Left Side of the Aisle #241

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of March 17-23, 2015

This week:

Good News: FCC to consider stronger privacy rules for ISPs
http://www.cnet.com/news/regulators-propose-stricter-privacy-rules-for-internet-service-providers/

Good News: Obama eliminates funding for "abstinence-only" sex ed in federal budget
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2005/03/be-careful-what-you-wish-for.html
http://www.siecus.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Page.viewPage&pageId=523&parentID=477
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2004/11/we-dont-need-no-stinking-studies.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2007/04/another-success-story-in-keeping-us.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2012/05/left-side-of-aisle-55-part-4.html
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/3/15/1501670/-Pres-Obama-eliminates-abstinent-only-funding-in-2017-budget-adds-4m-to-teen-pregnancy-prevention
http://www.hhs.gov/ash/oah/adolescent-health-topics/reproductive-health/teen-pregnancy/trends.html#

Good News: Interior Dept. says no lease sales for oil drilling off Atlantic Coast
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-01-27/obama-proposes-offshore-oil-drilling-from-virginia-to-georgia
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/03/15/in-reversal-obama-admin-to-block-oil-drilling-in-atlantic.html
http://in.reuters.com/article/usa-oil-atlantic-idINL2N16N0W3
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-15/obama-said-to-bar-atlantic-coast-oil-drilling-in-policy-reversal

Good News: Myanmar chooses its president from first free and open elections
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_Myanmar
http://www.sfgate.com/world/article/Suu-Kyi-loyalist-and-friend-elected-Myanmar-s-6891646.php
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2004/06/im-still-trying-to-keep-hope-alive.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2007/10/burma-no-time-for-silence.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2007/10/more-notes-on-burma.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2012/04/left-side-of-aisle-52-part-1.html
http://www.globalpost.com/article/6746286/2016/03/15/myanmars-parliament-elects-suu-kyi-confidant-president

Updates about Syria
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2016/03/2391-good-news-partial-ceasefire-in.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-kerry-we-may-face-best-opportunity-in-years-to-end-syria-war/
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=53453#.VukCyNBSQVI
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/russia-withdrawal-syria_us_56e6f864e4b0b25c9182af57?utm_hp_ref=world
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/russia-syria-withdrawal-putin_us_56e6faa1e4b0b25c9182b51d
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/analysis-why-putin-picked-moment-pull-out-syria-n538671
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2016/03/15/analysis-russian-withdrawal-aims-pressure-assad-seek-peace-syria/81805610/

Not Good News: UN excoriates South Sudan over human rights violations
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2014/01/1404-bad-news-south-sudan.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2014/01/1416-update-south-sudan.html
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2015/09/2184-more-tragedy-still-hope-in-south.html
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=17207&LangID=E
http://time.com/4255833/south-sudan-un-report-human-rights-abuses/
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/un-human-rights-south-sudan-militias-rape-women-girls-payment/
http://news.yahoo.com/sudan-troops-suffocated-60-church-compound-amnesty-213930700.html
http://www.voanews.com/content/south-sudan-rebels-sending-generals-to-juba/3239727.html

RIPs: Keith Emerson and Ben Bagdikian
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-35787187
http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/7256311/keith-emerson-death-suicide-health-issues
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/03/11/ben-bagdikian-dies-96-berkeley/
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2004/02/bill-is-that-you.html
http://fair.org/home/ben-bagdikian-visionary/

Clown Award: ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson
http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/31897/exxon-ceo-sues-no-fracking-near-my-mansion
http://www.thenation.com/article/exxons-pro-fracking-ceo-suing-stop-fracking-near-his-mansion/

Media failures: scare-mongering headline totally distorts the story
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/03/14/serbia-investigates-after-portland-bound-missiles-found-on-passe/21327741/

218.4 - More tragedy, still hope in South Sudan

More tragedy, still hope in South Sudan

I have talked about this a few times before. I don't know exactly why I do since I know few if any of you are interested in this except perhaps philosophically, but this is a story I have been following at least to some degree for years. I don't know why this particular world tragedy affects me more than others do, but I have found it a particularly sad tale. Maybe it's because it is so marked with hopes being raised and then being shot down - usually literally.

