Category: Brian Browne

A foolish man prefers licking the crumbs from the table of the rich more than breaking bread in the house of his brother…

 

We ended the first segment on this topic asserting the ADOS (American Descendants of Slavery) reparations movement in the United States is guided by advocates sincere in their concern for African Americas in the United States. They are not false agents deliberately trying to lead people astray. However, their sincerity might be the greatest danger. They seem to be blind to the deeper implications of the narrow course they chosen.

The architects of this movement underestimate the extent that hand of the American government, from the period of slavery to the present, has stricken much of the world. They seem woefully uninformed even nonchalant about the deprivations slavery and colonialism visited on the African continent.  Such ignorance is strange indeed for people professing to advance the cause of blacks in America. Because of their closed-minded, ahistorical perspective they endanger wider black unity in a manner that undermines the moral basis and the political force of the reparation claims they set forth.

In a way, ADOS leaders are more traditionally American in their mindset than they would care to admit. Much like their white counterparts, they see the world as stage on which America does as it pleases. Other countries and peoples can be tossed and battered; their resources and money confiscated; their societies gutted. No real harm done because anything that profits powerful elements in America is for the greater good. All wrongs committed the name of America become right because the nation’s political, military and economic power justifies all.  To stand in the way of the American government is to be chastised by Fate itself.

It is unfortunate that ADOS leaders should assent to such unfeeling hubris.  They should know better. For it was precisely this viewpoint that led to the enslavement of their ancestors. Progressive black Americans of the 1960s would have called such a viewpoint misguided, even reactionary. Dr. King would not have understood it. Malcolm X would have turned his back to it. Fifty years later, these ADOS leaders claim to be of the lineage of Malcolm and King. They are mistaken.

They seek to take the lead of a movement without the requisite comprehensive understanding of the economic history of slavery and of the rapacity of the American empire.

Perhaps the passage of the last half century and the demographic changes that accompanied this passage of time has removed the fear that America might return to the old days of stark racial segregation. Shorn of such mortal fears, ADOS leaders see no compelling reason to ally with black Africa or the black diaspora. Sensing the worst of American racism now lies in the past, their desire to reform the unequal and unjust way America operates internally or toward the outside world has been blunted. They basically are fine with how America conducts its business, with how it does what it does to other nations and peoples.  Their gripe can be distilled to one jolting thought. And that thought is not justice or even its proximate neighbor. They simply want their cut of the take; they desire what they see as their overdue share of the booty no matter how ill-gotten it may be.

The American people are basically decent and good. However, the American government has for decades been run by the corps of the merciless in league with the concert of sociopaths. If you are a black leader who speaks too loudly about freedom and sovereignty over their land and their own minds, you destined for grisly, incarnadine end. The authorities never searched for those who killed Malcolm x. They did not search because they knew the assassins; they likely armed and gave the killers a little stipend from the security state to carry out the sordid deed. We still can’t place a fitting stone over Patrice Lumumba’s grave because his murderers never told us where his mutilated body was discarded.

Iraq and Libya told the world they would not use the dollar. Their economies were torched; for such heresy, their leaders were executed in ways befitting a medieval inquisition. The bombs America dropped in Libya levelled the ground so that nation’s capital could operate as an open air slave markets where the children of black Africa could be sold to people and parts unknown. America did this to fellow black people yet ADOS leaders clamor not to such evils.  Instead, they position themselves to ensure they partake of the illicit profits made possible by America’s carnassial foreign policy.

The American government has stolen billions of dollars in resources and money from nations for no other reason than Washington disapproving the independent cut of the nations’ leaders. From Venezuela, America has taken oil and dollars to bring that nation to its knees. Forget the images seen on television of mainly of white anti-government protestors along he boulevards of Caracas, most Venezuelans are back and brown people.  Most would rather have the current government than languish under the one American seeks to impose.

ADOS leaders would seemingly share in the illegal spoils taken from Venezuela (if such was used to pay reparations) without flinching or caring that they were abetting the destruction of black lives in the sanctioned nation.

Last week I spoke of Haiti and will do so again for it is a most egregious case of injustice. America has basically selected the past three Haitian presidents. These agents have not placed a foot on the path of progress because they were too busy digging their heels into the neck of their people. America’s long standing policy has been to keep Haiti reduced, to prevent it from realizing its better self. 10 billion dollars was                    placed under the custody of former president Clinton to lead relief efforts after the                         ruinous earthquake in Haiti. People are still squatting in the makeshift shelters erected in the first weeks after the quake. The money is missing. Clinton has walked away from Haiti. The people cry and die. No one cares. It is as if they are non-people.

Haiti could do better but America prohibits that nation from developing its oil reserves.  America also has blocked the vital fuel aid Venezuela was giving Haiti. ADOS members want to extract reparations from the same government that chokes Haiti without mercy. However, ADOS sees no moral or brotherly ties to Haitians; nor does it feel an obligation to fight its potential paymaster in Washington to repair the damage wrought against the once heroic, now destitute black republic. The harm America has inflicted on Haiti is mirrored by the evil America has visited against black populations in Cuba and throughout the Americas.

Yet, in the eyes of ADOS, America’s racial unfairness ends at the American border.  What it does to blacks elsewhere is inconsequential. Their very self-identification is a paradox. In effect their position is that they are black within the context of the United States. But in the international context, their prime identity is American.  Seeking to be treated as a separate and unique nationality, they are out of Africa but in no way of or for Africa. Any connection to Africa is historical. In the realm of politics and economics, they see other blacks as just another ethnic group. As such, ADOS members remain galley workers and deck hands on the American ship of state.

During the 1960s, black American leaders championed African liberation. They hated colonialism, seeing it as the sibling of American slavery and its subsequent system of legalized racial discrimination. They lobbied and protested for America to remove its mean hand from Africa’s throat. These people perfectly understood that black America’s troubles and black Africa’s were spun on the same weave and consisted of much the same thread. To correctly fight one meant that you must simultaneously fight both.

The passage of time has fogged the black American and African minds. Few black Americans reach out to Africa. Few Africans reach out to black America. Both sides are wrong in this omission. Both are and will continue to pay a heavy price for their lack of racial foresight and vigilance.

