Category Archives: Philosophy

FTAC: Lady Justice, Scales, and Power v Justice for the Palestinians

30 Friday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Philosophy

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justice-scales-gifPrompt: the image of the Scales of Justice and the remark that the mission of the just is to “keep the balance or to seek balance when there is an imbalance”.

. . . . the scales of justice do not represent the equalization of everything or refer to “cultural relativism”: they represent blind-equal-objective weighing of evidence in matters pertaining to justice.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Justice

Justice does not seek to make the wealthy poor or the poor wealthy but rather to maintain the same ethical, legal, and moral principles as societies choose desirable and good for both classes. Rich or poor, black or white, Israeli or Palestinian Arab, all should be equal under the law.

In that the the Arab hangover from the 20th Century, the PLO, and Hamas apply different standards for the managing of Palestinian Arabs in their greater population than they do for themselves, it would seem an injustice on the part of such leaders to treat the Palestinians as less than themselves.

For Israel, military oversight is only a practical matter of defense. For the wealthy Abbas, Haniyeh, and Mashaal, the enclosure, separation, and language-borne “weaponizing” of their subject populations must be something else, i.e., the idolization of power over justice.

By way of Moscow’s practically patented habits in barbarism, including the manipulation of “the masses” through disinformation and reprehensible cultural education, the Palestinians have come to represent to the world a much confined and ill-used population anchoring for their leaders a most lucrative conflict business.

That’s just how it has been for the past 70 years: the feudal leadership directs popular anger toward Israel but keeps itself flush with serious cash.

Related on the Web:

If it had been invested shrewdly and well Gaza today could be a mini-Monaco. It could have a deepwater freight port, a flourishing fishing port and a leisure harbour crammed with the yachts of wealthy visitors. It could have resort hotels on the sea and farms, ranches and orchards in the hinterland producing nutritious food.

It has nothing of these. It is a failed state of poverty, misery and violence. So what happened to all that money? Well, a lot went on guns, explosives for bombs and material to build rockets to launch at Israel. But the bulk has certainly suffered the fate of most wealth in that neck of the woods. It has simply been embezzled, not by Israelis but by Palestinians and above all by their leadership cadres.

Forsyth, Frederick.  “So exactly how did Yasser Arafat get so rich?”  Express UK, November 15, 2013.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is currently building a $13mn presidential palace in the West Bank, just outside Ramallah.

Reportedly scheduled to take two years to finish, the palace’s construction, including two helipads, guest quarters and administrative offices over more than six acres of land, comes just months after the PA was forced to pass an emergency budget when billions in pledged international aid failed to come through.

Middle East Eye.  “In Pictures: The $13 mn Palestinian presidential palace.”  September 9, 2015.

Related:

Menachem, Yoni Ben.  “The Businesses of Mahmoud Abbas and His Sons.”  Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, September 14, 2016.

Related:

Corre, Addam.  “Hamas Leaders Worth Millions of Dollars From Allegedly Skimming Donations and Extortion: Is Anyone Surprised?”  Inquisitr, July 18, 2014; updated July 22, 2014.

Danan, Deborah.  “Gaza’s Millionaires and Billionaires — How Hamas’s Leaders Got Rich Quick.”  The Algemeiner, July 28, 2014.

Freimann, Myer.  “Hamas Killed 160 Palestinian Children to Build Tunnels.”  Tablet Magazine, July 25, 2014.

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FTAC: The Phantoms of Earlier Days

07 Wednesday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Islamic Small Wars, Philology, Philosophy, Poetry, Political Psychology, Politics

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Anti-Semitism : Medieval Political Tool

Islamic Supremacists : Civilizational Narcissists

Why?

Isolation somewhere at some time

&

Because he could; because they could.

Later and latest: “Moscow” — today, a political police state, still fundamentally feudal.

Moscow-Tehran : Red-Green ; Brown-Green: all about force in power.

Mudar Zahran – Mahmoud Abbas has the KGB record, a record that represents a relationship that never disappears. It’s the KGB that set up Arafat and the PLO — and it has been the Palestinian main ranks that have been made to suffer on behalf of those who have mightily enriched themselves.

Nadiya Al-Noor – is there a “modern world” capable of opposing the persistence of the medieval mode in the lives of states?

I think the general conversation on the middle east conflict across the forums has grown way beyond the Che image and poetry of the “freedom fighter”.

We’re all freedom fighters these days.

We should take a good look around at “what was” and needs be no more.

