is an option, and the most important question is whether he takes it. We will know in a few months. If he doesn’t, global events will begin unfolding without recourse to the United States, and issues held in check will no longer remain quiet.

RENEGADE EYE

Obama, Afghanistan and General McChrystal

Written by Alan Woods
Wednesday, 23 June 2010

The public clash between Obama and his top general in Afghanistan highlight the difficulties US imperialism is facing in what is clearly an unwinnable war. What the general has done is to express in public what is normally reserved for private conversation, but it does bring out clearly the impasse the US is facing in Afghanistan.

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RENEGADE EYE

Stratfor: Thinking About the Unthinkable: A U.S.-Iranian Deal

By George Friedman
March 01, 2010

The United States apparently has reached the point where it must either accept that Iran will develop nuclear weapons at some point if it wishes, or take military action to prevent this. There is a third strategy, however: Washington can seek to redefine the Iranian question.

As we have no idea what leaders on either side are thinking, exploring this represents an exercise in geopolitical theory. Let’s begin with the two apparent stark choices.

Diplomacy vs. the Military Option

The diplomatic approach consists of creating a broad coalition prepared to impose what have been called crippling sanctions on Iran. Effective sanctions must be so painful that they compel the target to change its behavior. In Tehran’s case, this could only consist of blocking Iran’s imports of gasoline. Iran imports 35 percent of the gasoline it consumes. It is not clear that a gasoline embargo would be crippling, but it is the only embargo that might work. All other forms of sanctions against Iran would be mere gestures designed to give the impression that something is being done.

The Chinese will not participate in any gasoline embargo. Beijing gets 11 percent of its oil from Iran, and it has made it clear it will continue to deliver gasoline to Iran. Moscow’s position is that Russia might consider sanctions down the road, but it hasn’t specified when, and it hasn’t specified what. The Russians are more than content seeing the U.S. bogged down in the Middle East and so are not inclined to solve American problems in the region. With the Chinese and Russians unlikely to embargo gasoline, these sanctions won’t create significant pain for Iran. Since all other sanctions are gestures, the diplomatic approach is therefore unlikely to work.

The military option has its own risks. First, its success depends on the quality of intelligence on Iran’s nuclear facilities and on the degree of hardening of those targets. Second, it requires successful air attacks. Third, it requires battle damage assessments that tell the attacker whether the strike succeeded. Fourth, it requires follow-on raids to destroy facilities that remain functional. And fifth, attacks must do more than simply set back Iran’s program a few months or even years: If the risk of a nuclear Iran is great enough to justify the risks of war, the outcome must be decisive.

Each point in this process is a potential failure point. Given the multiplicity of these points — which includes others not mentioned — failure may not be an option, but it is certainly possible.

But even if the attacks succeed, the question of what would happen the day after the attacks remains. Iran has its own counters. It has a superbly effective terrorist organization, Hezbollah, at its disposal. It has sufficient influence in Iraq to destabilize that country and force the United States to keep forces in Iraq badly needed elsewhere. And it has the ability to use mines and missiles to attempt to close the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf shipping lanes for some period — driving global oil prices through the roof while the global economy is struggling to stabilize itself. Iran’s position on its nuclear program is rooted in the awareness that while it might not have assured options in the event of a military strike, it has counters that create complex and unacceptable risks. Iran therefore does not believe the United States will strike or permit Israel to strike, as the consequences would be unacceptable.

To recap, the United States either can accept a nuclear Iran or risk an attack that might fail outright, impose only a minor delay on Iran’s nuclear program or trigger extremely painful responses even if it succeeds. When neither choice is acceptable, it is necessary to find a third choice.

Redefining the Iranian Problem

As long as the problem of Iran is defined in terms of its nuclear program, the United States is in an impossible place. Therefore, the Iranian problem must be redefined. One attempt at redefinition involves hope for an uprising against the current regime. We will not repeat our views on this in depth, but in short, we do not regard these demonstrations to be a serious threat to the regime. Tehran has handily crushed them, and even if they did succeed, we do not believe they would produce a regime any more accommodating toward the United States. The idea of waiting for a revolution is more useful as a justification for inaction — and accepting a nuclear Iran — than it is as a strategic alternative.

At this moment, Iran is the most powerful regional military force in the Persian Gulf. Unless the United States permanently stations substantial military forces in the region, there is no military force able to block Iran. Turkey is more powerful than Iran, but it is far from the Persian Gulf and focused on other matters at the moment, and it doesn’t want to take on Iran militarily — at least not for a very long time. At the very least, this means the United States cannot withdraw from Iraq. Baghdad is too weak to block Iran from the Arabian Peninsula, and the Iraqi government has elements friendly toward Iran.

Historically, regional stability depended on the Iraqi-Iranian balance of power. When it tottered in 1990, the result was the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The United States did not push into Iraq in 1991 because it did not want to upset the regional balance of power by creating a vacuum in Iraq. Rather, U.S. strategy was to re-establish the Iranian-Iraqi balance of power to the greatest extent possible, as the alternative was basing large numbers of U.S. troops in the region.

The decision to invade Iraq in 2003 assumed that once the Baathist regime was destroyed the United States would rapidly create a strong Iraqi government that would balance Iran. The core mistake in this thinking lay in failing to recognize that the new Iraqi government would be filled with Shiites, many of whom regarded Iran as a friendly power. Rather than balancing Iran, Iraq could well become an Iranian satellite. The Iranians strongly encouraged the American invasion precisely because they wanted to create a situation where Iraq moved toward Iran’s orbit. When this in fact began happening, the Americans had no choice but an extended occupation of Iraq, a trap both the Bush and Obama administrations have sought to escape.

It is difficult to define Iran’s influence in Iraq at this point. But at a minimum, while Iran may not be able to impose a pro-Iranian state on Iraq, it has sufficient influence to block the creation of any strong Iraqi government either through direct influence in the government or by creating destabilizing violence in Iraq. In other words, Iran can prevent Iraq from emerging as a counterweight to Iran, and Iran has every reason to do this. Indeed, it is doing just this.

The Fundamental U.S.-Iranian Issue

Iraq, not nuclear weapons, is the fundamental issue between Iran and the United States. Iran wants to see a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq so Iran can assume its place as the dominant military power in the Persian Gulf. The United States wants to withdraw from Iraq because it faces challenges in Afghanistan — where it will also need Iranian cooperation — and elsewhere. Committing forces to Iraq for an extended period of time while fighting in Afghanistan leaves the United States exposed globally. Events involving China or Russia — such as the 2008 war in Georgia — would see the United States without a counter. The alternative would be a withdrawal from Afghanistan or a massive increase in U.S. armed forces. The former is not going to happen any time soon, and the latter is an economic impossibility.

Therefore, the United States must find a way to counterbalance Iran without an open-ended deployment in Iraq and without expecting the re-emergence of Iraqi power, because Iran is not going to allow the latter to happen. The nuclear issue is simply an element of this broader geopolitical problem, as it adds another element to the Iranian tool kit. It is not a stand-alone issue.

The United States has an interesting strategy in redefining problems that involves creating extraordinarily alliances with mortal ideological and geopolitical enemies to achieve strategic U.S. goals. First consider Franklin Roosevelt’s alliance with Stalinist Russia to block Nazi Germany. He pursued this alliance despite massive political outrage not only from isolationists but also from institutions like the Roman Catholic Church that regarded the Soviets as the epitome of evil.

