Ambedkar And The Annihilation Of Caste

Sukumaran C. V

There is no code of laws more infamous regarding social rights than the Laws of Manu. Any instance from anywhere of social injustice must pale before it. Why have the mass of people tolerated the social evils to which they have been subjected? There have been social revolutions in other countries of the world. Why have there not been social revolutions in India is a question which has incessantly troubled me. There is only one answer and it is that the lower classes of Hindus have been completely disabled for direct action on account of this wretched system of Chaturvarnya.—B. R. Ambedkar.

April 14th 2015 is the 125th birthday of Ambedkar, the man who was the greatest crusader against the inhuman caste system of India, the man who sincerely wished to annihilate the monster called caste. I have often and again felt that, in the history of the whole humankind, the two most draconian human ‘inventions’ are the slavery that was prevalent in the U.S. and the caste system of India. As slavery was abolished and it doesn’t exist now, caste system of India is the only draconian human invention that exists today.

It was while I was in the 9th standard I happened to know about Ambedkar. The Malayalam Supplementary Reader for class 9th was a short biography of Ambedkar and the portion which described that the people who belong to Ambedkar’s caste have had to wear a small pot around their neck to spit in order not to defile the path they walk on by spiting on the path really disturbed me. And when I hear that even today there are people in our country who are not allowed to drink tea in glasses and tea shop reserve coconut shells for them, I am not only disturbed but also ashamed!

In his ‘Annihilation of Caste’ which was published in 1936, Ambedkar said: “...turn in any direction you like, caste is the monster that crosses your path. You cannot have political reform, you cannot have economic reform, unless you kill this monster.” (‘Annihilation of Caste’, Chapter III)

Still, nearly 80 years after, we have not been able to kill the monster and the monster continues to kill and maim and insult the people. Even in Kerala, the most ‘educated’ and the most ‘progressed’ state, people subscribe to caste prejudices and bias. The ‘forward’ class colleagues of a government department head, the day after his retirement, applied cow-dung water inside his cabin and on the chair he used to sit to ‘purify’ them as he belonged to a scheduled caste! It happened in Kerala four years ago. Mentally it happens every day. The ‘forward’ caste people who are down in the official hierarchy of the government civil service machinery, are irritated when their superior belongs to SC/ST category. Even OBCs join hands with the ‘forward’ class in sharing this prejudice.

one of my Dalit friends recently told me that he didn’t vote for the Dalit candidate who was fielded by the Left in the 2014 Loksabha election. The Dalit candidate, who won, is a highly qualified one and the Constituency in which he was fielded was one that was reserved for SCs. My friend’s question is: Why does even the Left field well qualified SC candidates in the reservation seats? Why can’t even the so called progressive parties field educated and qualified SC/STs in the general seats and make them win?

The irony is that even those who are supposed to fight the monster called caste don’t want to kill it. The question Ambedkar asked 80 years ago—‘Can you have economic reform without first bringing about a reform of the social order?’—is still relevant, but conveniently forgotten by every political party.

In the following words of Ambedkar, we can see the reason why secular democracy failed in this country and the religious fundamentalism of RSS and BJP thrives: “Why do millionaires in India obey penniless Sadhus and Fakirs? Why do millions of paupers in India sell their trifling trinkets which constitute their only wealth and go to Benares and Mecca? That, religion is the source of power is illustrated by the history of India where the priest holds a sway over the common man often greater than the magistrate and where everything, even such things as strikes and elections, so easily take a religious turn and can so easily be given a religious twist.” (‘Annihilation of Caste’, Chapter III)

The struggle against caste has not come forward even a step further from where Ambedkar has led it. After Ambedkar nobody is as serious and dedicated as he has been in annihilating the caste system, the most draconian social set up in the world. Therefore caste and caste bias still thrive in our country and the humans and humanity fail.

And the most pathetic development in our country today is the competition between Congress which has never tried to annihilate the caste system and the BJP which doesn’t even dare to question caste system, to ‘own’ Ambedkar in relation with his 125th birth anniversary! Both the BJP and Congress should do justice to Ambedkar’s legacy if they can assimilate his spirit against caste system which still drags India back as far as social progress and equality are concerned. How can the Congress ‘own’ Ambedkar who said that ‘every Congressman who repeats the dogma of Mill that one country is not fit to rule another country must admit that one class is not fit to rule another class’? (‘Annihilation of Caste’, Chapter II)

And how can the BJP ‘own’ Ambedkar who said that ‘the Hindus criticize the Mohammadans for having spread their religion by the use of their sword. …But really speaking who is better and more worthy of our respect—the Mohammadans and Christians who attempted to thrust down the throats of unwilling persons what they regarded as necessary for their salvation or the Hindu who would not spread the light, who would endeavour to keep others in darkness? I have no hesitation in saying that if the Mohammedan has been cruel, the Hindu has been mean and meanness is worse than cruelty’? (‘Annihilation of Caste’, Chapter IX)

Both the BJP and Congress don’t want the Ambedkar who fought the most draconian system in the world—the caste system. Both want Ambedkar as bait to garner Dalit votes. They want to ‘own’ the form of Ambedkar sans the spirit. They know full well that the spirit of Ambedkar will annihilate the very base and foundation of such parties— religion and caste.

As Ambedkar says, ‘…Hindu Society is a myth. The name Hindu is itself a foreign name. It was given by the Mohammedans to the natives for the purpose of distinguishing themselves. It doesn’t occur in any Sanskrit work prior to the Mohammedan invasion. …Hindu society as such does not exist. It is only a collection of castes. ... Castes don’t even form a federation. A caste has no feeling that it is affiliated to other castes except when there is a Hindu-Muslim riot.’ (‘Annihilation of Caste’, Chapter VI). The BJP used this ‘feeling of affiliation’ in the Gujarat riots, in the Muzafarnagar riots and in almost all communal riots. People who are in the bottom of caste hierarchy are turned against the Muslims and both the caste oppression and religious fundamentalism which don’t allow the people to annihilate castes and religions thrive oppressing the very people who help religious fundamentalism to grow and rule the country. (Minority fundamentalism, the other side of the same coin, and the so called ‘secular’ politics of the Congress and other parties for whom secularism has always been a meaningless word only to catch the votes of the minorities, provided sufficient fuels for the majority fundamentalism to spread over the country and swallow the entire nation.)

Caste oppression in India is as worst as the European slave trade and the slavery prevalent in the United States. We can only read with horror the details about the slave trade of the people who were ‘burdened’ with the duty of ‘civilising’ the world. Howard Zinn writes in ‘A People’s History of the United States’:

“The conditions of capture and sale were crushing affirmations to the black African of his helplessness in the face of superior force. The marches to the cost, sometimes for 1,000 miles, with people shackled around the neck, under whip and gun, were death marches, in which two of every five blacks died. On the cost they were kept in cages until they were picked and sold. …Then they were packed aboard the slave ships, in spaces not much bigger than coffins, chained together in the dark, wet slime of the ship’s bottom, choking in the stench of their own excrement….The height, sometimes, between decks was only eighteen inches; so that the unfortunate human beings could not turn around, or even on their sides, the elevation being less than the breadth of their shoulders; and here they are usually chained to the decks by the neck and legs.”