It's the case of South Sudan. The borders of Sudan, in the words of the BBC's Southern Africa correspondent, "seemed to have been drawn up on the back of an envelope by the colonial administration," resulting in a nation with a largely Muslim, Arabic north being stitched together with a largely Christian and animist black African south.

You can predict the result: Civil war came to Sudan i 1955 as the south tried to break away from the north. A settlement was reached in 1972 but it didn't resolve the basic problems. So civil war broke out again in 1983 and lasted for 22 bloody years. Two million died, the largest death toll of any war since World War II. Four million more were driven from their homes. Finally, when both sides were drained of blood and exhausted, an agreement was reached that allowed the south some autonomy for six years to be followed by a vote whether or not to become independent.

Despite obstacles, that vote came, on schedule, in 2011 and the vote for independence was nearly 99 percent. South Sudan became the world's newest nation. And it is, today, still the youngest nation on the planet. Hopes were sky high.

For a short time. Without an external opponent to override local ethnic and tribal rivalries and conflicts, the Sudan People's Liberation Army, or SPLA, turned on itself. The leaders of the two biggest factions, Salva Kiir and Riek Machar, were, in the new government, president and vice-president - but soon Kiir was accusing Machar of fomenting a coup and Machar was accusing Kiir of oppressing and trying to destroy the opposition and it rapidly escalated into a new civil war in December 2013.

In the time since, the pattern has been months of fighting followed by supposed ceasefires which have soon broken down, leading to more months of fighting and new supposed agreements.

Salva Kiir                               Riek Machar

Well, about two weeks ago, Machar, the main rebel leader and former vice-president, agreed to a compromise peace settlement. What's important here is that this is a proposed settlement, not just a ceasefire. But President Kiir stalled, missing a deadline for reaching an agreement and saying he needed more time and had "reservations" about the agreement and how it was reached.

Credit where it's due, the Obama White House made no secret of its "deep disappoint" that Kiir was "squandering" the opportunity to bring peace to South Sudan. Kiir was stalling for time, and the White House in effect told him "you have no time." On August 26, Kiir signed.

So once again there is hope.

And again, there are already reports of violations of the ceasefire and each side is accusing the other of being the guilty party.

However, we shouldn't give up that fragile hope just yet. In chaotic situations like this, it is rare for a ceasefire to take immediate full effect, that is, for all fighting to stop completely and immediately. More common is a rapid tapering off and watching for that pattern is a way of judging if both sides are serious about this.

In fact, it's even more important to hold off judgment for a bit here because it's not even clear that all of the rebel units are under Machar's control. Fighting may be getting generated by small, independent groups. Which is both good and bad: good because it would likely mean that large-scale, nationwide fighting will not occur; bad because small, regional conflicts could go on for some time.

The conclusion I would draw here is that if I can come back next week without having to note a significant renewal of fighting or a breakdown of the frankly tenuous peace accord, one which I have to say still has a lot of "and a player to be named later" about it, but if I can come back next week and say the ceasefire is holding for the most part, then we can at least hope that the people of South Sudan will have enough time, enough of a respite, to bury their dead.

And the fact that merely that is something to be hoped for is a measure of just how great the tragedy is.

Sources cited in links:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34083964
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Sudanese_Civil_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sudan
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34066511
http://news.yahoo.com/south-sudan-rivals-trade-accusations-over-fighting-073419632.html
https://www.stratfor.com/analysis/south-sudan-insufficient-peace-deal

Left Side of the Aisle #218

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of September 3-9, 2015

This week:

Good News: Connecticut Supreme Court finds death penalty unconstitutional
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/13/us/connecticut-death-penalty/
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/13/health/death-row-stories-execution-methods/index.html