This is the most glaring lapse in the ADOS movement. ADOS adherents are willing to accept America as an international leviathan committing all manner of transgressions against weaker nations. Yet they expect the same government to treat them justly at home. They seem not to comprehend that domestic injustice is born of the same stuff as imperialism abroad. No man is a swindler on the streets and an honest man at home. The two cannot magically delink. A nation that straitjackets weaker nations must also inhibit domestic minorities. This is the inevitable, relentless dynamic of racial prejudice. If blackness in Africa will be pinioned to the floor, blackness in America also must be stunted. National borders can no more lactify blackness than can the clouds above turn into the colors on a nation’s flag when the clouds pass from over one nation to the next.

Visit the ADOS website you will encounter a section on how to pay for reparations. Let’s assume for the moment America becomes willing to pay reparations. The claims approximate 10 trillion dollars or more. I have little qualm with that except to say that it is too low. However, this amount represents “back pay” covering a span of many decades. To obtain a lump sum payment or payment over even a five year period, the aggregate sum will have to be largely discounted to roughly 20-30 percent, i.e. 2-3 trillion dollars

There are roughly 30 million black Americans. This is roughly 70,000-100,000 dollars per each. This will help but not for as long or as much as it might seem at first face. For example, a family of four would obtain 400,000 dollars. Suppose the family was a working class one with a very modest income. Chances are the family currently lives in rented space. The family has little savings and few assets. If they live in or near a large city, their reparations amount barely pays the cost of an average home. They also may need a car, home appliances, and furniture not to speak of medical insurance or tertiary education for the children.

People will soon discover there are two aspects to prosperity. We all know the one about the present possession of money. Equally important but less apparent is the ability to continue to achieve a certain level of income. In this regard, a lump sum payment is akin to winning a small lottery.  The award is beneficial but also easily expended in relatively short order. Now the family has the desired home. All seems well. However, if the family does not earn sufficient income subsequent to the reparations award, they may be unable to pay real estate taxes or otherwise maintain home ownership.

Without attempting to fix the inequities in black employment and income, the lump sum reparations payment will be a burden in disguise for many blacks. They will venture into an inflated housing market by spending all or the majority of their award. However, their meager incomes may not be sufficient to sustain their enhanced lifestyle over time. An economic down turn may wipe away many of them, repeating what the 2009 financial crisis did to black homeownership.

Unless the nation tackles the problem of black income and employment, the lump sum payments will bring historic booms to the housing and perhaps auto industries. The economic improvements of many blacks will prove transitory. Much more needs to be done to reform the highly financialized, acutely unequal economy in order to protect and optimize the sustainability of any reparations award.  If this not done, the material evidence of the awards will disappear for half the recipients within a generation.

Ask ADOS why not limit liability for reparations to the descendants of those who owned slaves. After all, most whites did not own slaves. Those whites will say they should not have to pay for the wrongs of others. ADOS will cry against that. ADOS will assert that slavery was a national phenomenon in need of a bespoken national remedy. Thus, the nation must pay. Such a reply is right but woefully incomplete. A more accurate portrait would cast slavery as the initial fulcrum of the era of industrialization and globalization that began in the 18th century. As such, the enslaved blacks who were victimized by America were not solely confined to America’s shores.

Someone who knowingly invests in or purchases the goods of modern-day firm that employs slave labor is not absolved from blame simply because the enslaved labor is put to the task and to the lash in a different nation. Likewise, America’s abuse of Africans has a decidedly international aspect. However, ADOS opposes this wider scope of liability for the American nation.

There is a cynical logic underlying the superficial inconsistency of the ADOS position that reparation liability should not be limited to descendants of slaveholding families yet also should not be expanded to encompass descendants of slaves in other nations. ADOS has conjured its formulation regarding liability for payment and eligibility for award not based on optimal justice or logic. Their crafty formulation is but a means of seeking the highest award for the group of blacks to which they belong. They do this even at the expense of leaving undressed the gross injustice America has done and continues to visit on blacks elsewhere.

 

Reparations: Another schism in the black race (2)

ADOS behaves ignobly in this regard. In effect, they toss in their lot with white power simply because that is where the most money and material benefit seems to lie. For black America geography means a certain inescapable level of attachment to the mainstream political economy. However, ADOS takes this a step too far backward. By pasting themselves to the hip of white America to achieve economic reward while eschewing strong cooperation with blacks elsewhere is not brave nor is it as progressive and as forward leaning as ADOS pretends.  This conduct is the modern-day equivalent of the house slave identifying more with the financial wellbeing and economic fortunes of the master than the plight of those blacks in the distant fields. In this case, the mansion is America. The faraway fields are the nations of Africa and Caribbean.

There is more than a troublesome hint of black self-hatred in all of this. The ADOS website even goes so far as to suggest that upon paying reparations the United States government could seek partial indemnification from African nations that participated in the slave trade! This reveals a stunning lack of knowledge. First, the African nations that now exist did not exist in anything near their current form during the transatlantic slave trade. These nations cannot be held liable for any such thing? Second, black Africans generally fought or fled the white slavers. Kingdoms and peoples were decimated and collapsed due to this invasion.   Most Africans that traded slaves did so under duress – either they gave up others or they would have been forced to give over themselves to the slavers. Those Africans who partook of slaving for the perverse excitement and profit to be made were few indeed. But he cardinal point ADOS misses is that slavery crippled Africa; it did not enrich it.

To even suggest that Africa should pay the American government for a slavery that enriched America but impoverished Africa is an odd proposition. Strangely, ADOS does not suggest America seeking indemnity from the true slave-trading nations of UK, France, Portugal or Spain.  If not for these nations and their vessels, black slaves would not have been trafficked in great numbers to the New World.  If you remove the African slavers from the equation, the Europeans would still have managed to jam-pack the holds of their ships with the shackled bodies of stolen black men, women and children.

I fear ADOS leaders may have had personal encounters with individual Africans that were less than satisfying. If so, they do a disservice to a great cause by elevating their individual pique to the level of policy and intra-racial discord.

Their stance is also bad politics. Most white Americans will never actively support black reparations. They fear it will lessen them. Reparations remains a minority position despite its enhanced visibility. On the domestic political front, black America’s most natural political allies in this are communities of black immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean. However, if ADOS excludes them and even claims some of them are liable, ADOS has turned friend and brother into political foe. ADOS seeks reparations but what it creates are fissures among black people that serve no one save those who would keep blacks low.