This cruelty and meanness towards the humans by the humans was abolished, but in India the oppression and discrimination in the name of caste still continue and when will we the Indians be free from the oppressive and denigrating caste system which applies cow-dung water to ‘purify’ the official seat of an educated human being on account of his ‘lower’ caste origin? Will Ambedkar’s 200th birth anniversary see an India in which caste is annihilated totally?

Unsettling Questions Regarding The Mumbai Terror Attacks Of 2008

Elias Davidsson

The traumatic attacks in Mumbai in 26 November 2008 were described as India’s 9/11. The operation was unprecedented: ten young men battled hundreds of highly trained commandos for three days in a conflict that resembled David and Goliath. The huge media coverage created the impression that all the relevant facts about this event had been reported, but this impression is false.

Was anti-terror official Hemant Karkare deliberately killed on 26/11? Most probably. But what are we to make of the attacks on the Leopold café, the Taj, the Oberoi/Trident and the Jewish center at Nariman House, all unrelated to his demise?

Even those who suspect that Indian nationalists facilitated the assassination of Hemant Karkare continue to believe that the attacks on the other Mumbai targets were executed by Pakistani terrorists. According to this line of reasoning, Hindu nationalists joined with Pakistani terrorists to coordinate a double attack. Or one of these groups somehow obtained the exact details of the other group’s plans, including their date, time and location, and piggy-backed on them, praying that there would be no last-minute changes, delays or problems. Miracles do happen, they say.

As someone who does not believe in miracles, I have some pieces of information. This was all reported at the time, but has since been condemned to the memory hole. Each piece of information cracks the official legend of 26/11. Cumulatively, they shatter it.

1. The number of attackers

As the smoke of 26/11 dissipated, Indian authorities insisted that exactly ten young men had fought more than one thousand Marcos commandos, NSG commandos, police and security personnel for three days.

Yet, initially, the media reported that more than 20 attackers were involved. Vilasrao Deshmukh, for example, who was at the time the Maharashtra state chief, told Indian media on 27 November 2008 that 20 to 25 terrorists had entered Mumbai, and that many of them had escaped. He was not the only source for such figures. The New York Times reported on the 28 November 2008 that ‘the number of attackers have ranged from 20 to 40, with the number depending to a considerable extent on the number of boats involved.’ On the same day, USA Today reported, citing the Associated Press, that ‘more than 30 terrorists entered [Mumbai] by ship.’ Ha’aretz reported on 27 November 2008, that ‘nine members who were arrested...60 to 70 terrorists, some of whom came to Mumbai by boat, carried out the current attacks.’ Alex Neill, head of the Royal United Services Institute's Asia security programme, estimated that ‘up to 100 terrorists would have been involved in the planning and execution of the attack' and said 'it was surprising they had managed to keep it a secret.’

Who provided the media with these figures, on what basis, and for what purpose? Why has no journalist attempted to reconcile these initial figures with the ultimate tally of ten? Rakesh Maria, at the time the Mumbai Joint Commissioner of Police, had a ready answer: ‘This confusion is more or less a creation of the media.’

As the Mumbai authorities persisted in asserting that there had been only ten attackers, the New York Times wondered: ‘[P]erhaps the most troubling question to emerge for the Indian authorities was how, if official estimates are accurate, just 10 gunmen could have caused so much carnage and repelled Indian security forces for more than three days in three different buildings.’ But the paper of record did not follow up on this ‘troubling question.’ Was it a no-go zone?

2. Were nine attackers arrested?

According to the official account, only one of ten attackers, later known as Kasab, remained alive. The other nine were reportedly killed in combat. But this was not what officials had initially said.

At first, the media reported that several ‘terrorists’ had been captured alive. P.D. Ghadge, a police officer at Mumbai's central control room, told the media on the first day of the attacks that ‘We have shot dead four terrorists and managed to arrest nine suspected terrorists.’ On 27 November, both Home Minister Shivraj Patil and Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister R R Patil declared that at least nine terrorists were captured alive. Early on 27 November, the BBC quoted the Mumbai police: ‘four suspected terrorists have been killed and nine arrested.’ On 28 November, the third day of the attacks, the BBC cited R R Patil, again to the effect that ‘nine gunmen have been arrested.’ Meanwhile, The Hindu cited Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh: ‘nine persons had been detained.’

As late as on 29 November, the Indian Express cited the Director General of Maharashtra Police, A N Roy, who said: ‘All I can tell you at this stage is that nine suspects are with us and that some of them were picked up from around the operational areas. Once we finish questioning them, many facts will emerge. The whole story will shortly unfold.’

Then nothing more was heard of these arrests. The same media that previously reported that up to nine attackers had been arrested insisted that only one ‘terrorist’ had been captured alive. This change of narrative was not accompanied by any explanation. Did public officials lie about the multiple arrests? Were they lied to? Were arrested terrorists executed in custody? These are disturbing questions that remain unanswered.

Whatever the ultimate truth, it is clear that the authorities lied to the public, either initially, or subsequently, or both. Knowing why they lied may help reveal the hidden truth behind 26/11.

3. Who were the alleged attackers?

The public has been led to believe that the Mumbai attackers were properly identified. But were they?

To find out, it was necessary to determine, firstly, whether the bodies of the persons under police custody belonged to those who were observed by witnesses at the sites of killings; and secondly, the identities of the dead – from where they came, their real names, their birth dates, etc.

According to pathologists, the nine bodies presented to witnesses were burned beyond recognition. Whatever the state of the bodies, a visual identification of mutilated bodies, weeks after the events, under the prying eyes of police officials, cannot be considered a reliable exercise.

Nor were the real identities of the persons, whose bodies were held by police, determined. Their real names, birth dates, nationality and their residence addresses remain unknown. No family member came forward to identify either the bodies or the ‘sole living terrorist’, Kasab. His identity was based on what he allegedly told police officials behind closed doors.

Even the circumstances under which the nine ‘attackers’ died were not established by investigators or the Special Court. Did these alleged militants die in a military clash in Kashmir? Were they executed after being captured? Why are the precise circumstances in which they died kept a state secret?

4. Did the ‘attackers’ come by sea?

A sub-story of the 26/11 legend is that the attackers arrived in Mumbai by sea. Did anyone witness their landing at the seashore?

Only one person, Bharat Tamore, testified at Kasab’s trial that he observed young men landing on the Mumbai seashore on the evening of 26 November 2008. Was his testimony credible?