Now consider Richard Nixon’s decision to align with China at a time when the Chinese were supplying weapons to North Vietnam that were killing American troops. Moreover, Mao — who had said he did not fear nuclear war as China could absorb a few hundred million deaths — was considered, with reason, quite mad. Nevertheless, Nixon, as anti-Communist and anti-Chinese a figure as existed in American politics, understood that an alliance (and despite the lack of a formal treaty, alliance it was) with China was essential to counterbalance the Soviet Union at a time when American power was still being sapped in Vietnam.

Roosevelt and Nixon both faced impossible strategic situations unless they were prepared to redefine the strategic equation dramatically and accept the need for alliance with countries that had previously been regarded as strategic and moral threats. American history is filled with opportunistic alliances designed to solve impossible strategic dilemmas. The Stalin and Mao cases represent stunning alliances with prior enemies designed to block a third power seen as more dangerous.

It is said that Ahmadinejad is crazy. It was also said that Mao and Stalin were crazy, in both cases with much justification. Ahmadinejad has said many strange things and issued numerous threats. But when Roosevelt ignored what Stalin said and Nixon ignored what Mao said, they each discovered that Stalin’s and Mao’s actions were far more rational and predictable than their rhetoric. Similarly, what the Iranians say and what they do are quite different.

U.S. vs. Iranian Interests

Consider the American interest. First, it must maintain the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. The United States cannot tolerate interruptions, and that limits the risks it can take. Second, it must try to keep any one power from controlling all of the oil in the Persian Gulf, as that would give such a country too much long-term power within the global system. Third, while the United States is involved in a war with elements of the Sunni Muslim world, it must reduce the forces devoted to that war. Fourth, it must deal with the Iranian problem directly. Europe will go as far as sanctions but no further, while the Russians and Chinese won’t even go that far yet. Fifth, it must prevent an Israeli strike on Iran for the same reasons it must avoid a strike itself, as the day after any Israeli strike will be left to the United States to manage.

Now consider the Iranian interest. First, it must guarantee regime survival. It sees the United States as dangerous and unpredictable. In less than 10 years, it has found itself with American troops on both its eastern and western borders. Second, it must guarantee that Iraq will never again be a threat to Iran. Third, it must increase its authority within the Muslim world against Sunni Muslims, whom it regards as rivals and sometimes as threats.

Now consider the overlaps. The United States is in a war against some (not all) Sunnis. These are Iran’s enemies, too. Iran does not want U.S. troops along its eastern and western borders. In point of fact, the United States does not want this either. The United States does not want any interruption of oil flow through Hormuz. Iran much prefers profiting from those flows to interrupting them. Finally, the Iranians understand that it is the United States alone that is Iran’s existential threat. If Iran can solve the American problem its regime survival is assured. The United States understands, or should, that resurrecting the Iraqi counterweight to Iran is not an option: It is either U.S. forces in Iraq or accepting Iran’s unconstrained role.

Therefore, as an exercise in geopolitical theory, consider the following. Washington’s current options are unacceptable. By redefining the issue in terms of dealing with the consequences of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, there are three areas of mutual interest. First, both powers have serious quarrels with Sunni Islam. Second, both powers want to see a reduction in U.S. forces in the region. Third, both countries have an interest in assuring the flow of oil, one to use the oil, the other to profit from it to increase its regional power.

The strategic problem is, of course, Iranian power in the Persian Gulf. The Chinese model is worth considering here. China issued bellicose rhetoric before and after Nixon’s and Kissinger’s visits. But whatever it did internally, it was not a major risk-taker in its foreign policy. China’s relationship with the United States was of critical importance to China. Beijing fully understood the value of this relationship, and while it might continue to rail about imperialism, it was exceedingly careful not to undermine this core interest.

The major risk of the third strategy is that Iran will overstep its bounds and seek to occupy the oil-producing countries of the Persian Gulf. Certainly, this would be tempting, but it would bring a rapid American intervention. The United States would not block indirect Iranian influence, however, from financial participation in regional projects to more significant roles for the Shia in Arabian states. Washington’s limits for Iranian power are readily defined and enforced when exceeded.

The great losers in the third strategy, of course, would be the Sunnis in the Arabian Peninsula. But Iraq aside, they are incapable of defending themselves, and the United States has no long-term interest in their economic and political relations. So long as the oil flows, and no single power directly controls the entire region, the United States does not have a stake in this issue.

Israel would also be enraged. It sees ongoing American-Iranian hostility as a given. And it wants the United States to eliminate the Iranian nuclear threat. But eliminating this threat is not an option given the risks, so the choice is a nuclear Iran outside some structured relationship with the United States or within it. The choice that Israel might want, a U.S.-Iranian conflict, is unlikely. Israel can no more drive American strategy than can Saudi Arabia.

From the American standpoint, an understanding with Iran would have the advantage of solving an increasingly knotty problem. In the long run, it would also have the advantage of being a self-containing relationship. Turkey is much more powerful than Iran and is emerging from its century-long shell. Its relations with the United States are delicate. The United States would infuriate the Turks by doing this deal, forcing them to become more active faster. They would thus emerge in Iraq as a counterbalance to Iran. But Turkey’s anger at the United States would serve U.S. interests. The Iranian position in Iraq would be temporary, and the United States would not have to break its word as Turkey eventually would eliminate Iranian influence in Iraq.

Ultimately, the greatest shock of such a maneuver on both sides would be political. The U.S.-Soviet agreement shocked Americans deeply, the Soviets less so because Stalin’s pact with Hitler had already stunned them. The Nixon-Mao entente shocked all sides. It was utterly unthinkable at the time, but once people on both sides thought about it, it was manageable.

Such a maneuver would be particularly difficult for U.S. President Barack Obama, as it would be widely interpreted as another example of weakness rather than as a ruthless and cunning move. A military strike would enhance his political standing, while an apparently cynical deal would undermine it. Ahmadinejad could sell such a deal domestically much more easily. In any event, the choices now are a nuclear Iran, extended airstrikes with all their attendant consequences, or something else. This is what something else might look like and how it would fit in with American strategic tradition.

RENEGADE EYE

Stratfor: The Netanyahu-Obama Meeting in Strategic Context

Stratfor presents an interesting analysis of recent events in the Middle East. To the great powers, the Israel/Palestine issue is a sideshow. This article is slightly dated, but the analysis stands. This is not a socialist analysis, but it has data that could be incorporated into one.

By George Friedman
March 23, 2010

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to meet with U.S. President Barack Obama on March 23. The meeting follows the explosion in U.S.-Israeli relations after Israel announced it was licensing construction of homes in East Jerusalem while U.S. Vice President Joe Biden was in Israel. The United States wants Israel to stop all construction of new Jewish settlements. The Israelis argue that East Jerusalem is not part of the occupied territories, and hence, the U.S. demand doesn’t apply there. The Americans are not parsing their demand so finely and regard the announcement — timed as it was — as a direct affront and challenge. Israel’s response is that it is a sovereign state and so must be permitted to do as it wishes. The implicit American response is that the United States is also a sovereign state and will respond as it wishes.Barack

The polemics in this case are not the point. The issue is more fundamental: namely, the degree to which U.S. and Israeli relations converge and diverge. This is not a matter of friendship but, as in all things geopolitical, of national interest. It is difficult to discuss U.S. and Israeli interests objectively, as the relationship is clouded with endless rhetoric and simplistic formulations. It is thus difficult to know where to start, but two points of entry into this controversy come to mind.

