Getting over Trump(ed)

"Peaceful Acceptance" of "people's will" there was NOT in 2008

Kautilya, a religious bigot if ever there was one, nevertheless wrote an excellent treatise on state craft titled ‘Arthashastra’, one of the earliest works on the subject.  In Book VI, "The Source of Sovereign States", Kautilya writes, “The king who is situated anywhere immediately on the circumference of the conqueror's territory is termed the enemy. The king who is likewise situated close to the enemy, but separated from the conqueror only by the enemy, is termed the friend (of the conqueror).”

This is the earliest recorded note on the issue of friends and foes in the matter of governance.  It has subsequently been used in other contexts of course and is generally reduced to the familiar dictum ‘my enemy’s enemy is my friend’ often attributed to Mao Zedong.  What is important to note here is that neither Kautilya nor Chairman Mao proposed it as a general theory, but rather one which could be applied to given situations.  Perhaps this is why we have that other adage which could be considered a corollary of sorts, ‘there are no permanent enemies or friends in politics”.  

The recently concluded US Presidential Election prompted animated response from Sri Lankans of different political/ideological shades both here and in the USA.   They are as divided, one might say, as the people of the USA, perhaps for reasons that are not too dissimilar, reasons that appear to be drawn from the above political observations on friendship and enmity.  It’s probably not surprising considering that Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were said to be the most unpopular candidates in remembered history. 

After all, Republicans were told ‘hold your nose and vote Trump’ even as their Democratic counterparts pleaded, ‘hold your nose and vote Hillary’.  

It was a close race and one where the winner lost the popular vote.  Naturally, the Democratic camp felt cheated by the elections system or rather the system of selection in the USA.  On the other hand, if system was at fault, then the die-hard Clinton supporters can’t really complain, for they were happy when system-flaw hoofed out Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Primaries.  Trump was not the first ‘winner’ who lost the popular vote, he was the fifth, following the election of John Quincy Adams (1824) which helped launch the Democratic Party, Rutherford B Hayes (1876), Benjamin Harrison (1888) and George W Bush (2000), when the Supreme Court in a split decision refused to sanction a re-count in Florida.

One can only speculate whether the Democrats or rather the anti-Trump camp (which is broader than the support base of Clinton) would have been as vociferous in their protests had it been some other Republican that had secured the White House.  As for Trump supporters who are yelling that the Clinton camp is in denial and telling them to shut up and accept the result, they are silent on the kind of denial that the most racist and bigoted of their camp demonstrated when Barack Obama won in 2008.  

As of now, it appears that a lot of people, across the so-called political divide, are trying to get on non-existent moral high horses.   

Trump came with a lot of baggage that has upset a lot of people in the USA and elsewhere.  Women and minorities, in particular, have reasons to fear a Trump administration given his brash sexism, racism and homophobia.  Trump’s victory has in fact emboldened the worst elements of Intolerant America (of the US) and promised legislation to overturn key progress on resolving grievances of women, minorities and LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Queer) groups could only make things worse.  

His trigger-happy brashness is certainly worrisome given that the Republicans have control of the Senate and Congress and not just for US citizens that have reservation about Washington’s foreign policy prerogatives of late.  On the other hand, there would be those who think that it is best to have the true face of US foreign policy in the top seat because it would all be straight-up without the frills, double-speak and subterfuge.  Others might just shrug shoulders and say ‘same old, same old.’   These fears, more than the issue of a President elect who lost the popular vote, appear to be the fuel for the Dump Trump protests that have mushroomed all over the USA.   We didn’t see the Obama administration being ‘progressive’ about the pipeline crossing sacred burial grounds and the Missouri, the main water source of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.  Would Hillary do better?  Is she ‘more progressive’ than Obama? These are not questions that we hear from the  Dump Trump campaign.

It must be noted, however, that although the anti-Trump protests are putting ‘Arab Spring’ to shame, but the self-righteous Western media are given them the proverbial cold shoulder, just like the human rights squads that were so gung-ho about Middle Eastern dictators not too long ago.  

