Shut up about the Jews already…

Eric Alterman writes: Self-identifying American Jews constitute just 1.7 percent of the voting population, according to the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. This compares with 51.3 percent Protestant, 23.9 percent Roman Catholic and 16.1 percent “no religion.” Of the tiny percentage of American voters who are Jewish, roughly 7 percent put Israel at the top of their list of political concerns. So, overall, 7 percent of 1.7 percent — or pretty close to 0 percent — say they vote on the basis of policies related to Israel. And of this minuscule percentage, many are hawkish, but many others are dovish, and still others are in between or change their minds depending on the situation. Jews, you may have heard, have been known on occasion to disagree with one another, and even with themselves. But more than 80 percent of Jews polled share the view that the United States should play “an active role in helping the parties to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict” — roughly the same number who agree that a “two-state solution is necessary to strengthen Israeli security.”

And yet it’s nearly impossible to find a story in a mainstream media outlet that reflects this reality. Almost without exception, one reads of the danger to Obama of losing Jewish voters, with the reason being their alleged unhappiness with his (equally alleged) lack of sympathy for Israel. But Obama is not losing Jewish voters to Mitt Romney: they continue to support him, in every significant poll, at the rate of approximately 70 percent. And if they didn’t, it wouldn’t be because of Israel, and it wouldn’t matter anyway. The numbers are just too tiny.

The reason these facts, while available to all, remain so difficult to discern in our political coverage is that while Jews remain liberal and dovish — even on Israel—many Jewish funders and neoconservative pundits do not. Although these people are deeply out of step with the vast majority of Jews, they wish to create a media narrative that suggests the opposite. They are aided in this task by the largely conservative leaders of “major” Jewish organizations, who work with these same funders (most famously right-wing casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, currently under investigation) — funders who also happen to pay their extremely generous salaries. Money, you may also have heard, has a way of talking when it comes to politics. The fact that the policies these organizations push and the politicians they support and nurture represent views antithetical to those of the very same people they profess to speak for might be a problem in, say, an Israeli kibbutz or a Park Slope food co-op. In the world of professional Jewish organizations, however, it barely rises to the level of an inconvenience. [Continue reading…]

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Code Pink, the Taliban and Malala Yousafzai

At Open Democracy, Meredith Tax writes: The US antiwar group Code Pink, which describes itself as “a women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement working to end US funded wars and occupations,” recently sent a delegation to Pakistsan to campaign against drones with Imran Khan. On October 9th, a dozen of them held a symbolic twelve hour fast outside the Islamabad Press Club, holding “pictures of the more than 160 Pakistani children who have been killed by American drones.”

The same day, in nearby Swat, another Pakistani child, 14 year old Malala Yousafzai, was gunned down by the Pakistani Taliban because she was an advocate of education for girls. They stopped her school bus, asked for her by name, and shot her twice in the head, wounding two other students in the process

No turn of events could more forcefully illustrate the idiocy of the US peace movement’s one-sided approach to solidarity. [Continue reading…]

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Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

Jonathan Turley writes: Free speech is dying in the Western world. While most people still enjoy considerable freedom of expression, this right, once a near-absolute, has become less defined and less dependable for those espousing controversial social, political or religious views. The decline of free speech has come not from any single blow but rather from thousands of paper cuts of well-intentioned exceptions designed to maintain social harmony.

In the face of the violence that frequently results from anti-religious expression, some world leaders seem to be losing their patience with free speech. After a video called “Innocence of Muslims” appeared on YouTube and sparked violent protests in several Muslim nations last month, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned that “when some people use this freedom of expression to provoke or humiliate some others’ values and beliefs, then this cannot be protected.”

It appears that the one thing modern society can no longer tolerate is intolerance. As Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard put it in her recent speech before the United Nations, “Our tolerance must never extend to tolerating religious hatred.”