Tamore said in court that at the time he was employed by the Taj Mahal Hotel. He said that on 26 November at about 9:15 pm, while he was walking to work at the Taj, located 15 minutes from his residence, he saw ‘a dinghy coming towards Badhwar Park.’ He said he saw 10 persons on the boat, wearing saffron-coloured life-saving jackets. He could see them because of the street light. According to him, they all were between 20-25 years old. Eight of the said ten persons removed their jackets and put them in the boat before getting out. Each had one haversack and one hand bag. Tamore said he saw two of the said ten persons quite closely while they were proceeding towards the main road. Since both of them were unknown in the locality, Tamore intercepted them. Both of them told him that they were students. He also saw the remaining six persons proceeding towards the main road. The two persons who were left out in the boat proceeded in the same boat towards Nariman Point. (Judgment, p. 264)

Tamore told the court that he returned home from the Taj at about 7.00 am next morning. At that time, he had seen about 3-4 policemen standing near Badhwar Park Railway Officers' colony: ‘The policemen were talking something about [an] inflatable boat. [Tamore] therefore narrated the incident witnessed by him to the said policemen’. (Judgment, p. 265) He also said he identified Kasab in an identification parade as the person who told him they were students. (Judgment, p. 266) Tamore admitted under cross-examination that he might have seen Kasab’s photograph on television before the identification parade was held. (Judgment, p. 267). The Supreme Court revealed that this identification parade was held on 28 December 2008, after Kasab’s photograph had been widely and repeatedly published (SC, p. 53). The High Court ‘[did] not attach much importance to this.’ (HC, p. 432)

The defence counsel challenged Tamore's account: it was high tide at the time, and therefore the dinghy Tamore claimed to have seen could not have reached the seashore. Tamore admitted that it was high tide at the time but did not explain how the dinghy reached the seashore (Judgment, p. 266).

When making his first report to the police, Tamore surprisingly did not mention anything regarding the incident at the Taj, where he allegedly spent the entire night (Judgment, p. 267). The court did not invite anyone to corroborate Tamore's narrative. No one, for example, confirmed that he was an employee of the Taj; that he spent the night confined in the basement of the hotel; that he did not see or hear any of the incident occurring in the hotel; that he exited the hotel shortly before 7:00 am; and that on his way home he met policemen at the shore discussing a boat. No one confirmed what he actually told the police and when he did so. These failures are particularly significant – and disturbing – because Tamore was the sole witness produced in court who claimed to have observed people landing on the Mumbai shore on the evening of 26 November 2008. These failures are compounded by the facts that he told media after the trial regarding his alleged ordeal at the Taj, facts that he apparently withheld from the court, unless he lied to the media. The court's failure to thoroughly examine Tamore's credibility can hardly be attributed to negligence or to difficulty in finding staff members of the Taj who could corroborate or invalidate his narrative. The court also did not ask the police officers with whom Tamore interacted to confirm his story. The court, obviously, did not wish anyone to challenge Tamore’s narrative.

Tamore’s name was widely publicised in the media shortly after the attacks as the key witness to the landing of the alleged terrorists at the seashore. India Today wrote on 29 November 2008, for example: ‘The six terrorists who got off at Machimar Nagar were first spotted by Bharat Tamore, a Koli (from the fishing community) who works as an assistant supervisor at the Taj.’ This report did not quote Tamore directly, and it was not revealed how India Today discovered Tamore.

After Kasab's trial, Tamore and his wife were interviewed by Rediff. In this interview, new information came to light about his alleged experience at the Taj during the first night of the attack. Here is an excerpt from that article:

When Tamore reached his locker [at the Taj] and changed at about 9.30 pm on November 26, he heard some strange thumping overhead in the hotel's coffee shop, the Shamiana. Surprisingly, it continued. And got louder and stranger in sound. Then hordes of terrified employees, on the run, came pouring back into the staff area, where Tamore still was, and shared breathless descriptions of the ongoing attack and the terrorists. ‘They recounted that they were wearing jeans, and 'sack bags' (rucksacks) on their backs and carrying bags in their hands‘ Suddenly with cold foreboding Tamore knew exactly who they were.

He then said that his experience at the Taj was not limited to what others told him:

‘They herded about 100, 150 of us into an area near the bakery and told us to stay here. At the time we thought it was a temporary attack and we would get out after it was over. Who knew they would be there for three days?! We had no water, no food. And no way of telling people at home that we were still safe. We had all turned our phones off.’

Going by this account, Tamore not only saw terrorists at the Taj and heard them giving orders, but was kept with 100 or 150 other people without water and food. Yet, surprisingly, he did not report anything about this traumatic experience to the police or the court. Indeed, the court actually affirmed that he ‘had not seen anything of the incident’ at the Taj (Judgment, p. 265-6). Did Tamore lie to the journalists, did the media invent his account or did he withhold information from the court?

Rediff finally disclosed that ‘much of early 2009 was marked by recording [Tamore’s] testimony, working with the Mumbai police's crime branch to have his deposition ready.’ Tamore added: ‘There is a little Hanuman temple near my home. Every day when I passed it I would pray that god would give me the strength to see this through properly. That I would give the right information in court. And do the whole thing correctly. It was an attack on my home, my livelihood, my country. I had to testify.’ It certainly required substantial mental and emotional strength to ‘do the whole thing correctly’ and avoid contradicting himself. Let’s hope the police were happy with his performance after having coached him for ‘much of early 2009.’

According to media reports, three further persons had seen the ‘terrorists’ landing on the Mumbai seashore: Anita Uraiyar (aka Uddaiya), who claims to have been taken secretly to the United States for debriefing after 26/11; Prashant Dhanu(r), a fisherman who testified in court but did not claim to have seen any of the attackers; and Sumit Supadia, who claimed in media interviews to have seen the attackers land on the seashore, but was not asked to testify in court.

In sum, the story of the ‘ten’ attackers landing on the Mumbai seashore rests on the testimony of a single witness who was coached by police for his court performance and whose credibility is questionable.

To enhance the credibility of the sea-landing legend, CNN-IBN reported on 27 November 2008 that seven fishermen has been arrested on the first night of the attack as suspects, reporting that ‘police found a boat loaded with explosives near the Taj Mahal.’ Nothing further was heard of that boat, the explosives or of the detained fishermen.

(5) Were the individual killings investigated?

In a case of murder, criminal investigators must determine, as best they can, the circumstances under which the crime was perpetrated: who caused the victims’ injuries, when and where they were attacked, when they died and what type of injuries led to their death. The crime scene must also be documented in accordance with standardised rules.

While investigating the individual circumstances of more than 160 killings (the number of fatalities in the Mumbai events) was certainly a huge task, a great deal of significant information could easily have been assembled. There was no reason why the precise location of the bodies, when they were found, and who found them, could not be established. There was no reason why the exact circumstances in which the nine alleged attackers were killed could not be determined. There was no reason why investigators could not establish precise timelines of the unfolding of the individual episodes. There was no reason why it was impossible to determine the precise time at which the individual attacks started. These omissions had the effect of thwarting the reconstruction of the events. To compound these omissions, the authorities banned commandos, who participated in the operations, from testifying in court. Cumulatively, all these omissions indicated an intent to cover up the truth.

Surprisingly, the court found no witnesses for most of the killings – or perhaps it did not wish to find any.