The truth is that it is meaningless to think of Republicans and Democrats as Right and Left respectively.  They are so in relation to one another, but on the broad political spectrum both parties are far right, if you want to be serious about this.  

Apart from the real felt fears of the aforementioned groups within the USA, the truth is that it is meaningless to think of Republicans and Democrats as Right and Left respectively.  They are so in relation to one another, but on the broad political spectrum both parties are far right, if you want to be serious about this.  Even Bernie is not really ‘left’, but looks so in relation to Hillary and certainly in relation to Trump.   Sure, Obama ‘The Progressive’ didn’t have the cushions in Congress and Senate that Trump has, but he didn’t exactly make the world ‘safer’ did he?  The truth of the matter is whether one is Right or Left (relatively speaking), there are always operational limits imposed by the system, be in domestic or foreign policy, be it climate change or war (declared or undeclared).  In short the interests of the corporate class will be served while the interests of special groups such as the Jews will determine policy in the Middle East.  

US policy is not about resolution, but containment, or ‘management’ which is the more fashionable word.  Even domestic policy will be informed by the larger need to ensure that things do not get out of hand — neither the KKK or the anarchists in the Dump Trump efforts are likely to do as they please, subject of course to the caveat that the KKK types will probably get a pat on the back with the friendly ‘now enough’ while the anarchists, if there are any, will be roughed up.  

One might say that there could be a (dangerous) shift when it comes to environmental issues since Trump has selected a well known climate-change skeptic to head his US EPA transition team, Myron Ebell.  On the other hand, despite Obama’s rhetoric, the US conceded nothing voluntarily by way of multilateral efforts in this sphere.  The track-record, compared to other countries, is embarrassing.  With Trump, the one positive is that there’s less likelihood of spin, foot-dragging and (again) subterfuge — again not something that calls for popping the champagne.  

However, to think that a Trump Presidency would see a policy regime on Sri Lanka that is more informed, more acknowledging of contexts, fair etc., etc., is to be optimistic.  That’s not how Washington has worked. 

From this end, i.e. Sri Lanka, we had M.L. Shivajilingam of the Tamil National Alliance organizing an event to smash coconuts and light candles to bless Clinton ahead of the election.  Everyone knows that Clinton categorically stated that she did not want the LTTE defeated.  It’s hard to put any spin on that.  Why should any Sri Lankan who abhors terrorism be unhappy about a Clinton defeat under these circumstances, one can ask.  Again, it’s about friends and enemies, not in an absolute sense but at least in terms of specific contexts.   However, to think that a Trump Presidency would see a policy regime on Sri Lanka that is more informed, more acknowledging of contexts, fair etc., etc., is to be optimistic.  That’s not how Washington has worked.  To be thrilled about the result on account of justified antipathy to Clinton is certainly uncalled for.  

Kautilya was correct, but only so in a specific context determined by time and space.  Our enemies are not always our enemies and our friends are not our friends forever.  Our current enemies current enemies may in time and in different contexts become their friends.  Where would that leave us?  Ask Clinton if she’s changed her stand on Sri Lanka (vis-a-vis the LTTE) and she will cautiously skip around it but essentially end up standing against Sri Lanka.  Ask Trump and he might not know where Sri Lanka is, but if pushed, he might find himself rubbing shoulders with Hillary.  

So the USA had an election. So Donald Trump was elected or selected if you want to have it that way.  I feel for all those who feel less belonged than ever before in that country.  I am not sad that Clinton lost and I am indeed glad that I didn’t have to hold my nose and vote for either of these two.  I don’t think there’s reason to celebrate Trump’s triumph or Clinton’s defeat.  I could say ‘cheers’ for less spin on US foreign policy, but then again, going by history, I doubt I would be cheering for too long.  The truth is that the US still holds the trumps in certain global card games.  They’ve got one with a name in the White House.  Doesn’t make too much of a difference.   