A willingness to confine free speech in the name of social pluralism can be seen at various levels of authority and government. In February, for instance, Pennsylvania Judge Mark Martin heard a case in which a Muslim man was charged with attacking an atheist marching in a Halloween parade as a “zombie Muhammed.” Martin castigated not the defendant but the victim, Ernie Perce, lecturing him that “our forefathers intended to use the First Amendment so we can speak with our mind, not to piss off other people and cultures — which is what you did.”

Of course, free speech is often precisely about pissing off other people — challenging social taboos or political values.

This was evident in recent days when courts in Washington and New York ruled that transit authorities could not prevent or delay the posting of a controversial ad that says: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”

When U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer said the government could not bar the ad simply because it could upset some Metro riders, the ruling prompted calls for new limits on such speech. And in New York, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority responded by unanimously passing a new regulation banning any message that it considers likely to “incite” others or cause some “other immediate breach of the peace.”

Such efforts focus not on the right to speak but on the possible reaction to speech — a fundamental change in the treatment of free speech in the West. The much-misconstrued statement of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes that free speech does not give you the right to shout fire in a crowded theater is now being used to curtail speech that might provoke a violence-prone minority. Our entire society is being treated as a crowded theater, and talking about whole subjects is now akin to shouting “fire!”

The new restrictions are forcing people to meet the demands of the lowest common denominator of accepted speech, usually using one of four rationales. [Continue reading…]

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U.S. and U.K. are to Bahrain what Russia is to Syria, says prominent Bahraini human rights activists

The Independent reports: Maryam al-Khawaja doesn’t mince her words when she’s asked to assess what many Bahrainis think about Britain. “It’s not a very positive picture,” she sighs, stirring a spoonful of sugar into a steaming latte.

“People today are saying the United States and the UK are to Bahrain what Russia is to Syria. They are countries willing to aid repression, people who are willing to overlook human rights violations because it’s in their own interests. The only difference is that Russia doesn’t try to present itself as a beacon of human rights and democracy.”

Al-Khawaja – one of Bahrain’s most prominent human rights activists and the daughter of jailed opposition activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja – doesn’t want to be down on Britain. She recently travelled to the UK to hold talks with the Foreign Office and desperately hopes Downing Street will signal some sort of policy shift towards our ally in the Gulf. But she knows it is unlikely.

Over the past 18 months – as whole swathes of the Arab world have hit the streets to demand greater democratic representation and the end of autocracy – Britain has tried to portray itself as a friendly benefactor who is willing to help Arabs achieve a greater level of personal freedom. In Libya and Syria especially we marketed ourselves as supporters of a just cause, whilst chastising countries like Russia and China for blocking the march of self-determination. But with Bahrain our silence has been deafening. [Continue reading…]

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Focus was on Tripoli in requests for security in Libya

The New York Times reports: In the weeks leading up to the attack last month on the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, diplomats on the ground sounded increasingly urgent alarms. In a stream of diplomatic cables, embassy security officers warned their superiors at the State Department of a worsening threat from Islamic extremists, and requested that the teams of military personnel and State Department security guards who were already on duty be kept in service.

The requests were denied, but they were largely focused on extending the tours of security guards at the American Embassy in Tripoli — not at the diplomatic compound in Benghazi, 400 miles away. And State Department officials testified this week during a hearing by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that extending the tour of additional guards — a 16-member military security team — through mid-September would not have changed the bloody outcome because they were based in Tripoli, not Benghazi.

The handling of these requests has now been caught up in a sharply partisan debate over whether the Obama administration underestimated the terrorist threat in Libya. In a debate with Representative Paul D. Ryan on Thursday night, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said White House officials were not told about requests for any additional security. “We weren’t told they wanted more security again,” Mr. Biden said.

The Romney campaign on Friday pounced on the conflicting statements, accusing Mr. Biden of continuing to deny the nature of the attack. The White House scrambled to explain the apparent contradiction between Mr. Biden’s statement and the testimony from State Department officials at the House hearing.