Good News: homophobic bigots slowly being brought to heel
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/31/politics/kentucky-gay-marriage-licenses-supreme-court/
http://www.wkyt.com/home/headlines/Supporters-opponents-gather-outside-Rowan-County-clerks-office-323227931.html
http://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2015/08/26/appeals-court-upholds-gay-marriage-ruling-in-kentucky
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/08/31/supreme-court-rules-against-kentucky-clerk-in-gay-marriage-case/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-peron/the-phony-martyrdom-of-ki_b_8074338.html
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=jesus+on+divorce
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/kentucky-clerk-gay-marriage-fracas-married-4-times-article-1.2345036
http://www.gotquestions.org/Bible-hypocrisy.html

And not just Kim Davis
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/13/us/colorado-same-sex-wedding-cake/
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2015/08/13/colorado_cake_wars_decision_discrimination_is_not_free_speech.html

More tragedy, still hope in South Sudan
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34083964
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Sudanese_Civil_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sudan
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34066511
http://news.yahoo.com/south-sudan-rivals-trade-accusations-over-fighting-073419632.html
https://www.stratfor.com/analysis/south-sudan-insufficient-peace-deal

Clown Award: Patrick Couderc
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2013/05/left-side-of-aisle-110-part-1.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bandage-dress-not-for-voluptuous-women-lesbians-herve-leger-director-says_55d0dc67e4b0ab468d9d9927
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3199606/Fat-lesbian-don-t-wear-dress-Fashion-tycoon-iconic-bandage-frock-risks-women-s-wrath-bizarre-outburst.html?ito=social-twitter_mailonline

Outrage of the Week: blaming Black Lives Matter for shooting of deputy sheriff
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-arrest-suspect-killing-deputy-darren-goforth/
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/suspect-no-motive-houston-officer-darren-goforth-slaying/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/black-lives-matter-fox-news-hate-group_55e5c102e4b0b7a9633a3b12
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/darren-goforth-killing-sheriff-cites-black-lives-matter-movement/
http://avedoncarol.blogspot.com/2015/08/your-day-breaks-your-mind-aches.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/black-lives-matter-fox-news-hate-group_55e5c102e4b0b7a9633a3b12
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2015/0818/Why-Black-Lives-Matter-activists-are-arguing-with-Hillary-Clinton

Man’s sunflower tribute to deceased wife
http://www.krem.com/story/news/nation/2015/08/16/grieving-husband-plants-4-mile-ribbon--sunflowers/31819017/
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/08/17/1412809/-Wisconsin-man-creates-beautiful-4-mile-long-sunflower-memorial-to-his-wife

141.6 - Update: South Sudan

Update: South Sudan

Next update is about South Sudan. I don't expect in the future I'll be spending a lot of time on this because I know it's something that, quite frankly, a lot of you won't care about except in a broad philosophical sense. And while it's something I think you should know about, I also realize that it's not something you can do a lot about. Even so, I do want to give this update.

Peace negotiations, if you can call them that, have opened between the government of President Salva Kiir and rebel forces lead by former Vice-President Riek Machar - with (please try to contain your surprise) each side wanting the other to make the first move.

The government rejected rebel calls for an immediate release of prisoners, political supporters of Machar, which the government accuses of being involved in a coup against Kiir. Meanwhile, Machar, whose forces have taken the city of Bor and are reputed to be on the way to the capital city of Juba, is saying that groups calling for an immediate ceasefire are "jumping the gun," an attitude often taken by whichever side feels it is on the offensive.

The UNHCR, the UN agency dealing with refugees, reports that the conflict, which is only three weeks old, has already displaced 189,000 people. The map to the right gives some indications of the numbers involved.

Although the fighting has mostly been along ethnic lines, the fact is it appears at root to be more a matter of political power than ethnicity. Put another way, it's another example of tribal fears and hatred being exploited for the benefit of the powerful.

Same as it ever was. Which is the saddest part of all.