See also the following reflections in a series titled 'Love Notes to Democracy' following the US Presidential Election 2004:

Let's go to another country

The Church is the State

The USA elects a Pontiff

Wither democracy now?

"Chortle Now": The hidden transcripts of democracy

"Nothing" really matters

Territories of the displaced political

Good luck USA and remember I love you

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer.  Email: malindasenevi@gmail.com.  Twitter: malindasene.

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Suffering doesn’t disappear once the camera moves away

Years ago, someone wrote, ‘One day, like in Afghanistan, those journalists will get bored and go write about Syria or Iran; Iraq will be off your media radar. Out of sight, out of mind. Lucky you, you have that option. I have to live it.’

That someone was a blogger by the name of ‘Salam Pax’ (that’s ‘peace’ in Arabic and Latin) who was voraciously read during the first days of the US-UK led invasion of Iraq.  In October 2002, 5 months before the invasion, Salam Pax posted the following comment: ‘Excuse me. But don't expect me to buy little American flags to welcome the new Colonists. This is really just a bad remake of an even worse movie. And how does it differ from Iraq and Britain circa 1920. The civilized world comes to give us, the barbaric nomadic arabs, a lesson in better living and rid us of all evil (better still get rid of us arabs since we are evil).’

Prophetic.  David Swanson in an article titled ‘Sociocide: Iraq is no more,’ written a few days ago, tells us what happened. 

‘In Iraq, the United States has spent or wasted trillions of dollars over two decades, destroyed trillions of dollars worth of infrastructure, killed millions of people, injured and traumatized many millions more, driven several million people from their homes creating the greatest refugee crisis in the Middle East since the Nakba, encouraged ethnic and religious strife, segregated towns and neighborhoods, empowered religious fanatics, set back women's rights horribly, effectively eliminated gay and lesbian rights, nearly killed off some minority groups, decimated the nation's cultural heritage, and created a generation of people without the experience of peace, without education, without proper nutrition, without tolerance, without proper healthcare, without a functioning government, and without affection for or even indifference to the United States.’

The other day I wrote about a man called Raymond Allen Davis, a US citizen who was arrested in Pakistan following a shooting.  The US Government spared no pains to get his out.  Barack Obama himself intervened.  US lawmakers threatened Pakistan with aid-withdrawal unless Davis was released.  The judicial system stood tall.  And the US finally admitted that Davis was a CIA agent and part of a well-oiled US operation run without the knowledge of Pakistani authorities.  The Davis story was off-radar or at least gave only faint media signals courtesy the recent eruptions in the Middle East.  His victims, unlike Salam Pax, have no reality to live. They are dead, as are thousands and thousands who were deemed exterminable collateral in the so-called war against terror. 

It’s the Washington Style, one might say.  Or, as Salam Pax puts it, ‘a bad re-make of an even worse movie’.  There’s less noise about Egypt now, did anyone notice?  Did anyone notice that Hillary was almost cheering the Egyptians (who have got a lot of promises but not much to show for their efforts) but was less enthusiastic about the people of Bahrain?  Isn’t it strange that the only visible impact of the Wikileaks exposures is a buttressing of the argument for invading Iran? 

David Swanson recommends a book: ‘Erasing Iraq: The Human Costs of Carnage,’ by Michael Otterman and Richard Hill with Paul Wilson, with a foreword by Dahr Jamail. The authors claim that every Iraqi they spoke to reported similar things: houses bombed, dispossession, kidnapping and lives destroyed.  One person observed, ‘Americans -- when they hear one shot -- even if it's like 10 kilometers away -- they'll just open fire on everything.'  The corroboration comes from American soldiers.  One of them reported, ‘We had a pretty gung-ho commander, who decided that because we were getting hit by IEDs a lot, there would be a new battalion SOP [standard operating procedure]. He goes, 'If someone in your line gets hit with an IED, 360 rotational fire. You kill every motherf***** on the street.’  Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi ‘mother-whatevers’ were also killed by destroying water supplies, sewage plants, hospitals and bridges, especially in 1991 and 2003 but also through sanctions. 