Better had ADOS claimed that black Americans are entitled to direct or national reparations while black Africa, for example, is due indirect or international reparations. Under the principle of first do no harm, such indirect reparations could include America forswearing unilateral military intervention on the continent. Also America could establish an infrastructure and industrialization fund that will spend 30 billion dollars in Africa yearly for 25 years. Half of the monies would be earmarked for firms owned by Africans or black Americans. This would help America have a more positive stance in Africa thus counterbalancing China’s role. This would also help Africa by providing more funds while lessening its dependency on China for such funds. It also would spur black business development on two continents.

In the end, reparations are due. But they are due to blacks in the Americas and black Africans alike. ADOS wrongs us by exacerbating intra-racial divisions instead of healing them. Black people should use this moment to redefine themselves by rekindling the spirit of cooperation that described the relationship between black America and Africa during the contemporaneous movements of civil rights in America and independence in Africa.  Otherwise, ADOS will not be a path to reparations in the fullest meaning of the term.  It will degenerate into a vehicle that foments resentment and one that leads all but a few of us toward a more discreet form of servitude.

 

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By Brian Browne

A Wise Man Benefits From His Labor But a Fool’s Exertions Result in His Own Destruction

After months of political trench warfare where the slightest progress came with agonizing difficulty, Parliament finally voted to hold general elections on December 12. This ends month of wrangling that left none of the political parties and their leaders immune to public ridicule.

Since his ascent to the central seat on the front bench, Boris Johnson has diligently pursued either of two alternate goals: Brexit or general election. He strongly preferred a parliamentary vote approving his version of a Brexit plan. If denied a quick Brexit, then he wanted a parliamentary vote endorsing a new general election. The election would in fact affirm Johnson as prime minister or select the leadership of another party to steer the nation. As such, an election would in fact be a quasi-referendum on Brexit because, unlike Johnson, most of the establishment and the leadership of other traditional parties were keen on thwarting Brexit notwithstanding the narrow pro-Brexit referendum already held. Opposing the referendum’s outcome, these people aim to demote what was meant to be the final word on Brexit into provisional guidance.

Every parliamentary move Johnson made to seal an early Brexit was countered by the other parties led by Labor. In many ways, Johnson has been his own worst enemy. His boisterous egoism does not sit well with the more reserved members of the political class who pride themselves on subtle wit married to understatement. To them, Johnson has all the polish of a street corner vendor selling inexpensive kitchen ware. Yet, when Johnson peers in the mirror, he sees an exceptional genius who would be the savior of the UK if not the known civilized world. From his unique pale yellow coiffure to how he handles the duties of the PM’s seat, he sees no need to follow established etiquette. He is grander than the norms.

However, there is little parity between his self-portrait and how others see him. When they cast an eye his way, they see a cunning scoundrel if not a bona fide outlaw who will fleece your pockets should you be caught unawares. Instead of enjoying his tenancy at 10 Downing Street, they believe he should be locked in the Tower of London like the highwaymen of old. If they cannot tower or dungeon him, the least they can do is cut him down to size at every opportunity.

Johnson’s unrealistic timetable for an October 31 Brexit was perfect fodder in this regard.  Through a series of parliamentary votes, he was refused his deadline and made to formally request an extension of time from the EU to complete the Brexit process. He had previously said he would rather die than seek an extension. His opponents thought such a clear defeat would temper his sails and sufficiently embarrass him into contrition through the consumption of a generous portion of humble pie.

A normal person would have gotten wobbly knees from the stinging rebuke. But, Johnson is anything but normal. A normal person would not have made the outlandish, unnecessary boast in the first place. Thus he did not waste time lamenting that his own words had turned to crow which he was forced to eat before the entire world. He merely stepped through the scatterings that had been made of his statement.  He walked past the matter like a disinterested observer and not the chief protagonist of this knotty little subplot.

Deprived of his Brexit deadline, Johnson effortlessly turned his attention to an early election. On this, he stood on much firmer ground. Public opinion favored him. Polls show his party with a decisive advantage over Labor, the main opposition party. In some ways, this gap was a function of how materially different Johnson and his Labor counterpart, Jeremy Corbyn, spoke to the nation regarding Brexit. Despite his narcissism, Johnson can sense the mood of the people. He has an organic connection with them. Buried in the national psyche are images and personality traits that communicate to the collective subconscious with strong emotional force. Johnson fits one of these subliminal characters. He is the irascible pirate who became prime minister.

In a way, the juxtaposition is ill fitting. A buccaneer on the front bench seems a lark gone too far.  However, a large segment of the populace understands and even begrudgingly admires Johnson’s swashbuckling nature. The older generation grew up consuming tales of men who act like Johnson, except these larger-than-life figures road the high seas not the halls of Parliament. These men were daring to the point of recklessness. They were fierce, decisive and strong leaders who cared not about the odds arrayed against them. They would attempt what they sought to attempt, damn the consequences. This is part of the lore of the nation and it is part of the lure of Johnson to much of the older, male population. He hints at the romanticized version of the pirate or highwayman.

Mr. Corbyn seems almost effete by comparison. He cuts the picture of a dithering academician or a professional bird watcher. All he needs to complete the image is a piece of chalk in hand or a pair of large binoculars draped about his neck. Neither image inspires confidence or awe. While all believe Corbyn to be knowledgeable and intelligent, the hint of weakness dogs him like an incessant creditor.

Corbyn’s actions during the Brexit deliberations since Johnson took office have not helped his cause.  He twisted himself into a pretzel regarding Labor’s position on Brexit. His party’s official position was that it could negotiate a better deal than Johnson. However, after achieving this difficult feat, Labor would fight against its own deal by voting against Brexit either in a second referendum, the preferred option, or in Parliament.

This position was an extraordinary affront to common sense. No objective person could believe Corbyn could reach a better Brexit deal than the people sincerely committed to it. Further, it stretched all imagination to believe a party would vote against its own efforts in sculpting a benign resolution to such a complex issue.

Even worse, Corbyn played the chords of rank hypocrisy. He accused Johnson of bad faith in his Brexit maneuvers. However, few things can rival the cynicism and hypocrisy of Corbyn “I will wreck my own car” proposal. That he thought the electorate would buy this machination reveals how detached Corbyn had come from the public mood and how wrongly placed was his belief that the public would necessarily believe in him more so than it believed Johnson.