The first is the idea that anti-Americanism in the Middle East has its roots in U.S. support for Israel, a point made by those in the United States and abroad who want the United States to distance itself from Israel. The second is that the United States has a special strategic relationship with Israel and a mutual dependency. Both statements have elements of truth, but neither is simply true — and both require much more substantial analysis. In analyzing them, we begin the process of trying to disentangle national interests from rhetoric.
Anti-Americanism in the Middle East

Begin with the claim that U.S. support for Israel generates anti-Americanism in the Arab and Islamic world. While such support undoubtedly contributes to the phenomenon, it hardly explains it. The fundamental problem with the theory is that Arab anti-Americanism predates significant U.S. support for Israel. Until 1967, the United States gave very little aid to Israel. What aid Washington gave was in the form of very limited loans to purchase agricultural products from the United States — a program that many countries in the world participated in. It was France, not the United States, which was the primary supplier of weapons to Israeli.

In 1956, Israel invaded the Sinai while Britain and France seized the Suez Canal, which the Egyptian government of Gamal Abdul Nasser had nationalized. The Eisenhower administration intervened — against Israel and on the side of Egypt. Under U.S. pressure, the British, French and Israelis were forced to withdraw. There were widespread charges that the Eisenhower administration was pro-Arab and anti-Israeli; certainly no one could argue that Eisenhower was significantly pro-Israel.

In spite of this, Nasser entered into a series of major agreements with the Soviet Union. Egypt effectively became a Soviet ally, the recipient of massive Soviet aid and a center of anti-American rhetoric. Whatever his reasons — and they had to do with U.S. unwillingness to give Egypt massive aid — Egypt’s anti-American attitude had nothing to do with the Israelis, save perhaps that the United States was not prepared to join Egypt in trying to destroy Israel.

Two major political events took place in 1963: left-wing political coups in Syria and Iraq that brought the Baathist Party to power in both countries. Note that this took place pre-1967, i.e., before the United States became closely aligned with Israel. Both regimes were pro-Soviet and anti-American, but neither could have been responding to U.S. support for Israel because there wasn’t much.

In 1964, Washington gave Cairo the first significant U.S. military aid in the form of Hawk missiles, but it gave those to other Arab countries, too, in response to the coups in Iraq and Syria. The United States feared the Soviets would base fighters in those two countries, so it began installing anti-air systems to try to block potential Soviet airstrikes on Saudi Arabia.

In 1967, France broke with Israel over the Arab-Israeli conflict that year. The United States began significant aid to Israel. In 1973, after the Syrian and Egyptian attack on Israel, the U.S. began massive assistance. In 1974 this amounted to about 25 percent of Israeli gross domestic product (GDP). The aid has continued at roughly the same level, but given the massive growth of the Israeli economy, it now amounts to about 2.5 percent of Israeli GDP.

The point here is that the United States was not actively involved in supporting Israel prior to 1967, yet anti-Americanism in the Arab world was rampant. The Arabs might have blamed the United States for Israel, but there was little empirical basis for this claim. Certainly, U.S. aid commenced in 1967 and surged in 1974, but the argument that eliminating support for Israel would cause anti-Americanism to decline must first explain the origins of anti-Americanism, which substantially predated American support for Israel. In fact, it is not clear that Arab anti-Americanism was greater after the initiation of major aid to Israel than before. Indeed, Egypt, the most important Arab country, shifted its position to a pro-American stance after the 1973 war in the face of U.S. aid.
Israel’s Importance to the United States

Let’s now consider the assumption that Israel is a critical U.S. asset. American grand strategy has always been derived from British grand strategy. The United States seeks to maintain regional balances of power in order to avoid the emergence of larger powers that can threaten U.S. interests. The Cold War was a massive exercise in the balance of power, pitting an American-sponsored worldwide alliance system against one formed by the Soviet Union. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has acted a number of times against regional hegemons: Iraq in 1990-91, Serbia in 1999 and so on.

In the area called generally the Middle East, but which we prefer to think of as the area between the Mediterranean and the Hindu Kush, there are three intrinsic regional balances. One is the Arab-Israeli balance of power. The second is the Iran-Iraq balance. The third is the Indo-Pakistani balance of power. The American goal in each balance is not so much stability as it is the mutual neutralization of local powers by other local powers.

Two of the three regional balances of power are collapsed or in jeopardy. The 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq and the failure to quickly put a strong, anti-Iranian government in place in Baghdad, has led to the collapse of the central balance of power — with little hope of resurrection. The eastern balance of power between Pakistan and India is also in danger of toppling. The Afghan war has caused profound stresses in Pakistan, and there are scenarios in which we can imagine Pakistan’s power dramatically weakening or even cracking. It is unclear how this will evolve, but what is clear is that it is not in the interest of the United States because it would destroy the native balance of power with India. The United States does not want to see India as the unchallenged power in the subcontinent any more than it wants to see Pakistan in that position. The United States needs a strong Pakistan to balance India, and its problem now is how to manage the Afghan war — a side issue strategically — without undermining the strategic interest of the United States, an Indo-Pakistani balance of power.

The western balance of power, Israel and the surrounding states, is relatively stable. What is most important to the United States at this point is that this balance of power also not destabilize. In this sense, Israel is an important strategic asset. But in the broader picture, where the United States is dealing with the collapse of the central balance of power and with the destabilization of the eastern balance of power, Washington does not want or need the destabilization of the western balance — between the Israelis and Arabs — at this time. U.S. “bandwidth” is already stretched to the limit. Washington does not need another problem. Nor does it need instability in this region complicating things in the other regions.

Note that the United States is interested in maintaining the balance of power. This means that the U.S. interest is in a stable set of relations, with no one power becoming excessively powerful and therefore unmanageable by the United States. Israel is already the dominant power in the region, and the degree to which Syria, Jordan and Egypt contain Israel is limited. Israel is moving from the position of an American ally maintaining a balance of power to a regional hegemon in its own right operating outside the framework of American interests.

The United States above all wants to ensure continuity after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak dies. It wants to ensure that the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan remains stable. And in its attempts to manage the situation in the center and east, it wants to ensure that nothing happens in the west to further complicate an already-enormously complex situation.

There is very little Israel can do to help the United States in the center and eastern balances. On the other hand, if the western balance of power were to collapse — due to anything from a collapse of the Egyptian regime to a new Israeli war with Hezbollah — the United States might find itself drawn into that conflict, while a new intifada in the Palestinian territories would not help matters either. It is unknown what effect this would have in the other balances of power, but the United States is operating at the limits of its power to try to manage these situations. Israel cannot help there, but it could hurt, for example by initiating an attack on Iran outside the framework of American planning. Therefore, the United States wants one thing from Israel now: for Israel to do nothing that could possibly destabilize the western balance of power or make America’s task more difficult in the other regions.

Israel sees the American preoccupation in these other regions, along with the current favorable alignment of forces in its region, as an opportunity both to consolidate and expand its power and to create new realities on the ground. One of these is building in East Jerusalem, or more precisely, using the moment to reshape the demographics and geography of its immediate region. The Israeli position is that it has rights in East Jerusalem that the United States cannot intrude on. The U.S. position is that it has interests in the broader region that are potentially weakened by this construction at this time.

Israel’s desire to do so is understandable, but it runs counter to American interests. The United States, given its overwhelming challenges, is neither interested in Israel’s desire to reshape its region, nor can it tolerate any more risk deriving from Israel’s actions. However small the risks might be, the United States is maxed out on risk. Therefore, Israel’s interests and that of the United States diverge. Israel sees an opportunity; the United States sees more risk.