The White House spokesman, Jay Carney, said Friday that security issues related to diplomatic posts in Libya and other countries were dealt with at the State Department, not the White House. Based on interviews with administration officials, as well as in diplomatic cables, and Congressional testimony, those security decisions appear to have been made largely by midlevel State Department security officials, and did not involve Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton or her top aides.

While it is unclear what impact a handful of highly trained additional guards might have had in Benghazi were they able to deploy there, some State Department officials said it would probably not have made any difference in blunting the Sept. 11 assault from several dozen heavily armed militants.

“An attack of that kind of lethality, we’re never going to have enough guns,” Patrick F. Kennedy, under secretary of state for management, said at Wednesday’s hearing. “We are not an armed camp ready to fight it out.”

A senior administration official said that the military team, which was authorized by a directive from Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, was never intended to have an open-ended or Libya-wide mission.

“This was not a SWAT team with a DC-3 on alert to jet them off to other cities in Libya to respond to security issues,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the matter.

Security in Benghazi had been a growing concern for American diplomats this year. In April, the convoy of the United Nations special envoy for Libya was attacked there. In early June, a two-vehicle convoy carrying the British ambassador came under attack by rocket-propelled grenades. Militants struck the American mission with a homemade bomb, but no one was hurt. In late June, the Red Cross was attacked and the organization pulled out.

“We were the last thing on their target list to remove from Benghazi,” Lt. Col. Andrew Wood of the Utah National Guard, who was deployed in Tripoli as the leader of the American military security unit, told the House committee.

But friends and colleagues of Ambassador Stevens said he was adamant about maintaining an American presence in Benghazi, the heart of the opposition to the Qaddafi government. [Continue reading…]

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More than half of contributions to Israeli politicians come from foreign donors

Haaretz reports: More than half of the contributions to politicians in the past two years – 53 percent of the NIS 13 million – came from people who live overseas, cannot vote in Israel and are not directly impacted by the elected officials’ decisions, Haaretz has found.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu raised 96.8 percent of his NIS 1.2 million in campaign contributions from foreign donors, according to the State Comptroller’s Office, which published the candidates’ campaign contribution reports for the last two years on its website on Thursday. (Netanyahu announced on Thursday that elections would be held January 22.)

Minister Moshe Ya’alon was the only one of the 26 well-financed politicians who raised 100 percent of his campaign funds overseas. Netanyahu raised the second-highest percentage at 96.8 percent, followed by Minister Limor Livnat at 94 percent.

At the other end of the scale, Labor Party leader Shelly Yacimovich raised just 0.03 percent of her contributions abroad, while Likud MK Ofir Akunis raised 7.3 percent overseas.

Among political parties, Likud raised the highest percentage abroad – 67 percent – while Kadima raised 65 percent overseas. By contrast, Meretz raised zero percent overseas and Habayit Hayehudi raised four percent of its contributions from foreign sources.

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Greeks shocked at EU winning Nobel peace prize

The Guardian reports: Almost three years into the debt crisis that began beneath the Acropolis there is no doubt in the minds of many that Greece is at war – an economic war whose byproducts of poverty and hate, anger and desperation have begun inexorably to tear its society apart. And for the great majority the EU – with Germany at the helm – is solely to blame.

“It’s a new kind of war, one without weapons but just as deadly,” said Takis Kapeoldasis, a tattoo artist, giving voice to the mood at large. “I don’t want to be insulting but it’s Europe’s policies that have done us over and now it gets the prize of all prizes for peace and reconciliation.

“Those who made this choice should come and walk our streets now while there is peace and harmony because soon it’s going to be too late.” For young Greeks like Karmela Kontou, who belong to the generation hardest hit by the country’s descent into economic and social meltdown, the idea that the EU had been rewarded for its “successful struggle” to reinforce democracy and human rights was especially galling. After all, she said, “more and more Greeks are killing themselves” precisely because they see no light at the end of the tunnel.

Even worse was the democratic deficit. Growing numbers of Greeks feel they have no democratic say over any of the policies that have changed their lives. Greece may be paying for years of profligacy but the coffins of those who could no longer take the pain of being unable to pay extra bills and higher taxes on wages that had also decreased sharply were also lining up.