Sources:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/01/07/us-southsudan-unrest-idUSBREA0607Y20140107
http://www.voanews.com/content/south-sudan-ex-vp-backs-agreement-to-end-violence/1823826.html
http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/home
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/01/06/this-map-drives-home-how-bad-things-are-getting-in-south-sudan/

Left Side of the Aisle #141

Left Side of the Aisle
for the week of January 9-15, 2014

This week:

Bad-news-good-news: employer credit checks
http://www.demos.org/discredited-how-employment-credit-checks-keep-qualified-workers-out-job
http://www.demos.org/sites/default/files/publications/Discredited-Demos.pdf
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/18/elizabeth_warrens_bold_new_crusade_keeping_employers_out_of_your_credit_history/
http://www.demos.org/publication/problem-employment-credit-checks-why-america-needs-senator-warren%E2%80%99s-equal-employment-all
http://www.care2.com/causes/should-credit-scores-be-fair-game-in-the-job-hiring-process.html

Bad-news-good-news: guns
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/national_world&id=9384626
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2014/0107/Chicago-gun-laws-rolled-back-again-US-judge-strikes-down-ban-on-gun-stores-video
http://www.bet.com/news/national/2014/01/07/chicago-officials-say-they-must-continue-to-curb-gun-access-despite-ruling.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/31/new-york-gun-control_n_4525108.html
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/12/chris_christie_declines_to_defend_nj_gun_laws_sparking_criticism.html
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/01/christie_not_defending_nj_gun_law_in_states_highest_court.html

Point of personal privilege: atheism
http://www2.psych.ubc.ca/~will/Gervais%20et%20al-%20Atheist%20Distrust.pdf
http://www.alternet.org/
http://www.alternet.org/belief/5-worst-high-profile-attacks-atheism-year-how-oprah-time-magazine-and-supreme-court-justice

Point of personal privilege: drugs
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/08/legal-weed-next_n_4557583.html
http://www.drugwarfacts.org/cms/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/06/legalizing-marijuana-washington-state_n_2249238.html
http://www.gallup.com/poll/165539/first-time-americans-favor-legalizing-marijuana.aspx

Update: Utah and same-sex marriage
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/06/utah-gay-marriage_n_4548931.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/08/us/uncertainty-in-utah-as-appeals-process-plays-out-over-gay-marriage.html
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/57357406-78/court-utah-state-stay.html.csp
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/08/utah-gay-marriage_n_4562488.html

Update: South Sudan
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/01/07/us-southsudan-unrest-idUSBREA0607Y20140107
http://www.voanews.com/content/south-sudan-ex-vp-backs-agreement-to-end-violence/1823826.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/01/06/this-map-drives-home-how-bad-things-are-getting-in-south-sudan/

Update: Iraq
http://www.juancole.com/2014/01/iraqs-sunni-civil.html
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/iraq-falluah-al-qaida
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/01/iraq-forges-new-strategy-defeat-fighters-201418142439592864.html

Clown Award: John McCain and Lindsey Graham
http://www.juancole.com/2014/01/lindsey-graham-falluja.html
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/01/04/mccain-and-graham-slam-obama-for-iraq-violence/

Outrage of the Week: when religious freedom crosses the line
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/catholic-groups-court-halt-health-care-law-21385807
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/01/us/politics/justice-sotomayor-blocks-contraception-mandate-in-health-law.html?hpw&rref=politics&_r=0

Left Side of the Aisle #74 - Part 6

Muslim protests

I have to talk some about protests raging across the Muslim world over the film called "The Innocence of Muslims."

Right at the top I have to tell you that I tried to watch the trailer - it's on YouTube - and I couldn't get through more than the first three or four minutes. It is without doubt one of the worst movies of all time; by comparison, "Robot Monster" - look it up - is a masterpiece. If it wasn't for the deeply, deliberately offensive nature of the film and that fact that the producers of this movie intended to create the violence and bloodshed that has resulted, it would be utterly hilarious.

And it needs to be said that by any rational standard, it is utter madness to get that angry, that in too many cases violent, over something that stupid. But reality is what reality is and the movie is deliberately offensive and has sparked violence along with a large number of noisy but otherwise peaceful demonstrations.

I'm not going to try to cover events in detail; instead, I want to make a few points on a few points.