The problem Israel has is that, in the long run, its relationship to the United States is its insurance policy. Netanyahu appears to be calculating that given the U.S. need for a western balance of power, whatever Israel does now will be allowed because in the end the United States needs Israel to maintain that balance of power. Therefore, he is probing aggressively. Netanyahu also has domestic political reasons for proceeding with this construction. For him, this construction is a prudent and necessary step.

Obama’s task is to convince Netanyahu that Israel has strategic value for the United States, but only in the context of broader U.S. interests in the region. If Israel becomes part of the American problem rather than the solution, the United States will seek other solutions. That is a hard case to make but not an impossible one. The balance of power is in the eastern Mediterranean, and there is another democracy the United States could turn to: Turkey — which is more than eager to fulfill that role and exploit Israeli tensions with the United States.

It may not be the most persuasive threat, but the fact is that Israel cannot afford any threat from the United States, such as an end to the intense U.S.-Israeli bilateral relationship. While this relationship might not be essential to Israel at the moment, it is one of the foundations of Israeli grand strategy in the long run. Just as the United States cannot afford any more instability in the region at the moment, so Israel cannot afford any threat, however remote, to its relationship with the United States.
A More Complicated Relationship

What is clear in all this is that the statement that Israel and the United States are strategic partners is not untrue, it is just vastly more complicated than it appears. Similarly, the claim that American support for Israel fuels anti-Americans is both a true and insufficient statement.

Netanyahu is betting on Congress and political pressures to restrain U.S. responses to Israel. One of the arguments of geopolitics is that political advantage is insufficient in the face of geopolitical necessity. Pressure on Congress from Israel in order to build houses in Jerusalem while the United States is dealing with crises in the region could easily backfire.

The fact is that while the argument that U.S. Israel policy caused anti-Americanism in the region may not be altogether true, the United States does not need any further challenges or stresses. Nations overwhelmed by challenges can behave in unpredictable ways. Netanyahu’s decision to confront the United States at this time on this issue creates an unpredictability that would seem excessive to Israel’s long term interests. Expecting the American political process to protect Israel from the consequences is not necessarily gauging the American mood at the moment.

The national interest of both countries is to maximize their freedom to maneuver. The Israelis have a temporary advantage because of American interests elsewhere in the region. But that creates a long-term threat. With two wars going on and two regional balances in shambles or tottering, the United States does not need a new crisis in the third. Israel has an interest in housing in East Jerusalem. The United States does not. This frames the conversation between Netanyahu and Obama. The rest is rhetoric.

RENEGADE EYE

Has Obama Sold Out Already?

Louis Proyect here compares present day Democrats, to the old Whig Party: In 1820 a dispute arose over the extension of slavery into Missouri, which was not then yet a state. Henry Clay worked out a compromise in Congress that made Maine free and Missouri slave. This maintained the balance in the Senate, which had included 11 free and 11 slave states. Except for Missouri, it would ban slavery north of Arkansas. The Missouri Compromise sounds exactly like the kind of legislation that the Democrats would come up with nowadays, especially in light of Mukasey’s approval and the continued funding of the war in Iraq. That describes the Democrats on healthcare.

Obama had no mandate to take Universal Health Care (UHC) off the table. Now it looks like even the "ublic option is history. Even if the public option was passed, it only allocated a fixed number of clients.

This time the pendulum will not swing right. The right has no program for the economic or healthcare crisis. No ideas period. It's time for the union movement to break from its main enemy, the Democratic Party.

RENEGADE EYE

Stratfor: The Emerging Obama Foreign Policy

This post was written by Stratfor, a geopolitical strategic planning think tank. I enjoy their reports, and use the data provided, for analysis.

By Rodger Baker
February 16, 2009 | 1913 GMT

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is making her first official overseas visit, with scheduled stops in Tokyo; Jakarta, Indonesia; Seoul, South Korea; and Beijing. The choice of Asia as her first destination is intended to signal a more global focus for U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration, as opposed to the heavy emphasis on the Middle East and South Asia seen in the last years of the Bush administration. It also represents the kickoff of an ambitious travel plan that will see Clinton visiting numerous countries across the globe in a bid to project the image of a more cooperative U.S. administration.

Clinton’s Asian expedition is not the first overseas visit by a key member of the new administration. Vice President Joe Biden traveled to Germany for the Munich Security Conference, where he faced the Russians. Special Envoy for Middle East Peace George Mitchell has finished his first trip to his area of responsibility, and is already planning a return visit to the Middle East. And Richard Holbrooke, special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, has visited both South Asian countries in addition to making a “listening” stop in India.

The Emergence of a New Foreign Policy

As with any new U.S. presidency, there will be a period of reshaping policy, of setting priorities, and of balancing internal differences within the Obama administration. The various individuals and visits cataloged above in part reflect the Obama administration’s emerging foreign policy.

A two-pronged Obama foreign policy approach is unfolding. The first prong, relating to the general tenor of foreign relations, involves a modern application of the “speak softly and carry a big stick” approach. The second prong, relating to the distribution of power within the administration, involves a centralization of foreign policy centering on a stronger and expanded National Security Council (NSC) and relies on special envoys for crisis areas, leaving the secretary of state to shape foreign perceptions rather than policy.

The Obama administration faced mixed expectations as it came into office. Perhaps the most far-reaching expectation on the international front was the idea that the Obama administration would somehow be the antithesis of the previous Bush administration. Whereas Bush often was portrayed as a unilateralist “cowboy,” constantly confronting others and never listening to allies (much less competitors), it was thought that Obama somehow would remake America into a nation that withheld its military power and instead confronted international relations via consultations and cooperation. In essence, the Bush administration was seen as aggressive and unwilling to listen, while an Obama administration was expected to be more easily shaped and manipulated.

Anticipation of a weaker administration created a challenge for Obama from the start. While many of his supporters saw him as the anti-Bush, the new president had no intention of shifting America to a second-tier position or making the United States isolationist. Obama’s focus on reducing U.S. forces in Iraq and the discussions during Clinton’s confirmation hearing of reducing the military’s role in reconstruction operations did not reflect an anti-military bias or even new ideas, but something Defense Secretary Robert Gates had advocated for under former U.S. President George W. Bush. A reshaping of the U.S. military will in fact take place over the course of Obama’s term in office. But the decision to reduce the U.S. military presence in Iraq is not unique to this administration; it is merely a recognition of the reality of the limitations of military resources.

Diplomacy and Military Power

The new administration has applied this decision as the basis of a strategy to refocus the military on its core competencies and rebuild the military’s strength and readiness, using that as the strong and stable framework from which to pursue an apparently more cooperative foreign policy. U.S. diplomatic power needs a strong military, and operations in Iraq have drained U.S. military power — something highlighted by the U.S. inability to act on its policies when the Russians moved in on Georgia.

It is not only U.S. political power that is reinforced by military power, but U.S. economic strength as well. Control of the world’s sea-lanes — and increasingly, control of outer space — is what ensures the security of U.S. economic links abroad. In theory, the United States can thus interdict competitors’ supply lines and economic ties while protecting its own.

Despite globalization and greater economic ties, physical power still remains the strongest backer to diplomacy. Ideology alone will not change the world, much less the actions of so-called rogue states or even pirates along the Somali coast. The first principle of Obama’s foreign policy, then, will be making sure it has big stick to carry, one freed from long-term reconstruction commitments or seemingly intractable situations such as Iraq. Only with an available and effective military can one afford to speak softly without being trod upon.