“The mood is not just dark, it’s hopeless. People are killing themselves, the suicide rate is soaring, because they just can’t cope and the EU is definitely partly to blame,” said a 25-year-old.

Yiannis Baboulias writes: The timing is nothing if not ironic. On the day the EU has been awarded the Nobel peace prize, we watch as Europe sits idly by and lets fascism brew once again – this time in Greece. If a sharp turn towards religious fundamentalism and fascism is to be avoided, Europe needs to act now.

On Thursday night the Athens premiere of Terrence McNally’s play, Corpus Christi, was cancelled following protests by members of the far-right party Golden Dawn (including some MPs) and religious groups.

The protest had a clearly homophobic agenda. Manolis V, a journalist, was attacked by protesters while the police apparently did nothing: “The police is next to us. I shout ‘They’re beating me, aren’t you going to do something?’,” he wrote on Twitter. “I move away so I can look on from distance. A well-known Golden Dawn MP follows me. He punches me twice in the face and knocks me to the ground. While on the ground, I lose my glasses. The Golden Dawn MP kicks me. The police are just two steps away but turn their back.”

The spectacle of fascists physically attacking people whose moral agenda they disapprove of has become routine in today’s Greece. What should come as more of a shock is the tacit approval of the police.

Meanwhile, Reuters reports: Greece’s unemployment rate hit a new record in July with one in four now out of work, like in Spain, as a crippling recession and austerity measures continued to take a toll on the labour market.

Unemployment rose for a 35th consecutive month to 25.1 percent in July, more than double the euro zone average and up from a revised 24.8 percent in June, Greece’s statistics service ELSTAT said on Thursday.

The jobless rate has more than tripled since the debt-laden country’s five-year recession began in 2008 and now stands at 54 percent for those aged between 15 and 24 years, compared with 22 percent in July 2008.

A record 1.26 million Greeks were without work in July, up 43 percent from the same month last year.

The slump in the Greek economy is expected to accelerate later this year if the government implements further budget cuts of almost 12 billion euros over the next two years as a pre-condition for more funds under its EU/IMF bailout.

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Panetta warns of dire threat of cyberattack on U.S.

This is how the U.S. Secretary of Defense yesterday described America’s vulnerability to a devastating cyber attack:

What Panetta failed to mention in the scenario he laid out was that the cyberweapons necessary for conducting such an attack have already been created by the U.S. government and are now freely available for anyone to duplicate.

The New York Times reports: Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta warned Thursday that the United States was facing the possibility of a “cyber-Pearl Harbor” and was increasingly vulnerable to foreign computer hackers who could dismantle the nation’s power grid, transportation system, financial networks and government.

In a speech at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York, Mr. Panetta painted a dire picture of how such an attack on the United States might unfold. He said he was reacting to increasing aggressiveness and technological advances by the nation’s adversaries, which officials identified as China, Russia, Iran and militant groups.

“An aggressor nation or extremist group could use these kinds of cyber tools to gain control of critical switches,” Mr. Panetta said. “They could derail passenger trains, or even more dangerous, derail passenger trains loaded with lethal chemicals. They could contaminate the water supply in major cities, or shut down the power grid across large parts of the country.”

Defense officials insisted that Mr. Panetta’s words were not hyperbole, and that he was responding to a recent wave of cyberattacks on large American financial institutions. He also cited an attack in August on the state oil company Saudi Aramco, which infected and made useless more than 30,000 computers.

But Pentagon officials acknowledged that Mr. Panetta was also pushing for legislation on Capitol Hill. It would require new standards at critical private-sector infrastructure facilities — like power plants, water treatment facilities and gas pipelines — where a computer breach could cause significant casualties or economic damage.

In August, a cybersecurity bill that had been one of the administration’s national security priorities was blocked by a group of Republicans, led by Senator John McCain of Arizona, who took the side of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and said it would be too burdensome for corporations.