Perhaps Corbyn reasoned the EU would more freely negotiate a deal with him, knowing Corbyn would later sacrifice his own creation on the altar of Remain. While such machinations may have appealed to EU civil servants in Brussels who stridently oppose Brexit, the average person in    Liverpool and the Midlands were befuddled by this two-faced submission. They was left to ponder if the gentleman had suffered a slip that had caused him to take leave of his senses.

Corbyn should have known better. Corbyn’s numbers were falling in public opinion polls while Johnson had started to consolidate his base after suffering some slippage as well as some small but painful intramural rebellions. With his personal popularity ebbing, Corbyn should never have attempted so obtuse a position.

Corbyn further pinched himself into a sad corner by opposing Johnson’s insistence on a general election. Here, Corbyn recognized the poll numbers were against him. He actually made matters worse in publicly trying to fashion a plan where the opposition parties would cast out Johnson via a no-confidence vote and install Corbyn as the new PM. First, Corbyn was soundly rejected by the other parties. Second, all of this lent him the appearance of an unscrupulous, desperate schemer who wanted the big seat but was afraid to ask the people to give it to him through an election. Instead, he relied on backroom dealings. Again this smacked of hypocrisy.

Compared to Johnson’s relatively straightforward call for elections, Corbyn’s futile deal-making, coupled with his awkward foot-dragging on elections, made him appear to be a wizard of intrigue and a reluctant participant in elections. A politician who opposes elections soon becomes as untrustworthy as a vegan operating a butcher’s shop.

Once the other opposition parties expressed their desire for a general election, Corbyn and his party were politically exposed and isolated. They responded with an abrupt volte face. But it was too late. The public had already concluded that Corbyn had been a brake on elections. Thus, the parliamentary vote to hold elections was viewed as a setback for Corbyn. Unlike Johnson, Corbyn does not wear defeat well. One can see it on his face.

Elections are now less than two months away. These elections will determine if Brexit moves forward, fades away or is subject to a second referendum.  The key parties in the mix are the Tories, Labor, Liberal Democrats (LibDems), Brexit Party (BP), Scottish National Party (SNP)  and the Democratic Union Party (DUP) of Northern Ireland. If the vote came today, Johnson’s Tories would gain a plurality but fall short of a parliamentary majority. A coalition with the BP might get Johnson close to the majority he seeks. Plus, there are more than a handful of Labor Members of Parliament who represent pro-Brexit constituencies. Even with all this, Johnson could ultimately lose the race; but, at the moment, he has a good lead and the inside track.

Public opinion has shifted toward Brexit.   This is due to the conscience of many average citizen who initially opposed Brexit. Unlike their elite counterparts who are accustomed to getting their way, the average person is accustomed to the opposite. They can tolerate losing as long as the game is fairly played. They would rather lose a fair contest than win with a stacked deck. Placing a greater value on fairness than the elite does, they now want Brexit, not because they believe in the concept. They want it because they respect the referendum; they see honoring the referendum as safeguarding the UK’s democratic traditions.

They would rather risk their pocketbooks than their democracy no matter its visible imperfections. Conversely, the elite believes democracy should be subservient to their economic interests.  If their interests are at stake, democracy bend to accommodate them. Thus, they want another referendum. However, another referendum mocks democracy. Should an adverse result come of the second referendum, they might well seek a third or fourth session. If they should win the second, would not fairness dictate that the Brexiteers are entitled to request a best-of-three tie-breaker? This could go on ad nauseam.

As is often the case, the average person behaves with more principle than the haughty, indulgent elite.

To map the political topography will be to position the Tories as the middle-of-the-road Brexit party. A potential coalition partner is the BP itself. Led by Nigel Forage, elements of this party ooze racism and xenophobia. However, the party also represents many communities that feel dispossessed and that have economically suffered from closer integration with Europe. Brexit is the reason for this party’s existence. The BP wants a hard Brexit.

Johnson must walk a tightrope. He does not want the BP to steal Tory votes and seats. Thus he needs to undermine the reason people might vote BP instead of Tory. However, he cannot frontally assault the BP as they are likely coalition partners. He also cannot go too far in their direction with risking the support of those Tories and independents who favor a gentler Brexit. Johnson has threaded this needle as best he could. He will present the deal he has tabled as either a “soft hard” or “hard soft “exit, depending on one’s preference for linguistic nuance.

If the estimated support for both parties is evenly distributed across a large number of parliamentary constituencies, this tandem could approach a majority. However, if their support is concentrated in the same districts then the aggregate seats won by this duo will be much less than opinion polls now suggest. If this latter case proves true, Johnson will be in deep trouble.

Leading the opposition is Corbyn and Labor. Corbyn should have been PM by now, given the Tories’ fumbling of Brexit. However, Corbyn has blown each chance presented him. This election might be his last one. Months ago, he let slip what might have been a historic opportunity to push British politics to the left for several decades. Trying to muster votes and popular opinion, Johnson had actually stated he was prepared to embark on significant fiscal stimulus to counter the negative impact of Brexit. With this, Johnson was basically admitting that austerity economics was wrong. Johnson was sacrificing the central plank of Tory policy without which there really is no need for a Tory party.

Perhaps sensing a trap, Corbyn did not take Johnson up on this. If this was a trap, it was one of those rare ones that should have been entered. Corbyn should have called Johnson’s bluff. He should have offered to agree to Brexit based on an agreement to materially increase social spending for at least ten years. The deal could only be reversed by a 2/3s majority in Parliament. If Johnson did not agree, Corbyn could paint the Tories as mean ogres who knew Brexit would bite but who refused to do anything about the deep wound it would cause. This would place the Tories more on the defensive. If Johnson agreed to the deal, the increased expenditures would have done more for the people than remaining in the EU can ever accomplish.

But blinded by his elitist disdain for Johnson, Corbyn did not see the opening.  Instead, he mistakenly saw remaining in the EU as his prime objective instead of as a mere tactic. The objective should have been the betterment of the people’s economic condition whether that meant staying in or leaving the EU.

Making matters more complicated for Labor, many of their MPs sit in pro-Brexit constituencies. If they are true to the call of their electorate, they should support Brexit, thus undermining Corbyn while strengthening Johnson.