Rebuilding U.S. military readiness and strength is not going to be easy. Iraq and Afghanistan remain to be taken care of, and there are years of heavy activity and at times declining recruitment to recover from. While there are substantial benefits to a battle-hardened military accustomed to a high deployment tempo, this also has its costs — reset costs will be high. A very real domestic military shake-up looms on the one- to two-year horizon in order to bring the Pentagon back into line with fiscal and procurement realities, coupled with concerns about midlevel officer retention. But the Pentagon’s thinking and strategic guidance already have moved toward cooperative security and toward working more closely with allies and partners to stabilize and manage the global security environment, with an emphasis on requiring foreign participation and burden-sharing.

A Greater Security Role for Allies and a Centralized Foreign Policy

Obama will also work on managing the U.S. image abroad. Opposition to Bush and opposition to the war in Iraq often became synonymous internationally, evolving intentionally or otherwise into broader anti-war and anti-military sentiments. Rebuilding the military’s image internationally will not happen overnight. Part of the process will involve using the sense of change inherent in any new U.S. administration to push allies and others to take on a greater role in global security.

In Asia, for example, Clinton will call on Tokyo and Seoul to step up operations in Afghanistan, particularly in reconstruction and development efforts. But Tokyo and Seoul also will be called on to take a greater role in regional security — Seoul on the Korean Peninsula and Tokyo as a more active military ally overall. The same message will be sent to Europe and elsewhere: If you want a multilateral United States, you will have to take up the slack and participate in multilateral operations. The multilateral mantra will not be one in which the United States does what others say, but rather one in which the United States holds others to the task. In the end, this will reduce U.S. commitments abroad, allowing the military to refocus on its core competencies and rebuild its strength.

A strong military thus forms the foundation of any foreign policy. Obama’s foreign policy approach is largely centralized in a bid for a wider approach. Taking China as an example, for the last half-dozen years, U.S. policy on China was based almost entirely on economics. The U.S. Treasury Department took the lead in China relations, while other issues — everything from Chinese military developments to Beijing’s growing presence in Africa and Latin America to human rights — took a back seat. While the U.S.-China Strategic Economic Dialogue (or something similar) will remain a major pillar of U.S.-China relations under Obama, equally important parallel tracks will focus on military and security issues, nontraditional threats, politics and human rights. This multifaceted approach will require close cooperation among numerous departments and divisions to avoid the chaos seen in things like U.S. policy on North Korea.

This coordination will take place in an expanded NSC, one that brings in the economic elements on equal footing with security and political concerns. Combined with the appointment of special envoys for critical regions, this is intended to ensure a more unified and complete approach to foreign policy. This way, Obama retains oversight over policy, while his erstwhile rival Clinton is just one voice at the table. The State Department’s role thus becomes more about image management and development.

Accordingly, Clinton’s foreign travels are less about shaping foreign policy than shaping foreign images of the United States. She is demonstrating the new consultative nature of the administration by going everywhere and listening to everyone. Meanwhile, the hard-hitting foreign policy initiatives go to the special envoys, who can dedicate their time and energy to just one topic. Holbrooke got South Asia, Mitchell got the Middle East, and there are indications that managing overall China strategy will fall to Biden, at least in the near term.

Other special envoys and special representatives might emerge, some technically reporting through the State Department, others to other departments, but all effectively reporting back to the NSC and the president. In theory, this will mitigate the kind of bickering between the State Department and NSC that characterized Bush’s first term (a concern hardly limited to the most recent ex-president). And to keep it busy, the State Department has been tasked with rebuilding the U.S. Agency for International Development or an equivalent program for taking reconstruction and development programs, slowly freeing the military from the reconstruction business.

As Clinton heads to Asia, then, the expectations of Asian allies and China of a newfound American appreciation for the Far East might be a bit misplaced. Certainly, this is the first time in a long while that a secretary of state has visited Asia before Europe. But given the role of the vice president and the special envoys, the visit might not reflect policy priorities so much as a desire to ensure that all regions get visits. Clinton’s agenda in each country might not offer an entirely accurate reading of U.S. policy initiatives for the region, either, as much of the policy is still up for review, and her primary responsibility is to demonstrate a new and more interactive face of American foreign policy.

Clinton’s Asia visit is significant largely because it highlights a piece of the evolving Obama foreign policy — a policy that remains centralized under the president via the NSC, and that uses dedicated special envoys and representatives to focus on key trouble spots (and perhaps to avoid some of the interagency bickering that can limit the agencies’ freedom to maneuver). Most importantly, this policy at its core looks to rebuild the sense and reality of American military strength through disengaging from apparently intractable situations, focusing on core competencies rather than reconstruction or nation-building, and calling on allies to take up the slack in security responsibilities. This is what is shaping the first priority for the Obama administration: withdrawal from Iraq not just to demonstrate a different approach than the last president, but also to ensure that the military is ready for use elsewhere.

To get free Stratfor reports click here.

RENEGADE EYE

Obama's Inaugural Call for "National Unity"

By John Peterson
Monday, 26 January 2009

"On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord." - Barack Obama



American workers are faced with an economic and social crisis on a scale not seen in decades. One after another, the pillars of American capitalism are crumbling around them: all the major banks and financial services companies; all the major auto makers; the dream of home ownership and a secure retirement; the aura of invincibility of U.S. military might; the promise of a tomorrow better than today. In short, the bedrock upon which U.S. capitalism has justified its continued exploitative existence has turned to quicksand.

As Marx and Engels described life under capitalism in the Communist Manifesto: "All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind." This shattering of the "American Dream," the realization that this is indeed as "good as it gets" is having and will continue to have a profound effect on the consciousness of all classes in society, not the least of which is the working class. Already there are symptoms of a simmering discontent beneath the apparently calm surface of society. As the crisis deepens and the illusions in Obama are inevitably dashed against the cold realities of this system, these undercurrents will gain strength and direction, bursting to the surface in dynamic and unexpected ways.

The capitalist class, represented in government by the Democrats and Republicans, has also had its confidence shaken. They are unsure how best to proceed. Some argue that the market should be allowed to "adjust itself," while others advocate Keynesian state intervention and a new "New Deal." But while they may be divided on how best to get the economy moving again, they are unanimous in their defense of the capitalist system as a whole. Not once will you hear Obama, Bush, Biden, Cheney, the Clintons or the rest raise any doubts about the system itself. They are also well aware that the social consequences of the crisis could spiral out of their control. They have therefore chosen the best man they could find for the job: Barack Obama. He has in turn put together a galaxy of pro-capitalist and imperialist talent to assist him in carrying out his policies. The 44th president's historic task is clear: to preserve the United States of America as we know it today. That is to say, his role is to defend the U.S. capitalist system in its epoch of imperialist decay.

Then and Now

The constant comparisons and references to Abraham Lincoln are no accident. Lincoln came to power during a profound crisis that ultimately led to a bloody civil war that claimed some 618,000 lives. Although the Civil War was at root a war against the slave system, it was waged largely around the slogan of "preserving the union." Lincoln leaned on the masses and on the working class in particular, on their instinctive striving for unity and sense of outrage at the slave system to wage the war. His call for "national unity" resonated with the mood of society and the economic needs of the capitalist system. The war and Lincoln's role were revolutionary and supported by Karl Marx himself.

Lincoln's historic task was to defend burgeoning Northern capitalism and extend it to the entire country. At the time, this was a necessary and progressive task, despite the misery and exploitation that is part and parcel of the system. Capitalism was still in its historically progressive phase, and the abolition of slavery in the South "cleared the decks" for an unprecedented development of the productive forces and the strengthening of the urban working class, thus laying the material basis for socialism.