The most destructive possibilities, Mr. Panetta said, involve “cyber-actors launching several attacks on our critical infrastructure at one time, in combination with a physical attack.” He described the collective result as a “cyber-Pearl Harbor that would cause physical destruction and the loss of life, an attack that would paralyze and shock the nation and create a profound new sense of vulnerability.” [Continue reading…]

I have little doubt that in a second Obama term, cyber-defense will be used as a justification for an unprecedented erosion of civil liberties. There will be no acknowledgement that it was during this administration more than any other, Pandora’s box of cyberwarfare was thrown wide open.

While Panetta portrays this country’s vulnerability in terms similar to a conventional military or terrorist attack, it seems just as likely that a major cyber attack might be launched by disaffected members of America’s own cyber culture — libertarians who have no particular interest in harming the lives of ordinary Americans yet who believe in what they conceive as a righteous cause: crippling the U.S. government.

As computer security expert Ralph Langner notes: “In cyberspace, the real threat comes from nonstate actors against which military deterrence is powerless. It does not require the resources of a nation state to develop cyber weapons. I could achieve that by myself with just a handful of freelance experts.”

So, while government officials like Panetta couch cyber-defense in the traditional terms relating to foreign enemies, they are no doubt also looking for measures to protect their own interests from threats posed by domestic enemies. This is how civil liberties will come under attack. Don’t expect Congress or the media to mount a strong defense.

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Aleppo: Treating trauma on the frontline

Ian Pannell reports: An artillery shell had just landed and the hospital entrance was a grotesque tableau of blood, bodies and tears.

A small team of doctors set to work against a soundtrack of bombs and bullets.

The hospital lies in one of the southern districts of Aleppo city close to one of the city’s many front lines.

The staff asked us not to identify its name or location in case government troops attack it.

It is a well-placed fear – the building has already been hit 12 times.

The doctors say it is seen as a “legitimate target” by the army because they treat rebel fighters as well as civilians. [Continue reading and watch the video which accompanies this report …]

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Taliban’s ‘Radio Mullah’ sent hit squad after Pakistani schoolgirl

Reuters reports: One of the Taliban’s most feared commanders, Maulana Fazlullah, carefully briefed two killers from his special hit squad on their next target.

The gunmen weren’t going after any army officer, politician or Western diplomat. Their target was a 14-year-old Pakistani schoolgirl who had angered the Taliban by speaking out for “Western”-style girls’ education.

Tuesday’s shooting of Malala Yousufzai was the culmination of years of campaigning that had pitted the fearless, smiling young girl against one of Pakistan’s most ruthless Taliban commanders.

Their story began in 2009, when Fazlullah, known as Radio Mullah for his fiery radio broadcasts, took over Swat Valley, and ordered the closure of girls’ schools, including Yousufzai’s.

Outraged, the then-11-year-old kept a blog for the BBC under a pen name and later launched a campaign for girls’ education. It won her Pakistan’s highest civilian honor and death threats from the Taliban.

Yousufzai was not blind to the dangers. In her hometown of Mingora, Fazlullah’s Taliban fighters dumped bodies near where her family lived.

“I heard my father talking about another three bodies lying at Green Chowk,” she wrote in her diary, referring to a nearby roundabout.

A military offensive pushed Fazlullah out of Swat in 2009, but his men simply melted away across the border to Afghanistan. Earlier this year, they kidnapped and beheaded 17 Pakistani soldiers in one of several cross border raids.

Yousufzai continued speaking out despite the danger. As her fame grew, Fazlullah tried everything he could to silence her. The Taliban published death threats in the newspapers and slipped them under her door. But she ignored them.

The Taliban say that’s why they sent assassins, despite a tribal code forbidding the killing of women.

“We had no intentions to kill her but were forced when she would not stop (speaking against us),” said Sirajuddin Ahmad, a spokesman of Swat Taliban now based in Afghanistan’s Kunar province.