Iraq’s now ‘done’ or almost, some might say. I like to think that a people who are heir to a civilization such as the one whose present-day manifestations the US have more or less reduced to rubble are more resilient than Madeline Albright or Hillary Clinton might believe.  Still, Salam Pax wasn’t off the mark with respect to ‘going off media radar’. 

The cameras move from place to place.  They know how to pick up this and throw away that. That’s machination.  To be expected.  People and countries go off the media radar.  Suffering, though, is not a photo-op matter.  Cameras may move but as long as we have eyes, there’s nothing to stop us from looking. 

I am pretty sure that Obama, for all his glib talk about people-power and democracy, freedom of expression and the sanctity of human life, is in the end not very different from the ‘gung-ho commander’ quoted by Ethan McCord.  We are all   mother-whatnots.  This is why I keep my eyes open. Focused.  Ears too.  There’s one place I am not taking off my radar: Washington DC (and of course all that is entailed in that name, from Obama to Butenis and everything in between). 

This article was first published in the Daily News on February 23, 2011.  Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer who can be reached at malindasenevi@gmail.com

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Did Hillary talk ‘democracy’ to Ray McGovern or did she not?

February 20, 2011.  Exactly five years ago.  That's when I wrote about Hillary Clinton's democratic credentials.  Today, Hillary is once again trying to get the Democratic Party's nomination for the US Presidential Election.  Once again, she is 'front-runner'.  Once again she's tripping.  Why this happens to her can perhaps be found in the incurable deceit that plagues her.   This article refers to some of the issues.  Read on. 

A few weeks ago an organization with a dubious track record, especially with respect to Sri Lanka, Reporters Sans Frontiers (RSF) along with an equally shady outfit called Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDF, made up of LTTE-backers, money-launderers and petty thieves) called for a boycott of the Galle Literary Festival, citing issues pertaining to freedom of expression.  Well known personalities like Noam Chomsky and Arundathi Roy signed the relevant petition. Of all the authors appealed to, just one heeded the call, discovered something called a conscience while partying in Sri Lanka, and left. We are yet to hear if this man has reimbursed costs incurred by the organizers. 

That little ‘nothing’ was duly overshadowed by events in Tunisia and Egypt.  When Egyptians took to the streets and the end of 30 years of tyrannical rule by Hosni Bubarak seemed imminent, the United States of America, realizing that their darling dictator’s use-by date was approaching expiry, adopted the language of democracy, transition, freedoms etc.  Washington called for similar demonstrations in other Middle Eastern countries, being careful to exclude tyrannies friendly to US interests in the region.  Just as things being settling down in Egypt with no outward sign of US interests suffering any damage, protests erupted in Libya and Bahrain. We are yet to hear wild applause from Washington regarding Bahrain; the tone is still cautionary.  The Washington-friendly media is however all over Muammar al-Gaddafi.  

Mark LeVine in a piece titled ‘Here we go again: from Egypt to Bahrain,’ points out that ‘if the US is Egypt's primary patron, in Bahrain it is among the ruling family's biggest tenants, as the country is home to the Fifth Fleet, one of the US military's most important naval armadas, crucial to protecting Persian Gulf shipping and projecting US power against Iran’.  Bahrain is considered, LeVine argues, relatively moderate compared with Saudi Arabia, the ouster of whose ruler by a popular uprising Washington will not hear of.  To put things in context, Bahrain is repressive and far from free and even the State Department acknowledges that civil liberties, press freedom, speech, assembly, association and some religious practices are restricted.  What Washington’s Plan B for Bahrain is we do not know yet; these are after all and it is left to be seen whether things will be played according to the Washington Script for the Region. 

What is pertinent, however, is the consistency shown by Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, with respect to democracy-speak.  Freedoms are spoken of.  The sanctity of life is stressed.  The right to protest is championed.  When things seem slanted towards script-flip, there is appeal for calm, reason and better judgment.  The importance of freedom of expression is mentioned.  And there’s the quiet, behind-the-scenes grooming of successor or blueprinting of succession-roadmap.  