Conclusion

The above account represents the tip of a deceptive iceberg regarding the mass-murder of 26/11. Some may find reopening this dossier uncomfortable. Yet both the victims and society as a whole are legally entitled to know the truth of this calamity. The Indian authorities have demonstrated a surprising reluctance to establish the truth by an independent commission of inquiry. Meanwhile, Indian governments have capitalised on 26/11 to increase military expenditure, establish a national infrastructure of mass surveillance and enhance their cooperation with the United States and Israel. India has become a national security state. Was 26/11 perpetrated to justify this development? This sinister question deserves to be examined.

(The present information was adapted from the author’s book The Betrayal of India, which is planned for publication at the end of 2015.)

The Making of Hillary Clinton

Jeffrey St. Clair & Alexander Cockburn

First in a three-part series.

Hillary Clinton has always been an old-style Midwestern Republican in the Illinois style; one severely infected with Methodism, unlike the more populist variants from Indiana, Wisconsin and Iowa.

Her first known political enterprise was in the 1960 presidential election, the squeaker where the state of Illinois notoriously put Kennedy over the top, courtesy of Mayor Daley, Sam Giancana and Judith Exner. Hillary was a Nixon supporter. She took it on herself to probe allegations of vote fraud. From the leafy middle-class suburbs of Chicago’s west side, she journeyed to the tenements of the south side, a voter list in her hand. She went to an address recorded as the domicile of hundreds of Democratic voters and duly found an empty lot. She rushed back to campaign headquarters, agog with her discovery, only to be told that Nixon was throwing in the towel.

The way Hillary Clinton tells it in her Living History (an autobiography convincingly demolished by Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta in their Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton, an interesting and well researched account ) she went straight from the Nixon camp to the cause of Martin Luther King Jr., and never swerved from that commitment. Not so. Like many Illinois Republicans, she did have a fascination for the Civil Rights movement and spent some time on the south side, mainly in African Methodist churches under the guidance of Don Jones, a teacher at her high school. It was Jones who took her to hear King speak at Chicago’s Orchestra Hall and later introduced her to the Civil Rights leader.

Gerth and Van Natta eschew psychological theorizing, but it seems clear that the dominant influence in Hillary life was her father, a fairly successful, albeit tightwad Welsh draper, supplying Hilton hotels and other chains. From this irritable patriarch Hillary kept secret ­ a marked penchant throughout her life ­ her outings with Jones and her encounter with King. Her public persona was that of a Goldwater Girl. She battled for Goldwater through the 1964 debacle and arrived at Wellesley in the fall of 1965 with enough Goldwaterite ambition to become president of the Young Republicans as a freshman.

The setting of Hillary’s political compass came in the late Sixties. The fraught year of 1968 saw the Goldwater girl getting a high-level internship in the House Republican Conference with Gerald Ford and Melvin Laird, without an ounce of the Goldwater libertarian pizzazz. Hillary says the assassinations of King and Robert Kennedy, plus the war in Vietnam, hit her hard. The impact was not of the intensity that prompted many of her generation to become radicals. She left the suburb of Park Forest and rushed to Miami to the Republican Convention where she fulfilled a lifelong dream of meeting Frank Sinatra and John Wayne and devoted her energies to saving the Party from her former icon, Nixon, by working for Nelson Rockefeller.

Nixon triumphed, and Hillary returned to Chicago in time for the Democratic Convention where she paid an afternoon’s visit to Grant Park. By now a proclaimed supporter of Gene McCarthy, she was appalled, not by the spectacle of McCarthy’s young supporters being beaten senseless by Daley’s cops, but by the protesters’ tactics, which she concluded were not viable. Like her future husband, Hillary was always concerned with maintaining viability within the system.

After the convention Hillary embarked on her yearlong senior thesis, on the topic of the Chicago community organizer Saul Alinsky. She has successfully persuaded Wellesley to keep this under lock and key, but Gerth and Van Natta got hold of a copy. So far from being an exaltation of radical organizing, Hillary’s assessment of Alinsky was hostile, charging him with excessive radicalism. Her preferential option was to
seek minor advances within the terms of the system. She did not share these conclusions with Alinsky who had given her generous access during the preparation of her thesis and a job offer thereafter, which she declined.

What first set Hillary in the national spotlight was her commencement address at Wellesley, the first time any student had been given this opportunity. Dean Acheson’s granddaughter insisted to the president of Wellesley that youth be given its say, and the president picked Hillary as youth’s tribune. Her somewhat incoherent speech included some flicks at the official commencement speaker, Senator Edward Brooke, the black Massachusetts senator, for failing to mention the Civil Rights movement or the war. Wellesley’s president, still fuming at this discourtesy, saw Hillary skinny-dipping in Lake Waban that evening and told a security guard to steal her clothes.

The militant summer of 1969 saw Hillary cleaning fish in Valdez, Alaska, and in the fall she was at Yale being stalked by Bill Clinton in the library. The first real anti-war protests at Yale came with the shooting of the students at Kent State. Hillary saw the ensuing national student upheaval as, once again, a culpable failure to work within the system. “I advocated engagement, not disruption.”

She finally consented to go on a date with Bill Clinton, and they agreed to visit a Rothko exhibit at the Yale art gallery. At the time of their scheduled rendez-vous with art, the gallery was closed because the museum’s workers were on strike. The two had no inhibitions about crossing a picket line. Bill worked as a scab in the museum, doing janitorial work for the morning, getting as reward a free tour with Hillary in the afternoon.

In the meantime, Hillary was forging long-term alliances with such future stars of the Clinton age as Marian Wright Edelman and her husband Peter, and also with one of the prime political fixers of the Nineties, Vernon Jordan. It was Hillary who introduced Bill to these people, as well as to Senator Fritz Mondale and his staffers.

If any one person gave Hillary her start in liberal Democratic politics, it was Marian Wright Edelman who took Hillary with her when she started the Children’s Defense Fund. The two were inseparable for the next twenty-five years. In her autobiography, published in 2003, Hillary lists the 400 people who have most influenced her. Marion Wright Edelman doesn’t make the cut. Neither to forget nor to forgive. Peter Edelman was one of three Clinton appointees at the Department of Health and Human Services who quit when Clinton signed the Welfare reform bill, which was about as far from any “defense” of children as one could possibly imagine.

Hillary was on Mondale’s staff for the summer of ’71, investigating worker abuses in the sugarcane plantations of southern Florida, as close to slavery as anywhere in the U.S.A. Life’s ironies: Hillary raised not a cheep of protest when one of the prime plantation families, the Fanjuls, called in their chips (laid down in the form of big campaign contributions to Clinton) and insisted that Clinton tell Vice President Gore to abandon his calls for the Everglades to be restored, thus taking water Fanjul was appropriating for his operation.