He said the Taliban held a meeting a few months ago at which they unanimously agreed to kill her. The task was then given to military commanders to carry out.

The militia has a force of around 100 men specialized in targeted killing, fighters said. They chose two men, aged between 20-30, who were locals from Swat Valley.

The gunmen had proved their worth in previous assassinations, killing an opposition politician and attacking a leading hotelier for “obscenity” in promoting tourism.

Their trademark is to kill by shots to the head.

Such hits, although dangerous, are also a badge of honor among the Taliban. The fighters who carry them out often receive personal calls of congratulations from senior leaders and may also get cash or guns.

Now it was Yousufzai’s turn. [Continue reading…]

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Why are Americans so easy to manipulate and control?

Bruce E. Levine:

What a fascinating thing! Total control of a living organism! — psychologist B.F. Skinner

The corporatization of society requires a population that accepts control by authorities, and so when psychologists and psychiatrists began providing techniques that could control people, the corporatocracy embraced mental health professionals.

In psychologist B.F. Skinner’s best-selling book Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971), he argued that freedom and dignity are illusions that hinder the science of behavior modification, which he claimed could create a better-organized and happier society.

During the height of Skinner’s fame in the 1970s, it was obvious to anti-authoritarians such as Noam Chomsky (“The Case Against B.F. Skinner”) and Lewis Mumord that Skinner’s worldview — a society ruled by benevolent control freaks — was antithetical to democracy. In Skinner’s novel Walden Two (1948), his behaviorist hero states, “We do not take history seriously”; to which Lewis Mumford retorted, “And no wonder: if man knew no history, the Skinners would govern the world, as Skinner himself has modestly proposed in his behaviorist utopia.”

As a psychology student during that era, I remember being embarrassed by the silence of most psychologists about the political ramifications of Skinner and behavior modification.

In the mid-1970s, as an intern on a locked ward in a state psychiatric hospital, I first experienced one of behavior modification’s staple techniques, the “token economy.” And that’s where I also discovered that anti-authoritarians try their best to resist behavior modification. George was a severely depressed anti-authoritarian who refused to talk to staff but, for some reason, chose me to shoot pool with. My boss, a clinical psychologist, spotted my interaction with George, and told me that I should give him a token—a cigarette—to reward his “prosocial behavior.” I fought it, trying to explain that I was 20 and George was 50, and this would be humiliating. But my boss subtly threatened to kick me off the ward. So, I asked George what I should do.

George, fighting the zombifying effects of his heavy medication, grinned and said, “We’ll win. Let me have the cigarette.” In full view of staff, George took the cigarette and then placed it into the shirt pocket of another patient, and then looked at the staff shaking his head in contempt.

Unlike Skinner, George was not “beyond freedom and dignity.” Anti-authoritarians such as George—who don’t take seriously the rewards and punishments of control-freak authorities—deprive authoritarian ideologies such as behavior modification from total domination. [Continue reading…]

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Scientists say billions required to meet conservation targets

BBC News reports: Reducing the risk of extinction for threatened species and establishing protected areas for nature will cost the world over $76bn dollars annually.

Researchers say it is needed to meet globally agreed conservation targets by 2020.

The scientists say the daunting number is just a fifth of what the world spends on soft drinks annually.

And it amounts to just 1% of the value of ecosystems being lost every year, they report in the journal Science.

Back in 2002, governments around the world agreed that they would achieve a significant reduction in biodiversity loss by 2010. But the deadline came and went and the rate of loss increased. [Continue reading…]

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What ‘smart’ slime molds tell us about alien intelligence

Adam Rogers poses some interesting questions about how we understand intelligence, but the observations he describes about slime molds pose an array of other questions. For instance, although a slim mold doesn’t possess a brain as a distinct organ, what might this organism’s aptitude in network formation tell us about the way neural networks are formed? Is it possible that these molds don’t so much lack a brain but rather that they are more like a brain with no body? (And forgive this off of the top of my head speculation. I know nothing about slime molds and not much more about brains.)

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