The Soviet Union dissolved in bankruptcy officially on December 25, 1991, i.e., more than 25 years ago, and its offspring Putin strives mightily to sustain feudalism and associated motivations for conflict because his kind of narcissism loves appearing heroic amid the chaos and destruction he himself has created. He’s representative of the worlds so opposed to classical liberalism, justice, and life itself, and perhaps we may now dismiss the phantoms of earlier days.

Are we becoming public figures — are we public figures — enough for leaving the names in?

On this post, I think so.

There’s a lot alluded to in the excerpt, and I incline to leave it be but with the echo of its question:

Is there a modern world capable of opposing the persistence of the medieval mode in the lives of states?

–33–

Mahmoud Abbas: KGB and Groomed to Lie

26 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Philology, Philosophy, Political Psychology, Politics, Religion

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Islam orders the Muslim to be honest to himself and others. This order repeatedly comes in the Noble Qur’an and the sayings of Prophet Muhammad (SAWS). Islam orders the Muslim to tell the truth even if it is against the teller’s interest. Orders him not to cheat or deceive other people. A Muslim is ordered by Allah to be honest in his words and deeds, privately and publicly alike.

http://www.islamawareness.net/Honesty/honesty_article003.html

Portions of The Other Side have been considered as Holocaust denial by some critics,[8] especially the parts disputing the accepted number of deaths in the Holocaust as well as the accusations that Zionist agitation was the cause of the Holocaust,[9] a charge that Abbas denies.[10]

When Abbas was appointed the Palestinian prime minister in 2003, he wrote that the “Holocaust was a terrible, unforgivable crime against the Jewish nation, a crime against humanity that cannot be accepted by humankind” and that he does not deny it,[11] and said that “When I wrote The Other Side … we were at war with Israel. Today I would not have made such remarks”.[12] More recently, in 2013 he reasserted that part of his thesis that “the Zionist movement had ties with the Nazis”.[13][14] In 2014, he stated the Holocaust was the “most heinous crime in the modern era”.[15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side:_The_Secret_Relationship_Between_Nazism_and_Zionism

Apparently, Mr. Abbas spreads lies when at war with Israel but shrugs through the truth when its suits him.

Or perhaps when it suits his family’s wallet.

These documents, reports from senior Fatah officials and Palestinian social media reveal extensive corruption at the highest levels — the Abbas family and a Palestinian elite manipulating the political and financial systems to benefit themselves at the expense of the people.

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/306179-palestinian-kleptocracy-west-accepts-corruption-people

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/10/03/palestinian-kgb/

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2015/10/12/ftac-tip-to-the-kgbs-amplification-of-middle-eastern-anti-semitism/

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/12/27/excerpt-1920s-the-spread-of-hate-russia-germany-laqueur/

The architect of the Holocaust, Nazi mastermind Adolf Eichmann, was one of the first to deny its existence. While escaping the Nuremberg trials and evading international law, Eichmann befriended Nazi supporters in Argentina who published an anti-Semitic magazine titled “Der Weg,” or “The Way.” The magazine aimed to disprove what they called “the falsehood of the 6 million.” The magazine claimed the Holocaust was nothing but a libel, that there were never any gas chambers in Hitler’s Europe and that the Jews collaborated with the Third Reich in order to have another country for themselves after thousands of years in exile. According to Eichmann and the magazine’s publishers, the Jews were willing to sacrifice themselves to gain a national homeland.

Many Arabs were enthralled by this theory, and a young doctoral student by the name of Mahmoud Abbas, now the president of the Palestinian Authority, even wrote a dissertation on the subject titled, “The Other Side: The Secret Relationship between Nazism and Zionism,” which opened the door for several different conspiracies on the subject of the Holocaust to develop.

The Arabs were among the first Holocaust deniers to adopt Eichmann’s theory.

Cohen, Edy.  “Adding Insult to Injury.”  Israel Hayom, April 23, 2017.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/11/23/moscows-rules-a-module/

In the proverbial east, so it would appear, what may not be accomplished honestly may be accomplished through guile — and if not guile, plain lying and force.

One social trope BackChannels has heard regarding lying: “Any who lie to you don’t respect you.”

Fair enough.

BackChannels wonders to what extent those who lie to others, especially Palestinians who lie to Palestinians, respect even themselves.

Posted to YouTube by Human Rights Watch, August 29, 2016.