But things are far different today. Obama comes to power at a time of capitalist decline. His task is to preserve a rotting system whose historic task has been exhausted. Capitalism has ceased to play any progressive role for the vast bulk of humanity. It has already served its historical purpose: to lay down the material foundations for socialism. We will build on the technology and productivity of labor achieved by humanity under capitalism in order to build a new society, free of exploitation and based on the common interests of the working class majority. However, the capitalist class will not give up their power and privileges without a fight. This handful of individuals is determined to continue their domination and exploitation of billions of humans around the world. Their system is increasingly incompatible with the continued existence of humanity itself. We can either replace it with socialism on a world scale, or the entire "experiment" of human civilization could be thrown into a very violent and horrific reverse.

What Sort of Unity?

It is with these considerations in mind that we must understand the main theme of Obama's inaugural address: a call for national unity and sacrifice in the even harder times to come. But first, let's take a look back at the early Bush years. After September 11, 2001, GW Bush also invoked a call for "national unity." Here is what we explained at the time in the article What Sort of Unity?:

"Even more significantly, the sleeping giant of the American working class has now been awakened to social and political awareness. At the moment they are enraged, grieving, and in shock. They are reaching out for solutions that are familiar to them – military aggression, religion, abstract 'unity' and so on...

"The thundering cries for war and revenge are one of the most visible effects of the attacks. Overnight, the country has been gripped by war fever and nationalist hysteria. Sales of American flags have gone through the roof, and there is hardly a fast food store or church without a variant of 'God Bless America' displayed. Religious invocation has also reached unheard of levels as people look for answers in a world apparently gone mad. To hear the politicians and news anchors, one would not imagine that there is a separation of Church and State in this country. The calls for national unity are nearly universal and all the superficial political differences between the Republicans and Democrats have been drowned out by the beating of the drums of war...

"...It is therefore vital that we are clear as to what GW Bush means by 'national unity.' What he is calling for is for the working class to subordinate itself to the interests of the ruling class. This is always the situation under capitalism, but in times of crisis, war, and revolution, the importance of keeping the millions of newly conscious workers 'on the side' of the bosses takes on even greater importance. Especially when the very 'leaders' who are supposed to be protecting 'our nation' have proven completely inept at doing so, the spontaneous outrage of the working class must be channeled into 'safe' means – against an external enemy.

"...And although the immediate reaction of many has been to rally around the flag in the interests of 'national unity,' what they really strive for is the unity of humanity and an end to these terrible events. The fundamental effect of the attacks has been to give workers a shocking wake up call as to the cruelties of this world. Millions of people in the US now know what it feels like to live in uncertainty and fear - and they don't like it. They have been awakened to the fact that they cannot simply ignore the outside world - the problems of the rest of the world are also the problems of the American working class. And it is precisely the lack of stability of life under capitalism which will force millions of people to take their lives and futures into their own hands."

Nearly eight years later, what was the result of this "rallying around the flag"? Two imperialist wars costing billions each week while schools and hospitals are closed; some 47 million without access to health care; trillions in retirement savings lost and millions thrown out of their homes while CEO pay and bonuses reached astronomical levels. In short, the rich won and the working class and the poor lost.

Why is this? Why can't we "all just get along"? The reason is simple: the interests of the capitalist class and the working class are diametrically opposed. Under capitalism, the capitalist class holds all the cards. They control the media, the government, the courts, the police, the military, the banks, and the educational system. They write the laws. They make all the real decisions as to who works and who owns a home. In other words, they use every tool at their disposal to defend their own interests, which are irreconcilable with the interests of the working class majority.

Abstract "national unity," which blurs the clear class distinctions and contradictions that exist in society, subordinates the interests of the working class to the interests of the capitalist class. It is the "unity" of the horse and rider, of the lord and the serf, of the master and the slave. As Marxists, we are in favor of unity. But what is needed is class unity, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, religion or nationality. Only the power of the united working class can decisively challenge the domination of capital.

Change We Can Believe In?

Now it is Obama's turn to call for national unity. In his inaugural speech, he made it clear just what he means by "national unity." He acknowledged the "sapping confidence" of millions facing economic disaster. He addressed the "nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights." He compassionately identified with those losing their jobs and homes, calling on "we the people," on "this generation of Americans" to remain "faithful to the ideals of our forebears, and true to our founding documents." He also invoked the specter of terrorism and the danger of relying on "our adversaries" for energy. He dampened people's expectations of a quick reversal of fortunes, saying that the challenges are serious, many, real, and "will not be met easily or in a short span of time." He invoked the Scripture and the Declaration of Independence, asserting the "God-given promise that all are equal, all are free and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness."

And then, out of the swirl of lofty rhetoric, hints of what he really means:

"Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted – for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things – some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom

"...For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth...

"...Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction...

"We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions – that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America."

In other words, we must put aside our class differences ("differences of birth or wealth or faction"), stop complaining about our lot in life and accept the conditions we are forced to live under ("protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions"), and pull ourselves up by our boot straps to clean up the mess made by the capitalists and their system ("pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America"). In so many words, "hard work!" and "work hard!" This is the real "spirit of America."

But who is to do this hard work? Is it true that the millions "obscure in their labor," who break their backs for low wages just to scrape out a living, are simply not working hard enough? We might also ask: whose pleasures, riches and fame? Whose prosperity? Whose freedom?

After outlining an ambiguous plan to create jobs, lower health care costs, and cut unspecified inefficient government programs, he revealed his true colors as an apologist and defender of capitalism:

"Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control – and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart – not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good."

After lamenting the "excesses" of the system and taking a swipe at the "prosperous," he unveils the mythological creature of a kinder, gentler capitalism, which extends "opportunity to every willing heart."

Then, after invoking the "rule of law" and the "rights of man," he reminded Americans that they had "faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions." So much for Obama being a "communist"!

And in a line that could have been uttered by GW Bush himself, Obama had the following to say in reference to the Iraq War: "We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you."

And to tie his theme of national unity together, the following words:

"For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, ,the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate." [my emphasis]

In other words, we should applaud the sacrifice of low wage, part-time workers, who divide up capitalist scarcity and poverty amongst themselves for the "greater good." But more importantly, Obama's words have an unintended message: it is the millions of average working Americans that makes the country run. This begs the question: why don't these millions of American workers run the country?

In times of crisis, it is normal for people to want to band together, to seek protection, safety and comfort in numbers. But the fundamental question is the class question. Whose interests does Barack Obama defend? The working class majority or the capitalist minority? And if this is truly a democracy, should the interests of the majority be subordinated to the interests of a tiny minority?

Perspectives for the Future

The U.S. is a different place than it was just 8 years ago. A lot of water has passed under the bridge (and over the levees). Consciousness is changing rapidly. The old stereotypes about Americans no longer apply. For example, it will not be so easy to turn Americans' attention outward, hysterically, against an external enemy. Seven years of war and crisis has had an effect. University and factory occupations are back on the agenda. Now more than ever, there is an acute danger that the accumulated frustration and anger will be turned against the enemy at home: the bankers, CEOs, Big Business politicians, and the capitalist system itself. This is why Obama's task is so delicate and crucial from the perspective of the ruling class.



The capitalists have high hopes for Obama. They expect him to save their system. Millions of workers also have high hopes for Obama. They hope for an end to the instability, for a secure job at a living wage, a home, access to health care and a decent retirement. Hope for change is a powerful, inspiring force, but the truth is concrete. The reality is, despite this or that cosmetic change, life under Obama will be more of the same: tighter belts for the working class while the wealthy continue to enrich themselves, albeit with a more modest public display of their excesses.