The most interesting party in this is the Lib Dems led by the talented yet perhaps overly ambitious Jo Swinson. This in an unabashedly remain party. There is practically no circumstance imaginable where they would switch to favor Brexit. They are also an upper crust party. It is telling that the LibDems have 20 member in the Commons while over 90 members in the House of Lords. This is the party of the well-off and those on their way to being such. The Lib Dems are almost the perfect counterfoil to the Brexit party.

On most issues, the Lib Dems are Labor lite with a frequent twist of Tory. Their appeal is limited. However, they believe headway can be made in the coming election. They calculate Johnson will not get a majority and may be unable to form a government now that he has alienated the DUP. Lib Dems hope to be the second partner in an anti-Brexit coalition with Labor, SNP and possibly the DUP. Swinson would seek to share leadership with Labor in a center-left combine much like the center-right tandem of Cameron and Clegg. As such, Lib Dems realize they cannot win the election outright. If they play wisely, however, they might determine the balance of power.

The SNP categorically opposes Brexit. Johnson has no chance winning them to his side. The DUP was once with him. It can be again. It is afraid of the current Brexit plan because it permits a divergence in regulations governing Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. DUP fears this initial divergence is the opening round in a process that will eventually leave Northern Ireland as a minority religious enclave on the Emerald Isle. Johnson can win them back perhaps by promising more government sending and projects in Northern Ireland. He will also have to give them firm, formal assurances that Brexit will not lead to further economic and political segregation from the rest of the UK.

There have been shrewd and not-so-shrewd calculations leading to this point. The outcome is shrouded by the unknowns of life. Will scandal involving Johnson again resurface? Will Corbyn continue to play checkers on a chessboard? Will voters come out in numbers? Which parties’ polls are the least inaccurate?

When all is said and done and commentators look back at this moment, they will attribute to the winner the foresight of a grand strategist; they will attribute a clarity of vision that was nonexistent. Reality is grittier. The winner will be the one who fumbled like the rest. But fortune presented a chance; that person was sufficiently opportunistic and intelligent to see the opening for what it was and seizing it, stumbled their way to success. Upon uncertain chance and the varying degrees of political skills of the players, the future of a great nation depends.

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By Brian Browne

Democracy is forever in danger for the popular will Is rarely popular with the rich and powerful.

Finally, we happen upon Brexit, the vexatious decision that has riven the electorate in the United Kingdom so much so that the name of this assembly of island nations now seems to be an ironic misnomer or rather large proportion. There seems to be little union in any of this. The halls of Parliament that once claimed to speak to the world of the greatness of this union and its democratic traditions has been reduced to a chamber of cacklers, bluffers and obstructionists who dare neither move forward nor backward. The only movement they all appear to relish is that of wagging their tongues. Because of the smallness of their lawmakers and the resultant inability to treat this large issue, the union has been crammed into that infinitesimal space which has no name, that space so equidistance between the shadow of night and the light of day that if you peer at it from one side you swear that the space belongs to the other side.

This piece which comes in two parts will look at but not focus on the game of procedural of dash-and- block currently being played in the House of Commons, itself is another misnomer. It has been many years since that house welcomed the commoner as a member or respected his voice as that which should be followed; the house neither cares for his interests as the ones to receive priority attention. It is but a house of natty suits and fancy dresses. This is the Saville Row of politics and opinion; there is little common in any of that.

Commoners must be placed sufficiently in awe of the institution to make them feel so below it that they cannot really believe it should belong to them or respect their wishes.  The common person votes so that a member may represent the rich and powerful of that particular voting constituency. Much like its cousin republic on the western shores of the Atlantic, an average person’s vote in a parliamentary election is nothing but the ravening privilege to select the politician most qualified to betray his interests.

Almost by accident, an occasional statesman or true representative of the people is selected. It is such an oddity this days. One has a better chance finding a pair of whales playing backgammon in the Sahara. Thus, all of maneuvering in the House of Commons often does not reflect the mood of most of the people. The institution is not so much a bellwether of popular opinion as much as it is an elite pool, a cocoon of doubletalk and obfuscation.

While Parliament warrants every bit of derision that can be thrown at it for three years of shoddy handling of the matter, Brexit stands as the most momentous event of the early 21st century for the United Kingdom. Former PM David Cameron likely rues the day he tabled the notion of a referendum on continued membership in the EU. The smug PM believed he knew and understood all things political in nation. His self-appointed and unessential mission was to leverage the referendum to extract minor concessions from the EU while also orchestrating a resounding defeat of critics on his political right. History would prove Cameron sorely wrong in his estimation of his mastery of public opinion and of the currents that deeply influenced the nation’s political economy at that decisive moment.

The referendum unleashed and gave voice to forces the Right Honourable PM did not realize existed with such strength and attachment among the average person. That his honourable personage did not understand the fundamental mood of the nation exposes Cameron as derelict in his knowledge of the nation he led. He was unaware of the widespread angst he unwittingly helped create through the austerity and deregulatory policies heaved on the backs of a tired, dissatisfied electorate. Well cossetted and ensconced in 10 Downing Street, Cameron knew precious little of many of his countrymen and what they thought. His eleventh hour realization of their opinions would be a crash course in humbling defeat.

Additionally, it seemed fate had punished Cameron for the cynical intent behind calling the referendum. Too crafty for his own good, Cameron blinded himself to the inherent mismatch in his gambit. His aims were almost strictly political and tactical. He actually saw EU membership as ineluctable. He simply wanted to dance around the margins with regard to membership requirements while using his high-stepping dance as an opportunity to kick the teeth of critics to his right, thus consolidating the conservative base round him. He never thought EU membership at any genuine risk.

With this idee fixe, he plunged into the chore. Like an overconfident general cocksure of victory, he left his flanks exposed to unexpected fusillade which intensified into broadside cannonade. The common people did not see EU membership as a given. If it was inevitable, then the referendum was superfluous nonsense. They took Cameron at his word. They would vote on EU membership. They would not track their vote to follow Cameron’s limited political interests; they would vote according to their personal assessment of how the EU touched their own economic interests. In the end, the loaf of public opinion would break almost evenly. But in such an exercise, one side was destined to emerge slightly larger. Cameron’s folly was complete. The end result of the referendum was to produce a long, uncertain beginning of how to unwind that which most of the elite did not want unwound.