The sanctimony of it all is galling and this is not on account of the Wikileaks regurgitation of what most people who peruse media sources different from the Washington-guided already knew.  If anyone has any doubts about how two-tongued the United States is about democracy, justice, freedom, humanitarian concern and so on, the US vetoing a UN resolution on February 18, 2011 that would have condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank as ‘illegal’ and called for an immediate halt to all settlement building, these can low be laid to rest. 

All 14 other Security Council members voted in favour of the resolution. The US position was that while opposing settlement in principle, the Security Council was not the appropriate venue to resolve the Israel-Palestinian ‘Conflict’ (they don’t call it the occupation of Palestine).  So it’s ‘yes-on-principle’ but ‘no-in-practice’.  Susan Rice, busybody personified, says the Council should not attempt to resolve the core issues.  It was not about resolving core-issues Susan knows very well; it was statement of position, nothing more and nothing less.  Then again, that’s typical Washington language-skill or lack thereof!

So expect in the coming weeks and months a lot more of ‘more of the same’.  In other words, hypocrisy, feigned language-ignorance, selective umbrage at tyranny, clearing dictator shelves and replacing expired items with fresh ones, the celebration of some protests and cautioning of others, the switch from Plan A to Plan B or Plan C or D if necessary and so on. 

The world will hear countless lectures on freedom and democracy, decency and justice, civilization and humanity.  Some will listen, some will not. Some may applaud and others will smirk.  They’ll all be lectured to, nevertheless.  But there is one person that Hillary Clinton will not dare to lecture to.  His name is Ray McGovern.

On February 15, 2011, even as this lady was acting as though she was some Special Rapporteur on Goodness, she saw an infringement of all things she claims to hold sacred. Right before her eyes.  She was speaking at George Washington University condemning governments that arrest protestors and do not allow free expression. A 71-year-old man, Ray McGovern was grabbed from the audience in plain view of her by police and an unidentified official in plain clothes, brutalized and left bleeding in jail. She never paused speaking. When Clinton began her speech, McGovern remained standing silently in the audience and turned his back. Mr. McGovern, a veteran Army officer who also worked as a C.I.A. analyst for 27 years, was wearing a ‘Veterans for Peace’ t-shirt.

Blind-sided by security officers who pounced upon him, Mr. McGovern remarked, as he was hauled out the door, "So this is America?" Mr. McGovern is covered with bruises, lacerations and contusions inflicted in the assault.

Listen to the lady folks.  She’s entertaining. As is her boss, Barack Obama. 

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer who can be reached at malindasenevi@gmail.co

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The wages of believing one’s own lies

Eleven years ago, when the World Trade Centre, NY, the White House and the Pentagon were subjected to multiple attacks, the world was shocked.  Americans of the United States were shocked beyond belief.  World-shock was probably prompted by two things.  First, the audacity of the attack and the tragedy it produced, and secondly on account of the unthinkable having happened; the US was supposed to be invincible or that is the impression that Washington-based media-spin industry had created. 

When the shock abated, as often happens, sympathy for victim was laced with the whispered expression, ‘just deserts’.  People talked of cocks coming home to roost, of what went around coming around.  The ‘shock’ felt by the USA was quickly replaced by belligerence, revenge-intent and unbridled racism.  Nothing went from the people of Iraq or those of Afghanistan, but they were bombed into the Middle Ages. In the name of justice and democracy. 

Then came the turn of the Middle East and the now infamous ‘Arab Spring’ which, after a few hopeful months, settled into an unending winter of discontent.  The USA instigated rebellion.  Rebels were armed.  Al Qaeda operatives in these countries suddenly became bosom buddies.  The USA, as a nation, cheered when the Libyan leader was murdered in cold blood. 

And two days ago, the US Ambassador to Libya, J Christopher Stevens, was killed in an attack on the US consulate in Benghazi.  It is reported that unidentified armed men had stormed the grounds overnight amid uproar among Muslims over a US-produced film said to insult Prophet Muhammed. 

Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State is upset, naturally.  She says ‘many Americans (sic) are asking how such an attack could have happened in a country America (sic) had helped to liberate’.  The answer lies perhaps in a shocking inability to extricate oneself from the lies one propagates.  Propaganda is an inevitable part of politics, but it remains something that comes in the ‘overstatement’ column.  It is about inflation.  It tweaks or (in most cases) exaggerates the dimensions of truth.  The astute politician will see it as tool but will not believe his/her own lie.

There is a reason why the world understood 9/11 and understood it differently from the way the US chose to read it.  There is a reason why the world understands this horrific act that took the life of Stevens, even though the world will not approve. 

The USA must wake up from its drunken imperialist stupor.  Clinton and Obama and any others who may want to be President and/or Secretary of State in that country must understand that the world is not fooled by media spin.  They must understand that if they continue to operate in the manner they have, where queries about crimes against humanity are brushed aside with ‘don’t ask me that question’ or ‘we are executing a plan’ or some such nonsense, no Ambassador or US representative anywhere in the world is safe.  Steven is a victim of US foreign policy in the first instance and secondly that of a mob attack.  Mobs, Clinton should also understand, are made not just by fanatics but by those who stoke the fires of fanaticism by their own brand of religious intolerance. 

The USA is not a tolerant nation.  In the mad rush to ‘Save the USA from terrorism’, her leaders have forgotten that fostering terrorism has been a longtime strategy of containment and that terrorism is a preferred and frequently used fighting option (from Hiroshima/Nagasaki through CIA-led assassination to the drone attacks in Afghanistan).  The world is no less safe.  And no one is less safe than Americans (of the US) abroad.  J Christopher Stevens’ death testifies to this.  Clinton must understand. 

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Hillary Clinton and tomato-inspired drivel

Maybe all it takes is a few tomatoes, rotten or otherwise, to get Hillary Clinton rattled out of her mind.  She was rattled enough to come out with some prize gaffes about democracy, desire, will, and about US foreign policy.

It was Clinton’s first visit to Egypt since the election of President Mohamed Mursi (reported as ‘Islamist President’, note, and we never hear any European leader getting a tag ‘Christianist’).  Protestors threw tomatoes and shoes at her motorcade.  No one was injured and that’s a good thing, especially since the stuff that the USA has been tossing around the world were far more potent that tomatoes.   

No one knows who the protestors were. What is known is that people outsider Clinton’s hotel had been chanting anti-Islamist slogans and accusing the USA of ‘backing the Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power’.


Clinton has to say something: ‘I want to be clear that the United States is not in the business, in Egypt, of choosing winners and losers, even if we could, which of course we cannot’.  What rubbish!  The history of the United States of America is nothing if not the BUSINESS OF CHOOSING WINNERS AND LOSERS BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY! 


Here are some key phrases which, if tagged with ‘USA’, would yield enough material to keep you tickled for years: Assassinations and attempted assassinations of heads of states, military coups, overthrow of democratically elected governments, support of terrorists, support of armed groups, training of armed combatants.  Or, simply, you could look for ‘USA and Regime Change’, USA and Cuba (Grenada, Panama, Guatemala, El Salvador, Chile, Argentina, Congo, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Arab Spring…the list goes on).


I’m still grinning at that.  But there’s more to come. 


Clinton has to do a little Democracy Dance with a Secular Twist to keep the aggrieved and apprehensive Christians in Egypt at bay. This is what she tapped out:


"When we talk about supporting democracy, we mean real democracy.  To us real democracy means that every citizen has the right to live, work and worship as they choose, whether they are man or woman, Christian or Muslim. Real democracy means that no group or faction or leader can impose their will, their ideology, their religion (and) their desires on anyone else."