First, you may have already heard this but just in case it deserves repeating: All indications now are that the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi in Libya where the US ambassador was killed had nothing to do with the film. It was a preplanned assault, carefully laid out, carefully executed, that just used the film as a cover, as if you will a convenient excuse.

That in turn raises the different but related issue of how much of the rest of the protests, particularly the violent ones, were - well, not that they were planned in advance, but rather that there are people who were looking for an excuse, for any reason they could find, who will search out things that are or can be made to appear offensive, for the conscious purpose of arousing anger, of reaching that undercurrent of suspicion and resentment many in both the Arab and Muslim worlds (and you do know, yes, that they are not the same; in fact by population the largest majority-Muslim nation in the world is Indonesia) have toward the West, manipulating that resentment, the better to promote their own agendas and build their own personal power bases.

In any case it remains true that only a small minority of Muslims who took to the streets and it is an even smaller minority who are trying to exploit their grievances for their selfish gain.

There's an important related thing here: Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks made a very good point: He said he suspects that a lot of people in the Muslim world actually don't understand how the US works. They think, based on their own experiences, that if something like this movie was produced in and openly shown in the US - which it was, exactly once, to about 10 people - it must have been done with the support or at the very least the approval of the US government. Because they have had very little experience of free speech, they fall short on understanding what it means here, what restrictions on the government still exist here. They blame the US as a whole for what a literally tiny handful of bigots did.

A final point goes back to what I just said about an "undercurrent of suspicion and resentment." Joe Scarborough at MSNBC responded to the unrest by dismissing any cause other than "they hate us" - and then went on to say that "scratch any one of them from a peasant right up to a prime minister and you'll find someone happy to have the chance to throw a brick at a US embassy," apparently unaware of the irony of having by that bigotry just given "them" another reason to hate "us."

So I'm going to take a minute to read an edited version of something I wrote on October 2, 2001, less than a month after 9/11, partly in response to the question of that day, "Why do they hate us?"

For a moment, just for a moment, try to see the world through the eyes of an average person on the ground in the Middle East. This is how the world might look to you:

For centuries the West has looked down on you, regarding you, your culture, and, if non-Christian, your religion as inferior. (There is a reason bin Laden keeps referring to American “crusaders.”) They think of you as “ragheads” or “towelheads.”

Every time a strong Arab leader rises and tries to become independent of the West, they get slapped down. The only regimes that survive are those too weak or too corrupt to threaten Western interests. (One such “threatening” government was that of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran, who was overthrown in a CIA-engineered coup in 1953 after he attempted to nationalize oil reserves. The result was the 26-year reign of the Shah, whose army was practically stamped “Made in the USA.”) Yes, you resent the West’s wealth but it’s not so much that they’re rich and you’re poor, it’s that they’re rich because you’re poor, that their wealth is built on exploitation and economic domination.

In just the past 20-plus years [Remember, this was written in 2001.], you’ve seen the US pick a fight with Libya in the Gulf of Sidra, bomb Tripoli, openly try to kill Moammar Khadaffi, bomb a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan on the spurious claim it was a chemical weapons factory (leading to thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of deaths due to inadequate supplies of medicines), stand by along with the rest of the West while Muslims were slaughtered in Bosnia (stepping in only when European interests were threatened), shell Beirut, shoot down a civilian Iranian airliner, and fire cruise missiles into Afghanistan.

Then there’s Iraq, it’s infrastructure systematically destroyed in a war which it seems to you had nothing to do with the West except to humiliate another strong Arab leader. In the run-up to that war you saw foreign troops stationed near the holy sites of Islam at the insistence of the US despite Saudi Arabia’s reluctance and warnings that doing so would be deeply offensive to conservative Muslims - which it was. (One thus offended being Osama bin Laden.)

For 10 years you have seen the bombing of Iraq continue, so much so that a few months ago a Pentagon press representative referred to one such raid as “routine.”