Joining Cameron, the overwhelming majority of the establishment on both the Labor Left and Tory Right supported remain. They could not fathom that any reasonable person would vote otherwise for they saw themselves as the most reasonable and intelligent of their countrymen. In this process, they found that democracy can be an unruly instrument. Most people are not democrats in the strictest sense. Most accept democracy based on the delusion that their views are the best and most people will see as they do.

However, our position on a critical matter may not win the day. Other people have different experiences, knowledge and opinions. We see ourselves as the center of the universe and the fount of all reason. Others suffer the same egoistic infirmity. Sometimes, they win. If the matter at hand is minor, we do not care that much. We push on with our lives and console ourselves with how gracious we are to accept defeat with such good humor. However, our devotion to democracy will be placed under strain if the matter is important. If truly democrats, we accept the bitter defeat by fully respecting the decision against us.  If not, we plot to undermine or overturn it. If you wear a uniform, you might entertain the idea of a coup. If you wear the clothes of a laborer, you might take to the streets.

If you have a friend adorning a powered wig, you sue in court. If you wear natty suits and fancy dresses while sitting in Parliament, you seek void the vote by depicting your opponents as motivated by the worst of human intentions. To cast your opponents as moral outcast is to de-legitimate the outcome as morally repugnant. If democracy is supposed to approximate what is just, then it cannot be used to abet the morally defective. A softer version of this argument is to say the people were too ignorant to be trusted with such a decision. Such a decision should be left to the knowledgeable elite. The dumb masses should just trust that the elite will protect their dumb interests accordingly. In other words democracy is only for the learned. The people are too shallow to understand which shoe best fits them. Consequently, the vote needs to redone.

This is why establishment press and politicians so energetically caricatured Brexiteers as racist, lower class denizens who cast their votes in fear of losing jobs or neighborhoods to more qualified, more energetic immigrants. Many racists did in fact vote to leave. Among them were the UK’s most vociferous and virulent misanthropes. The awful truth is that for every overt racist that voted to leave, there was at least one or more covert racist who voted to remain. Racism does not generally dictate a person’s economic interests. More often, economic interests shape how racism is manifested. A racist laborer may view Brexit differently than a racist business owner or banker. One will fear losing his job to cheap immigrant labor while the other will fear the loss of cheap labor will dampen profits. There are racists who materially benefitted from remain and those who would benefit from leave. They all voted accordingly. If “leave” was a racist vote, by the same logic, “remain” must carry the same dreadful appellation.

To dismiss Brexit as chiefly a victory for racism or intolerance is inaccurate. At its core, shorn of racist sentiment on both sides, this was an epic standoff between those who lend more value to the long-term benefits of full national sovereignty versus those who trust more in the long-term benefits of closer legal and economic integration with the continental political economy. When seen in this light, one must confess a reasonable person can vote either way without being unjustly accused of a lapse in reason. Much depends on what a person values the most or what concerns him the least.

Many Brexiteers are reasonably concerned that, with the UK as a minority of one in a large group dominated by the Franco-German partnership, the EU could not possibly seek the best interests of the UK better than the UK could do unilaterally. To think otherwise would mean that governance should be relinquished to some form of foreign receivership. These people could point to the Eurozone’s harsh treatment of Greece, Spain and neighboring Ireland as cautionary signals that nation would be remiss to place too much faith in the goodness and sagacity of bureaucrats in Brussels.

Conversely, Remainers can render a persuasive argument that economic integration with the continent spurs grows by lowering trade barriers with the UKs closest partners. Also economies of scale are made more possible through union membership which will bring new jobs and investment to the UK that otherwise would not take place. Membership in such a large economic unit would benefit the UK by affording it privileges via trade deals with non-European nations that the UK lacked the bargaining leverage to achieve standing alone. Last, the UK was already tied to EU. To leave now would result in economic dislocation greater than any potential benefit derived from an exit no matter how well planned. These arguments too are reasonable and not subject to ridicule.

In hindsight, there is little wonder why the vote was close. It revealed the existence of two Englands (more accurately, of two United Kingdoms but that lacks poetic resonance.) London voted primarily to remain as did Scotland and Wales. Students and young adults leaned mostly in this direction.  The industrial heartland and older people voted to leave in general. However, among the most progressive elements of the political left support for Brexit was strong.

The bulwarks of the EU are free movement of goods people and money. In the abstract, none can argue with these concepts. They sound liberating. Who dare argue against freedom? However, they are double-edged swords in actual application.

What seems empowering on the individual level may be a suppressive agent at the macro-level. With regard to freedom of moment, if I want to dine on food the name of which I cannot pronounce and feel like being insulted for not speaking the native tongue, I can visit Paris. If I want to study renaissance art, I can backpack to Italy. If I want to live in a nation of ancient political democracy and modern economic depression, I will meander to Greece. If I have an affinity for stolid, unintelligible philosophy I can seek any university in Germany. It all sounds empowering. However, when you assess the mass movement of labor, a different trend takes hold. The movement of labor depresses wages.

When workers migrate to a place with higher wages, the resultant glut of able hands causes wages to fall. This is why business leaders favor remain for the most part and why a wide segment of British labor wanted Brexit. It is a strange world where the affluent businessman is considered enlightened for wanting to depress the wages and bargaining power of organized labor in his country while struggling workers are considered racists for wanting to protect their dwindling real incomes. That such perceptions abound is testament to the control a certain class has over the media.

Freedom of movement is more lucrative for some classes of people than others. This is because the velocity of movement determines the profitability or utility of movement. Thus, the free movement of capital allows the moneyed elite to send millions of euros, dollars and pounds across the world at a moment’s notice at nearly the speed of light. This freedom allows money to play constant, rapid arbitrage. Money can always seek out its highest return; partially because of this ability to move from a place of low to one of high return, valuations of financial assets remain elevated. This encourages investment to gravitate to the financial sector, thus discouraging investment in the real sector where jobs for the commoner are made or destroyed.