From 1971 on, Bill and Hillary were a political couple. In 1972, they went down to Texas and spent some months working for the McGovern campaign, swiftly becoming disillusioned with what they regarded as an exercise in futile ultraliberalism. They planned to rescue the Democratic Party from this fate by the strategy they have followed ever since: the pro-corporate, hawkish neoliberal recipes that have become institutionalized in the Democratic Leadership Council, of which Bill Clinton and Al Gore were founding members.

In 1973, Bill and Hillary went off on a European vacation, during which they laid out their 20-year project designed to culminate with Bill’s election as president. Inflamed with this vision, Bill proposed marriage in front of Wordsworth’s cottage in the Lake District. Hillary declined, the first of twelve similar refusals over the next year. Bill went off to Fayetteville, Arkansas, to seek political office. Hillary, for whom Arkansas remained an unappetizing prospect, eagerly accepted, in December ’73, majority counsel John Doar’s invitation to work for the House committee preparing the impeachment of Richard Nixon. She spent the next months listening to Nixon’s tapes. Her main assignment was to prepare an organizational chart of the Nixon White House. It bore an eerie resemblance to the twilit labyrinth of the Clinton White House 18 years later.

Hillary had an offer to become the in-house counsel of the Children’s Defense Fund and seemed set to become a high-flying public interest Washington lawyer. There was one impediment. She failed the D.C. bar exam. She passed the Arkansas bar exam. In August of 1974, she finally moved to Little Rock and married Bill in 1975 at a ceremony presided over by the Rev. Vic Nixon. They honeymooned in Acapulco with her entire family, including her two brothers’ girlfriends, all staying in the same suite.

After Bill was elected governor of Arkansas in 1976, Hillary joined the Rose Law Firm, the first woman partner in an outfit almost as old as the Republic. It was all corporate business, and the firm’s prime clients were the state’s business heavyweights ­ Tyson Foods, Wal-Mart, Jackson Stevens Investments, Worthen Bank and the timber company Weyerhaeuser, the state’s largest landowner.

Two early cases (of a total of five that Hillary actually tried) charted her course. The first concerned the successful effort of Acorn ­ a public interest group doing community organizing ­ to force the utilities to lower electric rates on residential consumers and raise on industrial users. Hillary represented the utilities in a challenge to this progressive law, the classic right-wing claim, arguing that the measure represented an unconstitutional “taking” of property rights. She carried the day for the utilities.

The second case found Hillary representing the Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Arkansas in a lawsuit filed by a disabled former employee who had been denied full retirement benefits by the company. In earlier years, Hillary had worked at the Children’s Defense Fund on behalf of abused employees and disabled children. Only months earlier, while still a member of the Washington, D.C., public interest community, she had publicly ripped Joseph Califano for becoming the Coca Cola company’s public counsel. “You sold us out, you, you sold us out!” she screamed publicly at Califano. Working now for Coca Cola, Hillary prevailed

Tomorrow: HRC and the Arkansas Elite. 

Saudi Arabia’s Other War

Eric Draitser

The Saudi war on Yemen has understandably come to dominate the headlines since it began in late March 2015. The international scope of the conflict – nominally including the participation of nearly a dozen Gulf countries – coupled with the obvious political and geopolitical implications, all but assured that nearly all mention of Saudi Arabia in the news would be in the context of this war. However, there is another war being waged by Saudi Arabia, this one entirely within its own borders.

While Riyadh viciously, and illegally, bombs the people of Yemen, it also continues to wage a brutal war of repression against its own Shia population. A significant minority inside Saudi Arabia, the Shia community has been repeatedly victimized by the heavy-handed, often murderous, tactics of Saudi security forces in a desperate attempt by the House of Saud to maintain its iron grip on power. Rather than being challenged to democratize and respect the rights of a minority, the Saudi government has chosen violence, intimidation, and imprisonment to silence the growing chorus of opposition.

Were it only the Shia minority being targeted however, this overt repression might be crudely caricatured as sectarian conflict within the context of “Iranian influence” on Saudi domestic politics; Iran being the bogeyman trotted out by Riyadh to justify nearly all of its criminal and immoral actions, from financing terror groups waging war on Syria to the bombardment of the people of Yemen. However, the Saudi government is also targeting bloggers, journalists, and activists who, despite their small numbers in the oppressive kingdom, have become prominent defenders of human rights, symbolizing an attempt, fruitless though it may be, to democratize and bring some semblance of social justice to the entirely undemocratic monarchy.

At War Against Its Own People

It is a well understood fact, almost universally recognized, that Saudi Arabia is one of the principal instigators of sectarianism throughout the Muslim world. Using a “divide and conquer” strategy that has worked with insidious perfection in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere, Saudi Arabia has managed to flex its geopolitical muscles and project its power without much threat to its own internal stability. However, there is increasingly a Shia movement within Saudi Arabia – we should not call it “sectarian” as it is about equality under the law – demanding its rights and legal protections that are undeniably incompatible with the absolutist, monarchical system that Saudi Arabia has erected.

Recent days have seen violent raids and clashes between Saudi security forces and residents throughout the overwhelmingly Shia Qatif province of Eastern Saudi Arabia, the most violent of which having taken place in the town of Awamiyah. In response to protests against Riyadh’s war on Yemen, the regime’s security forces unleashed a brutal crackdown that perhaps most accurately could be called violent suppression. As one activist and resident of Awamiyah told the Middle East Eye, “From 4pm until 9pm the gunfire didn’t stop… Security forces shot randomly at people’s homes, and closed all but one of the roads leading in and out of the village… It is like a war here – we are under siege.” A number of videos uploaded to YouTube seem to confirm the accounts of activists, though all eyewitness accounts remain anonymous for fear of government retribution.

Such actions as those described by activists in Awamiyah, and throughout Qatif, are nothing new. Over the last few years, the province has repeatedly seen upsurges of protests against the draconian policies of the government in Riyadh. Beginning in 2011, in concert with protests in Bahrain, Qatif became a hotbed of activism with increasingly significant demonstrations shaking the social foundations of the region, and rattling nerves in Riyadh which, with some justification, interpreted the growing democracy movement as a threat to its totalitarian control over the country. Responding to the “threat,” the Saudi government repeatedly unleashed its security forces to violently suppress the demonstrations, resulting in a number of deaths; the total remains unknown to this day as Saudi Arabia tightly controls the flow of such sensitive information.

Of course, these actions by the Saudi regime cannot be seen in a vacuum. Rather, they must be understood within the larger context of the events of the 2011 uprising, and ongoing resistance movement, in neighboring Bahrain. Long a vassal state of Saudi Arabia, the majority Shia Bahrain has been ruled by the al-Khalifa family, a Sunni dynasty that for years has lorded over the country in the interests of their patrons and protectors in Saudi Arabia. When in 2011, much of the country erupted in protests against the totalitarian Khalifa regime, it was Saudi Arabia which militarily intervened on behalf of their proxies.