Sanctions imposed by the West have cost the lives of 500,000 Iraqi children over the last 10 years, a death toll which then-Secretary of State Madeline Albright described in 1996 as “worth it.” Worth it, yes, you say - as long as it’s Arab children who are doing the dying.

And you see the US justify both the bombing and the sanctions on the grounds that Iraq “defies UN resolutions” while at the same time it pours billions of dollars in economic and military aid into Israel despite the fact that for 30 years Israel has openly defied UN resolutions about Palestinians and the occupied territories. It’s not even so much that the US supports Israel, it’s that the US does it to the detriment, the denigration, the denial, of the Palestinians.

If that was your world, what would the West, what would the US, look like to you? Like a noble friend? Or like a selfish, conceited, arrogant bully which figures it can do as it damn well pleases without cost to itself? Seen through such eyes, the question “Why do they hate us?” answers itself.

That's what I wrote then. In the intervening years, what have we seen? The Afghanistan War. The Iraq War. The drone war on Pakistan. The drone attacks on Somalia. The drone attacks on Yemen. Still no justice for the Palestinians, still no settlement, still no peace. So ask yourself if in that time we have given anyone, any Arab, any Muslim, any reason to change their minds.

Sources:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/an-incendiary-film--and-the-man-killed-in-the-crossfire-8131298.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/the-provocateurs-know-politics-and-religion-dont-mix-8131297.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/revealed-inside-story-of-us-envoys-assassination-8135797.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/16/hezbollah-protests-innocence-muslims_n_1888452.html?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-sb-bb%7Cdl19%7Csec1_lnk2%26pLid%3D206327
http://www.salon.com/topic/the_innocence_of_muslims/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innocence_of_Muslims
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wUF0lKLQ3s

9/11 - 2

The second part of my own observance of the anniversary of 9/11 is quoting an unpublished op-ed I wrote, dated October 2, 2001.

In the wake of September 11, a blunt truth: Barring divine intervention, and I for one do not count on that, we will never “rid the world of terrorism.” As long as there are people there will be those, both individuals and governments, prepared to commit the most venal cruelties against innocents to gain political ends. What we can hope to do is control terrorism, limit it, minimize it.

But if the history of the Middle East over the last 30 years proves nothing else, it proves beyond question that neither terrorism nor “counter”-terrorism, neither retaliation nor counter-retaliation nor counter-counter-retaliation will stop the circle of death - particularly not so long as those on each side insist on seeing themselves at the wronged innocents only defending themselves against unreasoning violence or oppression or exploitation (or all three) while viewing their adversaries as evil brutes fully aware of their own brutality. Another cycle of mayhem is simply not an answer.

If we want to limit, to minimize, terrorism, we have to understand the roots of it, understand what produces it, understand what moves people to embrace such desperation-driven fanaticism, because that it was terrorism is.

And that in turn requires seeing the world through someone else’s eyes, which is where most of the commentaries attempting to answer the now-popular question “Why do they hate us?” have failed. The authors have projected themselves into the Muslim world and tried to think of what they might resent about the West in general or the US in particular. That is, they have changed their imagined location but not their eyes, still seeing the world through the filter of their own perceptions and desires. So they wind up producing answers like “They hate us because we’re rich” or “They hate us because we’re modern” or “They hate us because we support Israel.” Such answers are so removed from context that even to the extent they’re right, they’re useless, the more so because they add up to the unintentionally-revealing “They’re backward, jealous, anti-Semites who hate us because we’re better than they are.”

So for a moment, just for a moment, try to see the world through the eyes of an average person on the ground in the Middle East. This is how the world might look to you:

For centuries the West has looked down on you, regarding you, your culture, and, if non-Christian, your religion as inferior. (There is a reason bin Laden keeps referring to American “crusaders.”) They think of you as “ragheads” or “towelheads."

Every time a strong Arab leader rises and tries to become independent of the West, they get slapped down. The only regimes that survive are those too weak or too corrupt to threaten Western interests. (One such “threatening” government was that of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran, who was overthrown in a CIA-engineered coup in 1953 after he attempted to nationalize oil reserves. The result was the 26-year reign of the Shah, whose army was practically stamped “Made in the USA.”) Yes, you resent the West’s wealth but it’s not so much that they’re rich and you’re poor, it’s that they’re rich because you’re poor, that their wealth is built on exploitation and economic domination.