People move faster than goods generally but not nearly as fast as money. Even within a class, the change in velocity of movement is significant. The wealthy move about more quickly in their private planes than anyone else. First and business class passengers are facilitated better than economy ticket holders. Those who cannot afford to fly take the slower train or bus. Those, who cannot afford these conveyances, walk and don’t go very far. Those who cannot afford to walk because they are where they are not supposed to be, subject themselves to be being stuffed into cramped, unventilated vehicles as smuggler’s loot. Instead of moving toward jobs, they often move toward death.

This was the case with 39 Chinese nationals found expired in the back of a refrigerator truck in the UK last week. A truck became a tomb for so many. This is the underbelly of the free movement of people and things. The most vulnerable of people are moved as if they were goods such as tomatoes or cabbage; often they are left to perish like they were surplus produce devoid of human value. We should cry at these instances and ponder the system that allows such tragedies. We don’t a tear. Instead we forget the dead for they were also forgotten in life; we rush to the supermarket to take due advantage of the latest sale.  We have thus sold ourselves to our own demons.

Back to more humane freedom of movement. Once a person gets to his destination, he makes a home. A home is a shelter but also a trap. The practicalities of human existence make it nearly impossible to engage in wage labor arbitrage. One cannot pick up at a moment’s notice to chase a slightly higher paying job 500 miles away. Movement of people suffers a great handicap compared to the movement of money.

Thus, while movement of money results in a higher ceiling for financial assets, the movement of labor has the opposite effect on wages due to the cumbersome nature of human movement. Movement of people tends to lower the wage ceiling in what were relatively high wage places. This increases the profit and political power of the business class due to the loss of bargaining leverage of the wage sector.

All this shows that opposition to or approval of Brexit is a complex matter. The matter cannot be reduced to simple formulas. Those who favor remain are probably more demographically diverse than the Brexiteers. However, those who favored Brexit are a more ideologically diverse crew. They cover the far right and the far left with some degree of support scattered across all points in between. Those who wanted to remain tend to concentrate around the center of the political spectrum.

Because of this, Brexit has made a jumble of extant partisan affiliations. Centrist Tories and Laborites ally to thwart Brexit. The far right and left join to realize it. This results in strange bedfellows and untold drama as actors seek to navigate and understand the new political terrain where party affiliation means less than at any time in living memory.

Next week, we will study some of their gyrations. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

 

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Only a madman delights in seeing himself burn, believing that setting himself alight makes him brighter than everyone else.

Once again, we must place dear Boris Johnson and Brexit on hold at least a week longer. Brexit is a compelling tale of the challenge to modern democracy posed by the conjunction of a complex issue, a divided electorate, and befuddled national leadership. Yet as portentous a matter as it is, Brexit seems prosaic compared to the mayhem in Washington. The sheer volume of the political lunacy will endanger your own capacity for logical thought. It is as if Alice in Wonderland has mingled with the Werewolf to produce such odd offspring who, after evening tea, spend the remainder of the night baying at the moon and its accompaniment of stars.

Fate seem to be paying a working visit to the picturesque American capital. The results of evil past now have come to harvest.

Fate first tempts a vain man with the nectar of victory before levying to his open lips the chalice of acrid defeat. This tale has been told many times; the wise listen, trying to decipher the ways of fate only to learn in part and remain ignorant in part; the vain hear only what they want and thus believe they know all there is to know. Fate sings a song that all people hear but none understand the full meaning of its lyrics.

We know not whether the words lend counsel or give chase, whether they are intended to guide us to safety or lead us to ruin. The wise take pause to ponder the majesty of it all and to choose his steps wisely. The foolish and the vain, believing themselves more majestic than all other things and all other people, rush in headlong pursuit of what they believe will glorify them. The first step is easy; but soon turbulence mounts. Stubbornly they reject the counsel of intervening events; they are deaf to the bells of warning. They pass the point beyond which there is no return. The date is now fixed. The chalice awaits them.

It is easy to predict that fate is preparing a place for President Trump. Perhaps so. But his vainglory is not unique among American statesmen. If a place is being set for him, there will settings for many others as well. When the bitter chalice is passed his way, they will laugh the throaty laugh of revenge. But their humor will be fleet indeed. For they will be quickly overcome by a stark realization. They are not seated beside Trump to snicker in his face. The seating arrangements has a more functional intent. Fate has placed these politicians near the president not to laugh but to join him in taking their fill from the bitter vessel, that cruel cup.

They had falsely measured the difference between themselves and Trump as if it was the difference between propriety and depravity, between day and night. However this was not the case. The difference between them and Trump was merely those between different arrogances. The difference was that not of day versus night. The difference was that between a foggy night with rain and a rainy night with fog.

Nowhere is the similarity in the vanity and arrogance more apparent than in Trump’s action and their reaction to his withdrawal of troops from Syria. This is a case of Satan chastising Lucifer for a breach of etiquette in falling to ask permission before leaving the dinner table to resume spilling the blood of innocents and otherwise stalking the world.

As a matter of political survival, President Trump would do well to reconsider his use of the telephone when communicating with world leaders. In his hand and because of his undisciplined mouth, the phone has become a seismic device, capable of producing large tremors and fissures in the political terrain. His call with the Ukrainian president activated the Democrats in Congress to impeach him. His talk with Turkish leader Erdogan has caused the war hawks in his own party to distance themselves from him. With all Democrats and half of Republicans haranguing him, Trump is a reeling, wounded man.

Politicians and pundits fustigate him for withdrawing American troops from oil-rich northeastern Syria. The American withdrawal opened the door to Erdogan sending troops into the region to bash the Syrian Kurds, his sworn enemy. Trump’s opponents cried that the withdrawal betrayed America’s global leadership and betrayed the Kurds. Trump’s retort was that Syria was of insufficient value to justify the continued deployment of troops.

To place Trump’s decision in proper context is to reveal a more complicated picture where the difference between black and white, villain and hero, turns to shades of gray laid across a gloomy terrain where heroism is absent and only Machiavellian sociopathic behavior flourish. Roughly a year ago, Trump ordered the withdrawal of troops from Syria. However, the intelligence community allied with some elements in the military refused to budge. This unelected element defied the expressed, legal orders of their democratically-elected commander in chief. Their objection was not so much born of principle but of profit.         It is well documented and beyond reasonable dispute that American operatives enlisted Eastern European arms merchants to move vast amounts of arms to Syria. This weapons would mysteriously end up in the hands of al Qaeda and ISIS fighters trying to topple the Assad government.