Bush ended his presidency with a 22 percent approval rating, a tremendous collapse from his post-September 11 high. Obama enters the Oval Office with over 80 percent approval: the only direction it can go is down. Obama's call for national unity is a call for the lamb to sleep with the lion. We have seen the effects of such "unity" in the years since September 11. We must learn from this experience and base ourselves on class unity. We can rely only on our own strength and organization to bring about the fundamental change we need.

On a small scale, the social crisis is already being expressed on the streets, in the factories, and on the campuses. This process will accelerate in the coming period. In the final analysis, what is at stake is the survival of the capitalist system itself and the success or failure of the socialist revolution in the United States. This may sound far fetched just a few days into Obama's presidency, but events in the coming years will prove the correctness of this perspective. His honeymoon has already ended for many workers and young people who hoped for more. Thousands have already broken with Obama and the Democrats, are aware of the need for a mass party of labor, and are looking for a revolutionary socialist solution to the crisis. We invite you to contact the Workers International League, to join with us in the struggle to bring about real change, not just hope for change. Join us in the fight for socialism!

January 23, 2009

By JOHN PETERSON

At the Dawn of a New Year

By Alan Woods
Friday, 02 January 2009

With the exception of New Year, the most important festivals in the western world are associated with events in the Christian calendar. However, it is well known that these festivals have their real roots in the old pagan religions and were generally linked with the different solstices and their relation to agriculture.

Christmas was the old pagan winter festival derived from the Roman Saturnalia with other pagan admixtures of Germanic and Scandinavian origin. There is no mention of the date of Christ's birth in the Bible. The early Christians celebrated the birth of Christ on the sixth or seventh of January (a tradition still maintained in the Orthodox Church). With their customary opportunism, the leaders of the Church changed the date to the 25th December to take advantage of the old pagan tradition.

Easter was the festival of the Spring Equinox, with its associations with ancient fertility rites (the English word Easter is derived from the pagan goddess Eostre or Ostara). Haloween has roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain, when people communed with the spirits of the dead and thereby averted their anger. There are countless other examples that bear witness to the stubbornness with which humanity clings to the past.

The persistence whereby men and women preserve ideas and beliefs rooted in a remote and primitive past is proof of the profoundly conservative nature of human thought in general. Tradition, habit and routine weigh heavily on human consciousness. As a rule people do not like change, particularly sudden change that upsets their preconceived notions and beliefs.

But at decisive moments a series of small, imperceptible changes reach a critical point where quantity becomes transformed into quality. Then all the old ideas and prejudices are thrown into confusion. Men and women are forced in spite of themselves to question their old ideas, and also the kind of society they live in, its morality and justice.

Such a critical point was reached in 2008, when, after a long period of economic growth, the world economy entered into a sharp decline, which has not yet run its course. This fact has profoundly impacted on the consciousness of all classes in society, from the ruling class, the bankers, politicians and bureaucrats, through the middle class, small businesspeople and intellectuals, to the majority of humankind: the workers, peasants and poor people.

After a long period of relative prosperity, in which the values of "free market economics" were accepted without question and the impressive firework display of globalization dazzled the vision and befuddled the brains of the so-called intelligentsia (including the "Left"), it is no wonder that the first reaction to the economic crisis is one of shock and disbelief. Consciousness, with its innate conservatism, is still lagging far behind events, which are moving at breathtaking speed throughout the planet.

This state of affairs can only be surprising for minds that have been atrophied by formalistic thinking. For anyone with the slightest knowledge of dialectics, it is no surprise at all. Formalism rejects contradictions and cannot cope with them, whereas dialectics embraces contradictions and explains their logic and necessity.



It will take some time for the consciousness of the masses to catch up with events. This consciousness still lives in the past and is hoping against hope that the present crisis will be only a temporary interruption of "normality" which, if we are patient, will surely return. The alleged "backwardness" of the masses is only apparent and is destined to change into its opposite.

The real backwardness is in the psychology of the leaders of the mass organizations: the leaders of the trade unions, the socialist and communist parties, who have long ago abandoned all idea of socialism and adapted themselves to capitalism. Their only aspiration is that capitalism will, for some reason unknown to science, shed its ugly and oppressive features and acquire a humane and progressive character.

But the economic crisis has placed on the order of the day not a peaceful and democratic capitalism, but mass unemployment, savage cuts in wages and conditions, the abolition of social reforms and a general worsening of living standards. This is a recipe for class war on a massive scale. That is the reality of capitalism in 2009 and not the sugary illusions of the reformists who understand nothing and are only capable of seeing the backside of history.

It frequently happens that the intelligent representatives of Capital come to the same conclusions as the Marxists. At the time when the reality of the financial collapse finally made itself clear to all, the Financial Times on 5/11/2008 published a very interesting article by Chrystia Freeland, which deserves to be studied carefully for what it reveals about the current state of mind of the ruling class in the United States.

Ms. Freeland begins with a small anecdote that in the Halloween celebrations last October, in addition to the time-honoured witches and demons, current events inspired many of the revellers at the street party in New York's Greenwich Village to put on a more unusual costume - Sarah Palin disguises. This fact, trivial in itself, reveals the degree of contempt with which people in the USA viewed the discredited Bush administration - a contempt which they subsequently expressed at the polls.

However, far more interesting was the comments this journalist quoted from leading figures in the US Establishment. And when we read these comments, let us bear in mind that they are not meant to be read by ordinary men and women. The Financial Times is not an ordinary newspaper but something like an internal bulletin for the bourgeoisie. This makes what we read here even more important:

"That day a senior Wall Street executive ruefully predicted to me that next year it will be New York bankers who are the nation's villains of choice." And the article continues: "In private, some of America's most influential business and political leaders are uttering the same warning: with the election resolved, the big political story in the US will be the wave of public anger directed at capital and capitalists, particularly of the financial variety." (My emphasis, AW).

These are quite extraordinary things to read in a paper like the FT. What do they mean? They mean that the ruling class in the USA is well aware that the political and social effects of the economic crisis have not yet manifested themselves. The growing anger of the people has temporarily been diverted by the electoral circus (this is its main purpose in any case). The blame for the crisis is placed on the shoulders of the Bush administration in the first place. And while the masses were distracted by the Obama campaign (which undoubtedly sowed great illusions) the bankers and capitalists were temporarily forgotten. But this will not last.

The banker quoted in the above lines is not any banker, but a senior Wall Street executive (who does not want to be named for obvious reasons). What is he predicting? He predicts that as soon as the intoxicating fumes of the Presidential elections clear away, there will be an explosion of popular anger directed against capital and capitalists, particularly of the financial variety. It would be impossible for us to put it any clearer than this! The article continues:

"In recent weeks, a former Clinton cabinet member warned a private equity firm he advises that this new hostility will be the single biggest threat facing the company. An east coast senator told a lunchtime group of Wall Street supporters that public anger toward them will top the political agenda, and expressed sympathy for the peoples' rage. A memo about the financial risks the new president will face prepared for Barack Obama's transition team listed as point one the possibility that ‘sympathetic victims drive policy response' ". (My emphasis, AW)

Here again, the real situation in the USA is admirably expressed. This unnamed former cabinet member warns the US capitalists that they will face the anger of the population, that this question will "top the political agenda" in 2009 and that he himself has some "sympathy for the peoples' rage".