Wow!  I should say ‘WOW’, bold and in the 72-pt font equivalent to capture the utter bewilderment that reading this provoked in me.  It reminded me of an Amarasiri Peiris song ‘Snehaye Nagarayai’ (The City of Love’).  Well, ‘snehaya’ is somewhere between affection and love, and I can’t find the English equivalent.  The song goes like this: ‘Snehaye nagarayai sitha mage, maavathak ho novo raagaye’ (My mind is the Sneha City and in it there is not one single avenue of lust).  The female singer responds, ‘Vandanaave gihin enna aasai matath koi dese ethda me mok pure?’ (I would like to make a pilgrimage to this wonderful place but pray, tell me, where on earth is this city of bliss?).

An ideal type, folks, is a great platform from which you can preach (even if you don’t practice it). We’ve heard that word ‘democracy’ roll out of lying tongues so many times that the word sounds hollow and vulgar. 


Clinton is making an impassioned or tomato-inspired plea for secularism.  Will cannot be imposed. Ideology cannot be imposed. Religion cannot be imposed.  Desires cannot be imposed.  According to Hillary.  Here are some snippets, tidbits to munch on until the next tomato strike, perhaps.

WILL

When last did the USA NOT impose or tried to impose its will? The expansion of the United States was about imposition of will, with guns mind you.  In fact, the establishment of that country was about imposing will, i.e. the will to steal land and other resources, the will to subjugate native populations, the will to kill and the will to destroy traditions and coerce people to convert to ‘Christianity’.  If that’s too far back, take the Patriotic Act.  Take the protection of those responsible for the financial meltdown and the violence against protesting victims.  Take the treatment of African Americans and Hispanics.  That’s ‘will’, and let’s not even get to the whole business of helping tyrants into power, removing them when they refused to play ball and replacing them with more pliant tyrants.  That’s also ‘will’.

IDEOLOGY

What Hillary’s ideology?  Well, it has many strands obviously, but principally it is constitutionally sanctioned theft, aka capitalism.  Have the goon class that has been running the USA from Year Dot done anything apart from thrusting this ideology down the throats of others, citizens as well as those living in other countries?  Hillary is old enough to know what her ideological fellow-travelers did to Communists and those suspecting of being Communists.  She would have heard of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. 

RELIGION

‘Religion’, the biggest, mother-of-all bullshit story ever, according to George Carlin, is not to be ‘imposed’, Hillary insists.  Then why on earth is there a line saying ‘In God We Trust’ on each ill-earned dollar bill put out by the US Treasury?  Why celebrate Christmas?  When is Hillary going to give the Queen of England a piece of her mind for doing absolutely eff-all with regard to priests from the Church of England reserved seats in the House of Lords?  When is she going to tell France to revise its holidays so that Christians and their preferred holy days are not stuffed down the throats of non-Christians?  When is she going to Switzerland and give them hell for the fundamentalist anti-minaret referendum?  And how about dress codes, especially for Muslims in Europe? 

DESIRE

The less said about ‘stuffing desire down the throat’ the better.

Forget all this.  What on earth is Hillary doing in Egypt if not lecturing people about what’s right and wrong, and in the process, putting her contradiction-foot in her contradicting-mouth?  Even advocating ‘democracy’ and Hillary-Democracy is itself a matter of ‘imposing will’.  The USA is not a democracy, doesn’t Hillary not know? 

The lady says the USA is not interested in winners and losers.  Great.  Now can you get the whatever out of the Middle East, Ma’am?  If you are not interested in winners and losers in Syria, say, why in god’s name are you telling Russia and China to agree with you on who should lose?  Why did you back a certain horse in Afghanistan? 

Come on Hillary, something is stinking and it is making the smell of rotten tomatoes seem like something that came out of a top class perfumery. 

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Peace: whose business is it anyway?

It has been reported that US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton and Indian Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh have ‘agreed to work closely in expediting the Sri Lankan peace process (sic)’.  That ‘decision’ had been taken when the former visited the latter in New Delhi on Tuesday.

Interesting.

First of all, neither Clinton nor Singh are representatives elected by the people of Sri Lanka.  Nor were these individuals mandated to ‘expedite’ any process that concerns Sri Lanka.  Neither of them have bothered to explain what ‘peace process’ means.  Most importantly, neither of them has the moral authority to pass judgment, forward proposal or even comment on things Sri Lankan.  Let us explain.