The number of American contractors in Syria doubled the number of uniformed troops. Tightly interwoven with the intelligence community, many of these contractors trafficked in the contraband of war. They traded arms for oil and gold and whatever valuables were to be had.  They also had little ethical quibble over the identity of their trading partners as the trades were clandestine. In such a situation no American lives were to be lost yet small fortunes were to be made. In this theatre of unnecessary war, they carved for themselves a most profitable enclave.

For economic reasons they did not want their deployment to end. Thus the war also must persist. Trump’s order would have changed that. So they did not abide him, claiming their departure would destabilize a nation they were there to ruin.

For reasons only Trump knows, he did not press the issue at that time. He let the intelligence community have its way. Perhaps he thought his acquiescence would bring them to his side.  It did no such thing. By the time of his call with Erdogan, Trump was incensed that the impeachment saga had been unleashed by the CIA agent who reported his conversation with the Ukrainian president Zelensky.

At that point, with Erdogan pressing to let him seal the Turkish border with Syria, Trump decided to give the intelligence community a bit of its own coin. They had ambushed him right in the White house. So he would slap back by terminating the Syrian operations. In the intervening months since his first aborted withdrawal order, veteran hardliners. Bolton as NSA and Mattis as Defense Secretary, had exited his cabinet. Their replacements were loyalists who would not buck Trump’s directives as did their predecessors. Thus, the faithful execution of the withdrawal order.

While his motives are always suspect, Trump may have done the right thing for the wrong reasons. Without realizing the full consequence of his spiteful act, he just might have initiated a concatenation of events that will bring Syria closer to ending this futile war and bringing stability to the nation.

With the American armed presence removed, the Kurds have been forced out of their idyllic fantasy. They made the strategic mistake of believing a small complement of American soldiers and mercenaries would permanently guaranty their de facto independence in northeastern Syria. This was a terrible bout of wishful thinking. Trump’s exit puts an end to that mistake. Now forced to choose between dying at the end of Erdogan’s sword and establishing a modus vivendi with the Assad government, the Kurds selected to live with Assad.

This was the choice they should have made at the onset. To secure the territorial integrity of Syria, Assad is willing to grant the autonomy the Kurds seek as their minimum. The oil fields of Deir Ezzor and the wheat fields of that region are back in Syrian hands instead of America’s. With the American stranglehold on it resources ended, the nation will be better able to finance itself and feed its people. Damascus and the Kurds will have satisfied their core objectives. Much death, destruction and loss of time could have been averted if the Kurds earlier would have followed the dictates of their long-term interests by allying with Assad instead of being duped by the misrepresentations of their American interlocutors.

The agreement with the Kurds has allowed the Syrian army to enter the northeast. The Syrian army is backed by Russian air and ground power as well as by the Iranians. This will blunt the Turkish advance against the Kurds, saving many lives in the process. Erdogan will not risk confrontation with Russia as long as he is assured that his border is secure. This gives an opening for Syrian and Turkish negotiations to establish a détente ending open hostilities between the two neighbors. These peacemaking efforts now have a chance to occur. As long as American troops stood in the way, peace had no chance at all.

The American establishment’s opposition to Trump show that they are as vain as he is and much more martial. Previous American presidents have lied their nation into war. They were hailed as patriots for spilling the innocent blood of Americans and foreigners alike.  Trump bluffs himself out of war and toward peace. He is decried as a sellout. David Gergen, a CNN commentator who has advised presidents of both parties, went apoplectic. Expressing the sentiment of the foreign policy establishment, he advocated that America go to the UN to get a resolution to stop the Turks from entering Syria. His claim is an example of undiluted hypocrisy.

Gergen and the rest seem to forget American troops were in Syria against the express will of the Syrian government. In ordinary parlance, this means America illegally invaded a nation that posed no imminent threat. America breached this most fundamental tenet of international law and peace. Yet, America wants the UN to condemn Turkey for doing the same thing the US had done. As such,  America is like the thief who steals a television from a house then turns about to raise a hue and cry because a more determined thief has pinch both the refrigerator and stove.

(Also do not be taken by establishment cries that Trump has betrayed the Kurds. This is not the first time. If the Kurds remain gullible, this will not be the last. Daddy Bush sold them out. Clinton used them. Bush the younger exploited them. Obama toyed with them. Abusing the Kurds has become the recreation of American presidents on a bipartisan basis. )

In complaining about Trump’s decision, the establishment implies the prior policy was some masterful achievement. It was not. Their policy was cynical folly. Their policy was to overthrow the legitimate government of a nation simply because they disliked it. They set a house ablaze because they did not like the color it was painted. America engineered a motley alliance featuring itself, other western powers, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Israel and the full menu of Sunni terrorist groups to descend on the Alawite government in Syria. This was an international coalition formed to undo a nation that threatened none of the states aligned against it.

Yet, the invasion failed. Calling in allies Russia and Iran with a small hand from Hezbollah, Syria survived and rebuffed the onslaught. America has tried to depict this as a civil war. However, the majority of fighters against the Syrian government are not Syrian. They are jihadists transported, funded and supplied mostly by Washington and Riyadh. Only a small minority of the fighters are Syrian. The civil war is a fraud, a cover for international intrigue against a sovereign nation.

After 8 years of this violent futility, it should be called the failure that it is. Although for less than pristine reasons, Trump was right in ending this travesty against international law.

If things remained as they were, Syria                            would always be a sick and bleeding nation. No matter how or why it came about, Trump’s action may give Syria a chance to move toward something that resembles peace. The world should be relieved by this.

However, a wild card remains. The American establishment and intelligence community feel hurt and insulted. As such, they can be very dangerous actors. Don’t be surprise if they begin working underground to manufacture violent incidents featuring al Qaeda or ISIS. They will do this to make it look as Trump’s action must be walked back because it has made the West more vulnerable to terrorist attack and infiltration.

Thus be careful how you perceive Trump and his political foes. There is no doubt that he is vainglorious and in this lies great danger. However, his defects do not mean his foes are angels. They may simply be practitioners of a different brand of vanity which, at times, may be more bloodthirsty and incarnadine than his. Thus, if you have good reason to be wary of Trump, you also have ample reason to keep a watchful eye on the others.

 

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