In just the past 20-plus years, you’ve seen the US pick a fight with Libya in the Gulf of Sidra, bomb Tripoli, openly try to kill Moammar Qadaffi, bomb a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan on the spurious claim it was a chemical weapons factory (leading to thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of deaths due to inadequate supplies of medicines), stand by along with the rest of the West while Muslims were slaughtered in Bosnia (stepping in only when European interests were threatened), shell Beirut, shoot down a civilian Iranian airliner, and fire cruise missiles into Afghanistan.

Then there’s Iraq, it’s infrastructure systematically destroyed in a war which it seems to you had nothing to do with the West except to humiliate another strong Arab leader. In the run-up to that war you saw foreign troops stationed near the holy sites of Islam at the insistence of the US despite Saudi Arabia’s reluctance and warnings that doing so would be deeply offensive to conservative Muslims - which it was. (One thus offended being Osama bin Laden.)

For 10 years you have seen the bombing of Iraq continue, so much so that a few months ago a Pentagon press representative referred to one such raid as “routine.” Sanctions imposed by the West have cost the lives (by UN estimate) of 500,000 Iraqi children over the last 10 years, a death toll which then-Secretary of State Madeline Albright described in 1996 as “worth it.” Worth it, yes, you say - as long as it’s Arab children who are doing the dying.

And you see the US justify both the bombing and the sanctions on the grounds that Iraq “defies UN resolutions” while at the same time it pours billions of dollars in economic and military aid into Israel despite the fact that for 30 years Israel has openly defied UN resolutions about Palestinians and the occupied territories. It’s not even so much that the US supports Israel, it’s that the US does it to the detriment, the denigration, the denial, of the Palestinians.

If that was your world, what would the West, what would the US, look like to you? Like a noble friend? Or like a selfish, conceited, arrogant bully which figures it can do as it damn well pleases without cost to itself? And amid all this, what is the only force that has offered you hope, offered you help, offered you a model that has defied the West, offered you self-respect? Islamic fundamentalism. Seen through such eyes, the question “Why do they hate us?” answers itself.

This doesn’t mean excusing the terrorists who brought such ruin and pain to the streets of New York on September 11. We are all responsible for what we do and their acts deserve nothing but condemnation: Understanding does not mean approving.

What it does mean is that our best targets for “attack” in this “extended campaign” are not the actual terrorists (who likely number no more than a few thousand) but the tens of thousands, the millions, among who they recruit and from who they draw their strength. Our best weapons are bread and butter, not bombs; our best tactic reconstruction, not retaliation; our best strategy justice, not jingoism. The best way to minimize terrorism is to ensure that the dispossessed have a genuine stake in the world and don’t see us as grasping bullies - and the best way not to be seen as a grasping bully is not to be one.

I freely admit that one reason for posting this piece and the previous one is ego: I think the analysis I made at the time has stood up pretty well from the vantage point of 10 years down the road.

Oh, crap

Just crap.

The northern Sudanese army has seized a strategic town [called Abyei] along Sudan’s contested north-south border in a serious military escalation that has the potential of igniting an all-out civil war, Western officials said on Sunday. ...

The southern part of Sudan is gearing up to declare independence in July and both northern and southern Sudan claim Abyei, making it one of the most combustible issues between the two sides. The Abyei area produces a small amount of oil but more than that, it has become a potent, emotional symbol for both northern and southern Sudanese. It has been called Sudan’s Jerusalem because of the difficulties of resolving its status.

A column of tanks from the north have seized the town. The southern forces have not said how they will respond, but they have tens of thousands of heavily-armed troops.

The clash follows weeks of attacks by both sides in areas around the town, which has a mixed history: Culturally and ethnically southern, it has been administratively northern for decades and lies on a route that northern nomads use to bring their herds to watering holes.