In March this year, the USA sponsored a resolution on Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council.  It was a resolution that Sri Lanka objected to, vehemently, and perforce was one roundly seen as an unfriendly move on the part of the USA.  It was a resolution that India supported, thereby dispelling all illusions about that country’s friendship claims. 

If one were to go back further in history, then we can talk of how India ‘expedited’ the ‘peace process’ in Sri Lanka by funding, arming, training and giving refuge to terrorists.  We can talk of how India PREVENTED the vanquishing of the fascist LTTE organization in 1987, postponing that eventuality by 22 years and thereby facilitating that many years worth of carnage. That act of thuggery also helped unleash an insurrection that left 60,000 dead in less than 2 years. 

The USA, for all its anti-terrorist rhetoric, actively sought (through its local representative, Robert O Blake) to throw a lifeline to the fascists in the last days of the conflict, showing generosity of a kind that was and is patently absent in how that country dealt with its armed detractors in Afghanistan, most notably al Qaeda and Taliban operatives including Osama bin Laden.    

Both countries were very active in supporting a largely pro-terrorist Ceasefire Agreement signed in 2002.  There was no ‘expediting’ of anything other than destabilization, chaos, anarchy and separatist drives. 

Despite all these spokes in the wheels, Sri Lanka did defeat fascism.  Sri Lanka opened the doors that the LTTE had closed to peace, normalcy and reconciliation.  Singh and Clinton may have their own definitions of ‘peace’, and they are more than welcome to apply them to themselves, Singh in Kashmir and Clinton in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and other places where massive crimes against humanity are perpetrated in the name of democracy. 

Sri Lanka, however, is not another state of either India or the USA. Guns, bucks and inflated egos do prompt people to be presumptuous, that’s human of course.  But this without-any-by-your-leave attitude will not help heal strained relations between these countries and Sri Lanka.        

There is reference to a ‘stalled peace process’.  The wording is telling.  There was a stumbling block to peace in Sri Lanka: the LTTE fascists.  That obstacle was removed.  There are unresolved grievances, yes.  Not all of them are Tamil-specific.  Not all of the articulated ‘grievances’ are myth-free.  Neither are they un-tainted by ‘aspiration’.  There’s nothing among these ‘grievances’ that come even close to the suffering of certain communities in India and the USA.  Indeed if there has been ‘stalling’ it is because of the TNA’s intransigence, its long history of supporting LTTE fascism and its absolute reluctance to come to terms with political realities and historical facts.   

In May 2009, Sri Lanka closed a chapter, the long and bloody story of fascism, spawned by chauvinism of all kinds but especially that of the likes of Ponnambalam Ramanathan, S.J.V. Chelvanayakam and G.G. Ponnambalam, and nurtured by the evil designs of Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv.  The meddling of the likes of Blake didn’t help at all.  Singh and Clinton can walk that path.  They have the power to push Sri Lanka back into those terrible times.  That’s not helping ‘peace’. 

Given their histories and their abilities to rupture old wounds, if they really want to help, it’s best they keep their distance.  Rebuilding is easy and is happening. Curing a nation of old suspicions and animosities that are naturally birthed by conflict takes longer.  If Singh and Clinton are impatient, hard luck! They can look at their own examples if they really want to know about ‘inability to resolve’ and ‘insufferable delays’.  This is Sri Lanka.  It is a country that has its own pace.  Own way.  Those who prescribed, dished out bad medicine.  When that happens, such physicians are not re-visited.    

Dr. Singh and Ms. Clinton are not citizens of ‘peaceful’ countries.  They are both leaders of countries at war; at war with other countries and peoples and at war with their own people.  They are hardly in a position to prescribe solutions to others. 

Peace in Sri Lanka is the business of people who live in Sri Lanka.  They can’t find fault with anyone who says ‘Thank you, but no!’  

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