Some of this anger already found expression during the election campaign, when both Democrat and Republican politicians sought popularity by denouncing "Wall Street greed". The article continues:

"But this riveting election campaign, and the financial wildfire that erupted in the middle of it, may actually have served to muffle public anger. The financial crisis is the reason Wall Street is out of favour, to be sure, but from September 15, when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, to October 13, when Treasury secretary Hank Paulson coercibly bought an equity stake in all of America's big banks, the urgency and the severity of the economic threat were so great as to preclude much of a hunt for culprits. The political battle, meanwhile, featured many rhetorical shots aimed at Wall Street, but the real fight was between the two political parties, and their two champions, who have been the main focus of public passion in recent weeks.

"Today, that has changed. The credit crisis, ever so slowly, seems to be easing, and with it the fears of a second Great Depression. America has chosen a new president. The country now has the leisure to reflect on its economic plight - and demand that the man it elected yesterday act on its conclusions."

This is the central problem. Having struggled to divert the attention of the public from the crisis of capitalism by building up the image of Obama as the miracle man, the American ruling class is preparing the ground for a colossal backlash when the miracles do not appear. We continue to read:

"Americans already are unhappy -Wharton economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers have found that overall happiness plunged in September, the month the Dow did, and has now declined as deeply as it did during the 1981 recession. Things are likely to get worse, with further economic contraction and concomitant job losses and bankruptcies. Moreover, the hundreds of billions the state has committed to shore up the financial sector have not translated into cheaper personal credit, or fewer foreclosures, for ordinary Americans.

"Financiers are bracing themselves for a wave of public rage - hence, for instance, the recent meeting at which they agreed collectively to promise not to use the Treasury's $135bn capital infusion to pay bankers' bonuses. They know, however, that gestures like this one won't be enough."

Barak Obama reminds one of the fake medicine men in the Old West who travelled around the small towns selling bottles of "snake oil" guaranteed to cure every known ailment for a modest fee. The promise was highly attractive and many people queued up to purchase this wondrous medicine. The problems arose when, after consuming it, no signs of improvement were observed, by which time the medicine man, now considerably richer, had driven his wagon to the next town. However, Barak Obama cannot just get into his wagon and move on. He must stay and face the consequences of the expectations he has aroused.

The revelations of fraud and downright corporate robbery that are already emerging will pour petrol on the flames. Smart politicians like congressman Henry Waxman will make their careers from mercilessly exposing leading hedge fund managers in Washington. In an attempt to pacify public opinion there will be Enron-style trials, and some bankers are certain to go to jail. But all this will not be enough to prevent the gathering storm. The article ends with a significant historical parallel:

"Americans will be pressing their new leader to help them determine who is to blame. That is, after all, a favourite question of angry people during turbulent times: it was one of the slogans of the Russian revolutionaries. If he is to be successful, the president-elect must find a way to move the national debate beyond this vengeful query to the other great Russian revolutionary cri de guerre: What is to be done?"

The problem for the ruling classes of the USA and the rest of the world at the dawn of the New Year is that they have not the slightest idea of what to do. The vast quantities of money that have been handed over to the bankers in various ways have had very little observable results. The snake oil is not working. The banks pocket the loot and refuse to lend to the consumer, the industrialist or even to each other. Demand and credit continue to shrink, leading to more bankruptcies, closures and unemployment.

At first sight 2009 has opened under the black flag of reaction. Israeli imperialism has concentrated all its military might on the bloody task of battering a defenceless Gaza into submission. As usual the "United Nations" display utter impotence, while the leaders of the "Free world" reveal their nauseating hypocrisy by placing victims and aggressors on an equal plane, shaking their heads and weeping crocodile tears about the evils of "violence".

The bloody events in Gaza are a further expression of the impasse of capitalism on a global scale. It manifests itself in universal turbulence at every level: economic, social, political and military. These are the convulsions of a socio-economic system that has no future yet refuses to die. The results of this contradiction will be untold misery, poverty, unemployment, wars, death and suffering for millions. This is the only future that capitalism has to offer the peoples of the world at the dawn of 2009.

But appearances are deceptive. Beneath the surface, powerful forces are maturing. As the crisis unfolds, millions of people will begin to draw the necessary conclusion, which is this: the capitalist system must die in order that humanity can live. The capitalist class is well aware of the dangers facing them. The strategists of Capital look to the future with fear and trembling. The pages of their press are filled with the blackest pessimism and foreboding.

The year 2009 is a year of many anniversaries. It is the anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, when the people of that courageous island stood up against the might of US imperialism and defeated, ending the rule of landlordism and capitalism. Today the Venezuelan Revolution is reaching the decisive moment when it must also break the economic power of the oligarchy by expropriating the landlords and capitalists, or else face defeat in the future.

As they will soon be reminding us, this is also twenty years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. That was a time when the capitalists and their spokespersons felt triumphant. They announced the end of Communism, the end of Socialism, even the end of History. But now it is clear to all that their predictions were false. What collapsed 20 years ago was not socialism or communism but only a bureaucratic and totalitarian caricature of socialism.

The collapse of Stalinism was a great historical drama, but in retrospect it will be seen by history as only the prelude to an even greater drama: the collapse of capitalism, which is already being prepared. Of course, capitalism will never collapse under its own weight, through its own contradictions. History requires the conscious intervention of men and women, fighting for their own emancipation. It requires the revolutionary movement of the working class, organized and led by its most conscious representatives.

January 1919 is a tragic anniversary in our revolutionary calendar. It is the anniversary of the Spartakist uprising in Berlin, which ended in defeat and the murder of two of the most outstanding revolutionary leaders of the international proletariat: Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. That was a terrible blow against the German working class. Then too, the bourgeois and their agents in the leadership of the Social Democracy, Noske, Ebert and Scheidermann, felt that they had triumphed. But the German proletariat recovered from the defeat - as the workers of all countries always recover from every defeat - and went on to defeat the Kapp putsch in 1920 and two years later formed a mass Communist Party.

1919 was not only the anniversary of a terrible defeat but also of a great step forward. In March of that year in Moscow the Communist International held its first Congress, uniting the genuine proletarian revolutionaries of the whole world. In the programmatic documents of the first four years of the CI we find the summing up of all the rich experience and theoretical heritage of our movement, beginning with the Communist Manifesto of Marx and Engels.

Today, ninety years later, we stand on the basis of these marvellous ideas, which have been vindicated by history and which today are more relevant than ever. While the bourgeoisie and its ideological defenders and reformist hangers-on are plunged in despair and pessimism, we Marxists look to the future with confidence and optimism. The American banker who spoke to the Financial Times last Halloween was already terrified of a phantom - the same phantom that haunted Europe in 1848 - the phantom of Communism.

The forces of genuine Marxism were thrown back for decades by the material conditions of capitalism and the crimes of Stalinism, forced to swim against a powerful current. Now the tide of history is beginning to flow in another direction and we are beginning to swim, not against the current of history, but together with it.

The International Marxist Tendency, which is proud to stand on the basis of the ideas of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Luxemburg and Liebknecht, has consistently defended these ideas when it was difficult to do so. Other tendencies that laid claim to the name of Marxism have sunk without trace or else abandoned the defence of these ideas. The next period will create the most favourable conditions for the growth of the IMT.

When the agents of the ruling class murdered Luxemburg and Liebknecht, they thought they had settled the matter. When the agents of Stalin murdered Leon Trotsky, they thought the same. But you cannot murder an idea whose time has come. On this historic anniversary, as we pay homage to the memory of the martyrs of our movement, we call out with a confident voice: "WE ARE HERE AND READY TO CONTINUE THE FIGHT!"

RENEGADE EYE