After a bloody 20-year civil war that saw two million dead and four million refugeed, a peace agreement was reached in 2005 which involved a six-year period of autonomy for the south followed by a plebiscite on independence there. When the vote took place in January, over 95% voted for independence.

Now this. The thought that a peace, an agreement, that what has been so painfully established could all fall apart this close to some kind of closure is almost too much to think about.

Still, there have been stumbles and clashes on this path before. And at one time, simply making that 2005 agreement looked like a miracle. I can only hope that the Sudanese, both of the Muslim north and the Christian-animist south, have one more miracle in them.

I'll believe it when I see it

This should be good news: At the end of a three-day visit to Sudan during which he met with senior officials, Sen. John Kerry said that those officials

assured him that they are committed to holding a referendum on southern independence on time. ...

[Kerry] says Sudan's leaders "are absolutely committed" to making the Jan. 9 referendum take place as planned.

The vote will decide whether the south will split from the north and become an independent state.

Kerry told reporters Sunday the U.S. is committed to playing a "positive role" in ensuring a peaceful outcome to the vote.

Yes, that should be good news, as it is part of implementing a peace pact putting an end to a civil war that lasted over 20 years and saw 2 million dead and 4 million driven from their homes. But the truth is, I can't be too enthusiastic just yet.

I had a few posts on the progress of the peace talks that eventually lead to this point. There was the early optimism in December 2003 that a deal was possible. Then there was an actual outline of a deal in May 2004, the heart of which was that the south, which is largely Christian and animist, would be autonomous for six years, including with its own monetary system, with a vote on independence to come at the end of that time. That is the vote now scheduled for January. Meanwhile, the largely Muslim north would continue to be ruled under Sharia law.

It took more than six months to turn that outline into a preliminary accord, but it was done and in January 2005 the deal was signed.

Then came the crashing of hopes that June when the leading figure among the southern rebels, who under the pact had become vice-president, was killed in a helicopter crash. Things have been on a knife edge since with the risk of incidents leading to renewed civil war ever present. Oddly but still understandably, a clash in May 2008 in an important oil-rich area coveted so much by both sides that under the preliminary accord it is guarded by joint patrols, was seen as something of a blessing in disguise - because it did not lead to more general fighting. People, it seemed, really were tired of war.

So here we sit, months away from a referendum that could well lead to a final resolution. There are still issues outstanding, including the status of that oil-rich region straddling the northern and southern regions, but there always are in such cases until the very end. So why am I not as enthusiastic as might be expected?

One big reason is that quite bluntly I do not trust Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. In Darfur, he proved himself a master at

the compromise-and-stall game: Hold out until the pressure is too much, then "compromise" to take the heat off - and promptly forget about it once people look the other way.

In fact, a couple of years ago I noted seven times he had pulled that off over the preceding three years.

And now? This is from al-Jazeera for October 10:

Sudan's president has accused the country's southern autonomous leadership of breaching terms of a peace deal, warning that a conflict could re-erupt if the two sides did not settle disputes before a referendum on the south's secession, state media reported. ...

[Omar Hassan al-]Bashir said he was still committed to holding the vote on the south's independence, which is set to take place on January 9, but insisted both sides first had to settle differences over the position of their shared border and how to share oil, debt and Nile river water.

"He [Bashir] said a new conflict between the north and south will ensue if there was a failure to address these issues before the referendum and that such a conflict could be more dangerous than the one that took place before the peace agreement," Suna reported, referring to a speech Bashir gave on Saturday.

What's more, according to the VOA,

Mr. Bashir's foreign minister has suggested the government could reject the referendum results if it sees "interference" in the vote.

The south is strongly expected to vote for independence in the referendum. So it certainly appears that Bashir is positioning himself to be able to refuse to accept the outcome unless he gets what he wants on the outstanding issues.

Bashir doesn't have nearly as much wiggle room here as he did with Darfur, but the bottom line remains: As much as I hope this comes off the way it's supposed to, I will believe it when I see it. And not a moment before.