Despite being the leading edge of what would come to be known as the “Arab Spring,” the uprising in Bahrain was largely forgotten amid the far more catastrophic events in Libya and Syria. Naturally, it should be noted that Saudi Arabia played a central in sponsoring both of those conflicts, as protests were transmogrified into terrorist wars backed by Saudi money and jihadi networks. In the midst of the regional instability, Saudi intervention in Bahrain became, conveniently enough for Riyadh, “lost in the shuffle.” So, while the world hemmed and hawed about “dictators” in Libya and Syria, and marshaled political, diplomatic, and military forces to bring regime change to both, the dictatorship in Saudi Arabia continued to prop up its proxies in Bahrain, while suppressing the uprisings at home.

But while many would claim that Saudi actions are dictated not by authoritarianism but a continuing geopolitical struggle with Shia Iran, such arguments seem frivolous when considering the repression of freedom of speech within Saudi Arabia.

It is not sectarianism and “Iranian meddling” that has caused the Saudi regime to convict Raif Badawi, a liberal blogger and independent journalist, for the crime of “insulting Islam” for daring to question the draconian laws enforced by the reactionary monarchy and its police state apparatus. Not only was Badawi sentenced to ten years in prison and 1000 lashes, he was also originally tried on the absurd charge of “apostasy” which could have carried a death sentence. Indeed, though these charges were thrown out, reports have emerged in recent months that the apostasy charge may be brought back in a second trial; the punishment for a conviction would be beheading. So, physical abuse, long-term imprisonment, and a possible death sentence for a blogger who had the temerity to voice his opinion about political and social issues. And this country has the gall to intervene in Yemen on behalf of “democracy”?

Speaking of death sentences handed down by Saudi authorities for publicly airing one’s beliefs, the case of Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr also highlights the deeply unjust policies of the regime. A vocal supporter of the Qatif protests, Nimr was convicted of the crime of “disobeying” the Saudi government by seeking “foreign meddling” in the country. An obvious reference to the ever-present bogeyman of Iran, the spurious charges have been widely interpreted as an attempt to silence a major critic of the regime, one who has the support of the significant Shia minority. Saudi courts have sentenced Nimr to death for the “crime” of supporting the protests seeking democratization and a respect for minority rights. That decision was appealed, and last month a Saudi court upheld the death sentence.

While the House of Saud might peddle its propaganda of Iranian meddling with regard to Sheikh Nimr with some success, what of Badawi? Is he also an “agent” working on behalf of Iran? What of the estimated 12,000-30,000 political prisoners held in Saudi jails under very dubious pretexts?

Rights? What Rights?

The Saudi regime attempts to frame all of its blatant human rights abuses in the context of legitimate law enforcement. But this is a poorly conceived illusion, and cruel insult to the very concept of human rights. While the Saudis attempt to lecture countries like Syria about “human rights” and treatment of the people, Saudi Arabia remains perhaps the world leader in systematic and institutional oppression of its own citizens.

The infamous repression of women in Saudi Arabia has earned the country international scorn, but the regime scoffs at such conclusions. As the Washington Post wrote in 2013:

Saudi Arabia’s restrictions on women go far, far beyond just driving, though. It’s part of a larger system of customs and laws that make women heavily reliant on men for their basic, day-to-day survival… each Saudi woman has a “male guardian,” typically their father or brother or husband, who has the same sort of legal power over her that a parent has over a child. She needs his formal permission to travel, work, go to school or get medical treatment. She’s also dependent on him for everything: money, housing, and, because the driving ban means she needs a driver to go anywhere, even the ability to go to the store or visit a friend… The restrictions go beyond the law: women are often taught from an early age to approach the world outside their male guardian’s home with fear and shame…[they are] warned against the “dangers that threaten the Muslim woman,” such as listening to music, going to a mixed-gender mall or answering the telephone.

It takes an unfathomable degree of hypocrisy to oppress women in this way, and then lecture Syria – a secular socialist country where women’s rights and freedoms are guaranteed, and where women have every educational and professional opportunity they might have in the West – about its treatment of its citizens. It is staggering the gall required of an unelected feudal monarchy to chastise the Yemeni rebels, and make a case for “legitimacy” in government.

Naturally, Saudi Arabia gets away with such egregious hypocrisy not because it isn’t obvious to the world, it most certainly is. Instead, the House of Saud is able to carry on its repression because of its powerful patron in Washington. Because the regime has for decades furthered the geopolitical agenda of the United States, it has managed to continue its brutal repression facing only minimal outcry. Though there is scrutiny from international human rights organizations, the government is not sanctioned; it is not isolated by the much touted “international community.” Instead it continues on with its oppressive policies and aggression against its neighbors.

Saudi bombs are falling on Yemen as you read this. Saudi-sponsored ISIS terrorists are waging war on Syria and Iraq as you read this. Saudi-sponsored terror groups all over the Middle East and Africa continue to destabilize whole corners of the globe. Activists in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia itself are being brutally oppressed by the Saudi regime and its proxies.

And yet, the House of Saud remains a US ally, while Assad or the Houthis or Iran or Hezbollah (take your pick) are the great villain? It is plainly obvious that right and wrong, good and evil, are mere designations of political expediency for Saudi Arabia and, taken more broadly, the US and the imperial system it leads.

Handicapping the Presidential Field

Ben Schreiner

With the official announcement from the formerly “dead broke” Hillary Clinton that she has decided to accept—er, decided to seek—the Democratic presidential nomination, the 2016 presidential election has begun in earnest.  Here, then, is a brief rundown of the various charlatans and sociopaths vying for the White House.

The Republicans

Jeb Bush

A true blue blood with loads of cash.  The clear front-runner, in other words.

Scott Walker

A celebrated union-buster with a hate of organized labor so pure it has led Walker to equate Wisconsin pro-union protesters with ISIS and declare Reagan’s breaking of the PATCO strike a foreign policy accomplishment.  Of course, a hate of workers is all Walker has to offer.  But don’t confuse that for a weakness.  As one “impressed” South Carolina Republican was recently left to gush of his interaction with the one-trick pony Walker: “We talked football for five minutes. Politics never came up.”  Look, then, for the worker-hating, football-loving Walker to mount the most serious challenge to the annotating of Bush III.

Rick Santorum

A failed Senator with a longstanding dream of one day parlaying a fantastical bid for the White House into his very own Fox News show.  Unfortunately for Santorum, he once again faces stiff competition in this regards.  Look for Santorum to come up short on his dream once again, only to return for one more try come 2020.

Bobby Jindal

A governor with an utterly failed economic agenda, who now spends his time warning America’s beleaguered Christians about the perils of impending Muslim colonization.  Jindal’s delusional ambition notwithstanding, a plush gig as a pundit permitting the governor the opportunity to freely espouse all his favorite Islamaphobic canards remains the most likely outcome of any 2016 run .

Ben Carson

A man with the homophobic bonafides necessary to win over the Republican primary voter.  Alas, Carson’s appeal begins and ends there.  But it can only help the Republican Party’s “minority outreach” to have an actual minority up on the debate stage, so expect Carson to stick around at least through the first debate.

Chris Christie

A man who has built his national brand by publicly berating and bullying public school teachers, while simultaneously indulging an insatiable appetite for publicly financed luxury.  The man is the American elite personified.  The problem for Christie, of course, is that such unvarnished personifications of the American elite often struggle to win the “hearts and minds” of the rabble.  Just ask Mitt Romney.

Ted Cruz

A wannabe televangelist and Harvard Law graduate who married a Goldman Sachs managing director and is currently a sitting U.S. Senator.  So clearly Cruz is Middle America’s favorite anti-establishment crusader.  Of course, for frauds of Cruz’s ilk (see Mike Huckabee), the grand prize isn’t the White House, but a financial payout. So look for Cruz to battle it out with Santorum before ultimately securing a lucrative contract with Fox News.

Rand Paul

A principled “libertarian,” swiftly shedding his deeply held principles as he goes.  Look for Paul’s faux libertarianism to hoodwink enough young, rich, white males (i.e., “libertarians”) to sustain his campaign well near the party’s national convention.  Just don’t look for Paul’s charade to muster enough support to actually secure the nomination.

Rick Perry

The very same idiot who ran in 2012, albeit this time the simpleton is betting he’ll be able to fool the Republican electorate by donning a pair of designer glasses.  He is worth watching early, as his grasp of the superficiality of running for president is no doubt a formidable asset.

Lindsey Graham

The hard-hitting foreign policy heavyweight of the Republican field.  The always somber Graham has decided to use his role as a stock Sunday morning talk show guest to flirt with a long shot candidacy for no other reason than to press the point that if we don’t “man up” and start dropping some more bombs on the Middle East “barbarians” du jour, we are all going to “get killed here at home.”  With such measured hot takes, look for Graham to make any short list of potential Secretaries of State in any future Republican administration.

Marco Rubio

A war hawk’s war hawks with a pretty haircut.  Look for the inexperienced Rubio to beef up his credentials by advocating the bombing of at least two more countries by the time of the Iowa caucuses.  And if if Rubio proves himself adept at framing such savagery as somehow being humanitarian endeavors undertaken to “protect civilians,” look for Rubio to market himself to the nation’s moneyed elite (á la an Illinois Senator from years past) as the best face to graft on American imperialism.

Mike Huckabee

Mike Huckabee has a new book out.  He’s decided to sell that book by “running for president.”

Carly Fiorina

The former chief executive of HP responsible for sacking over 18,000 employees during her over 5 year run as the head of the company.  That said, given a chance to stand next to the war-mongering, blood-stained Hillary Clinton, the American electorate may actually come to warm to the cut-throat Fiorina.  And again, it can’t hurt the aesthetics of the party to have a woman up on the debate stage, so expect Fiorina to make it at least as far as the first Republican debate.

The Democrats

Hillary Clinton

A true blue blood with loads of cash.  The clear front-runner, in other words.

Bernie Sanders

A sham “socialist,” pro-Israel hawk.  Look for Sanders to play Kucinich in the 2016 primary should he launch a campaign; that is, look for Sanders to work on drawing the outer edges of American liberalism back into the Democratic fold before inevitably dropping out of the race and endorsing Clinton.

Martin O’Malley

The former governor of Maryland is positioning himself as the party’s “populist” alternative to Clinton.  Of course, there is no alternative to Clinton within the neoliberal Democratic Party.  But it will certainly look better if Hillary has someone to actually “debate.”  Plus, who knows, maybe O’Malley has a little Kucinich in him as well.

Third Parties

Third parties are irrelevant in American politics.  The dwindling few who still turn out to vote are to steadfastly ignore all matters related to economic and foreign policy, and instead carefully wade through the culture war milieu to select their preferred lesser evil major party candidate.

Early Prediction

The blue bloods prevail in both parties, setting up a dynastic struggle for power befitting American democracy.

A Decolonial, Restructuring Matter

Andrew Smolski

John Ackerman’s article in Proceso, “Ludismo Electoral”, demonstrates a profound lack of understanding about the electoral boycott proposed by the Zapatistas for over two decades, and also proposed by the poet and thinker Javier Sicilia. The first misunderstanding is about what a legitimate political party is and how it comes into being. The second misunderstanding is due to his treating corruption and fraud as if they can be divorced from the currently existing political parties. This is compounded by his subsequent confusing of political parties with elections proper, and thus with democracy. His last misunderstanding concerns the idea that with “left” leaning politicians in power, the space opens up for further rebellion, which then makes elections central to struggle, rather than a supporting part.

His misunderstandings are linked to his theoretical apparatus, laid out in works such as Organismos Autónomos y Democracia: El Caso de México, which subsumes informal politics, the politics of social movements, and politics of the periphery, under formal institutionalized politics. That is, Ackerman’s analysis begins with the State, makes it the central motor of struggle, a form of Marxist-Leninism without Ackerman employing such a discourse. If only he had read Dussel or Luxemburg, then this could all have been avoided. Then we could recognize that in Mexico the State is no longer functional in any sense, and that any politics of liberation begins from the outside, from the periphery, from the spontaneity of the people who most marginalized. To want to take over the State at this juncture is to want to take over the rot as a ritual act without much substance.

So, my arguments are that a.) any political party must arise from the masses themselves, that is from outside the formal arena of politics as currently constituted, b.) all current political parties are part of a systemic failure, and thus can only be abstractly cordoned off from fraud and corruption, but are concretely perpetuating it through their very existence, c.) elections are only useful if the system is able to change in a reformist manner, if the system is not completely defunct, and d.) no one, based on the evidence, can think that it would be possible to get enough “leftist” politicians into power at this moment to actually produce the opening up of rebellious space that Ackerman is discussing, which is actually being done by the informal social movements Ackerman would have us make subordinate to the aims of political parties. These arguments are not new, these are, at least in my reading, Sicilia’s argument and in part Zapatista arguments.

On point “a”, we can look at the work done by George Ciccariello-Maher demonstrating the need “of generating an alternative power outside the state capable of transforming, ultimately, abolishing that state” as a major part of the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela. This decolonial form of politics is in stark contrast to the euro-centric form proposed by Ackerman that tells to not cede a battleground, and thus be forced to vote for the lesser of two (actually, quite a few more in Mexican politics) evils, MORENA. So, instead of the party arising from the movement, the party is already part of the institutionalized formal system of politics, thus maintaining many of the problems Ackerman honestly does wish to ameliorate or put to an end.

On point “b”, as pointed out by Sicilia (see issue no. 1988 of Proceso), even with AMLO in power, Abarca would’ve been mayor of Iguala, and thus the massacres still would’ve been perpetuated. Further, Sicilia points out that this is not a “person” or “individual” problem, but rather a structural one. So, to act as if a different political party, a party made up of functionaries who learned their politics in the existing structure, would change that structure becomes ludicrous. It demonstrates a profound lack of sociological understanding, and ignores that when many of the politicians who make up MORENA were in PRD, there were assassinations in states under their control. As Sicilia says, “sirs, you all lack humility, self-criticism, and analytic profundity.”

On point “c”, the only reason to reform a system is if the system only needs to be tweaked. If a system forces 44.2% of its people to live poverty, if it cannot feed daily 19.7% of its population, if almost a full half of its economy is informal (see Alejandro Portes’ work), if it has mass femicides, disappearances, homicides, kidnappings, rapes, and torture, much of it committed by the state itself, is that system worth reforming? Elect someone new, and how will they then be able to deal with so much rot? This a serious question, reform or revolution, or in the case of Sicilia and Vera, a new popular constitutional assembly. No one is ceding a battlefield, because it is already charred black and smells of burnt flesh.

On point “d”, Ackerman derives his point most likely from the work of sociologist Pablo González Casanova in Democracy in Mexico, in which González Casanova utilizes statistical data on the number of strikes and policy decisions of Mexican Presidents to show a correlation between left-leaning presidents and increased labor action. However, the current moment is not reflective of the 30s to 60s period studied by González Casanova with its rhetoric of revolutionary nationalism, its murals unifying the proletarian, peasant, and indigenous identities, which quickly turned into a paternalistic, authoritarian state, and then into a neoliberal, corrupt, and fraudulent state. This is once more, a problematic point, one that does not recognize the extent of the problem, and incorrectly produces the causal direction. Social movements make the space for their own organic politicians to rise.

So, I think Ackerman should rethink his argument. His analysis is typically powerful and on point. But, he has decided, as have many others in Mexico, including my favorite writer, Paco Ignacio Taibo II, to put their energy behind the vote, the vote for MORENA. This tactical question becomes something much more, it becomes also the future. And, maybe I am wrong, maybe Sicilia is, maybe the Zapatistas are, maybe the parents of the 43 students are wrong for rejecting AMLO and MORENA. I do not think so, not when the evidence seems to be clear, that a fundamental institutional restructuring is necessary. Imagine if Elena Poniatowska called for revolution, instead of a vote for MORENA. Imagine if we left fear of the unknown behind and began to trust in the informal inertia of the Mexican Moment.

To demonstrate my gratitude to Javier Sicilia, who writings have inspired me over the past three years, I would like to repeat his demands:

“the San Andres Accords must be respected, stop the war, free José Manuel Mireles, his self-defense forces, Nestora Salgado, Mario Luna, and all political prisoners, bring justice for the victims of violence, judge the criminal politicians, and boycott the elections.”

Using Film Propaganda to Scare Refugees

Binoy Kampmark

“To be perceived, propaganda must evoke the interest of an audience and must be transmitted through an attention-getting communications medium.”

– Leonard W. Doob, based on Goebbels’ Principles of Propaganda

It is right out of the top drawer of the Reich minister for propaganda and enlightenment, Joseph Goebbels. The impact of televisual images on potential refugees is designed to improve their wretched lot – through the use of fear that hopefully immobilizes them. Don’t come to Australia, or you will drown, be abused, or suffer an assortment of various indignities in detention. Leave the hellhole contrived by circumstance at your peril. Providence knows best.

The move by the Australian government into the world of anti-refugee propaganda is a fitting reminder what sort of regime is in power. As the presenter for ABC’s Lateline program asked, “How did on-water maters become on-screen matters? How did the Immigration Department get into the movie business?”

Truth to be told, this industry of loathing has a timeline. Under the Labor government, Customs commissioned a radio drama series targeting audiences in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The purpose there was to dissuade potential asylum seekers from getting onto boats destined for Australia.

In 2000, John Howard’s conservative government enlisted Australia’s bestiary of natural freaks in a campaign to convince asylum seekers that they were heading for an ecological nightmare. A series of videos were produced showing the lethal prowess of crocodiles, sharks and deadly snakes. Come to Australia, as a summation went, “and you’ll be eaten, bitten or mauled.”

Then immigration minister Philip Ruddock explained that the films, shown on television in Pakistan, Turkey, Jordan, Syria and Iran, used “the most effective messages and images to use overseas while at the same time being sensitive to local cultures and their requirements.” A true anthropologist.

In the latest production venture, a telemovie, as it is being termed, has been commissioned at the cost of $4 million, ostensibly to target the people smuggling campaign that gets the immigration junta tetchy. A good portion of those arriving in Australia by boat tend to be products of what Australian officials call a “business model”, enterprising middle men who net the proceeds and pass on the human cargo for unsafe passage. No reference to international law is ever made in these observations – what matters are the words of repulsion and prevention.

The plot, if the film can be dignified by the use of that term, is bound to consist of the staple terrors. Asylum seekers will be pictured drowning at sea on route to the land of milk and honey. The target audiences will be in areas where the choice is between the quick and the dead: Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. These are deemed the “source” countries. Screenings will also be made in transit countries such as Indonesia.

A morally excited producer Trudi-Ann Tierney from Put It Out There Pictures suggested that “the impact this film will have on a person’s decision to attempt a journey by boat to Australia cannot be underestimated”. It will have such value in that it could help “save people from detention, disappointment and even death.” Such a wonderful, moral mission.

In a statement from Put It Out There Pictures to Lateline, Kierney and her crew insist on excising politics from the equation of human suffering. “This is about people, not politics.” A prophylactic theme is emphasised, suggesting that the producers are somehow interested in preventing deaths by stifling the exercise of rights to asylum.

As for the use of film, Tierney believes in its force. “Film educates and engages like no other medium. It is a powerful and emotional way to explain the complexities of the current policies; the stories it tells moves, connects with its viewers.” Never mind the quality of what the film conveys – film is the moving reality.

Such institutionally accepted imbecility is the hallmark of many a propaganda unit – eventually, the producers begin to believe their own faithful messages. The fiction drugs the maker. Tierney should know, having herself been behind the Kabul US embassy funded anti-terror program Eagle Four, featuring the fanciful exploits of the Afghan police force.

Basing herself in Afghanistan from 2009, Tierney got into the business of producing that most dreaded of genres, the soapie, with Secrets of this House. Then came her chance in 2010 to air Eagle Four, which sought to deodorise the rather rank police forces of a failed state for a puzzled Afghan populace. This was a tall order given the common image in circulation of “corrupt, drug-taking thugs.” (Her own words.) In Making Soapies in Kabul (2014), Tierney explained how, “We would be well paid for this particular piece of propaganda.”

The more digging one does behind this venture, and the more fitting the union between Put It Out There Pictures and Canberra seems. Tierney has no room for politics largely because she is merely an extension of the political establishment that hires her, a fashioned mercenary of the mouthpiece. As she described her mission in Afghanistan, her production was aimed at, “Influencing (audience)… values and behaviour to suit the objectives of NATO and its allies.”

The ultimate rationale behind this propaganda splurge is self-defeating. Given a choice between death at the hands of Shia militants, Sunni groups, and stock standard authoritarian regimes, the risk of death at sea shrinks. The incentive to escape horror is all powerful. Rather than focusing on efforts at peace building and rehabilitation, the Australian government continues its efforts to win its place in an already crowded moral purgatory.