Related

http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheEmperorsNewClothes_e.html

https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/08/29/palestine-crackdown-journalists-activists

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2016/country-chapters/israel/palestine

https://www.amnesty.org/en/countries/middle-east-and-north-africa/palestine-state-of/

http://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/topics/palestinian-violations

Expect updates to this post as more material comes together on Abbas representative of the end of a long cycle of totalitarian dictatorship — perhaps more gently, “authoritarian governance” — comes into view on the world stage.  Today’s political crooks get covered in global media and come to look exactly as they have painted themselves throughout the course of their careers.  Mahmoud Abbas?  KGB — he has the record of it, and once marked is marked forever with that organization — so whose interests, apart from his own, is he really representing?

Abbas has also made for himself a record as a Holocaust denier although he has backed away from that lunacy — still, one may wonder how many unwarranted words — assertion of fact that just aren’t true — he has still to recover.

–33–

Also in Media: “I am an Arctic researcher. Donald Trump is deleting my citations” | Victoria Herrmann | Opinion | The Guardian | March 28, 2017

29 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, American Domestic Affairs, Epistemology, Philology, Philosophy, Political Psychology

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At first, the distress flare of lost data came as a surge of defunct links on 21 January. The US National Strategy for the Arctic, the Implementation Plan for the Strategy, and the report on our progress all gone within a matter of minutes. As I watched more and more links turned red, I frantically combed the internet for archived versions of our country’s most important polar policies.

I had no idea then that this disappearing act had just begun.

Since January, the surge has transformed into a slow, incessant march of deleting datasets, webpages and policies about the Arctic. I now come to expect a weekly email request to replace invalid citations, hoping that someone had the foresight to download statistics about Arctic permafrost thaw or renewable energy in advance of the purge.

Source: I am an Arctic researcher. Donald Trump is deleting my citations | Victoria Herrmann | Opinion | The Guardian – 3/27/2017

Islam’s Double Vision: American Islamic Forum for Democracy & “Islam on the March!”

24 Friday Mar 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, American Domestic Affairs, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, Islamic Small Wars, Philosophy, Politics, Religion

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AIFD-Banner-BePartOfTheChangex600

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy’s (AIFD) mission is to advocate for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state.

AIFD is the most prominent American Muslim organization directly confronting the ideology of political Islam and openly countering the common belief that the Muslim faith is inextricably rooted to the concept of the Islamic State (Islamism). We stand firmly for universal human rights – including gender equality, freedom of conscience, and freedom of speech and expression. Founded by Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, AIFD envisions a future wherein Muslims never feel a conflict between their personal faith and their commitment to individual liberty and freedom. Rather, we work to empower Muslims to be primary advocates for liberty and freedom.

American Islamic Forum for Democracy.  “About AIFD”.  As encountered March 24, 2016. 

We are being called to tolerate, accommodate, and include people who believe it is compassionate to murder gay people; from Imams trained in moderate Saudi Arabia to moderate Iran. We see gays from these countries murdered before our eyes: gays hanging from cranes in the city squares or thrown off tall buildings. Think about that. Close your eyes and picture someone blindfolded, hands tied behind their back and flung over a building. Imagine the horror of that death. Yet we say nothing and invite Islam into our western countries-to preach and proselytize in the name of freedom of religion and freedom of speech-yet without question against our laws.

We tend to forget that Islam is far more than a religion. It, like democracy, is an ideology, but at odds with democracy.

Islam is inherently, innately, systemically, and endemically homophobic, misogynistic, xenophobic and virulently anti-Jewish. Islam opposes the ethic that the Jewish people brought into the world 3500 years ago and brought to these shores by Christians. We know this because we hear their calls “Death to America,” “Death to Israel,” “Death to the Jews.”

Bederman, Diane.  “Islam on the March Part 2”.  Diane Bederman.com: Your Passionate Voice of Reason, March 23, 2017.

–33–

American Presidential Credibility, Integrity, Trust

04 Saturday Mar 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Epistemology, Philology, Philosophy, Political Psychology, Political Spychology, Politics, United States of America

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pkiss-nash-524x

Opening scene, Putin’s Kiss, 2012 documentary.

Think back a little bit.

Hicks also asked other superiors why Susan Rice, US ambassador to the UN, had said the attack might have been a spontaneous reaction to an anti-Islamic video. That video was a “non-event” in Libya, Hicks said, adding that it seemed clear from the first that the assault was a terrorist attack.

“The sense I got was I needed to stop the line of questioning,” Hicks told the House panel.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/Decoder/2013/0509/Benghazi-whistleblower-Has-diplomat-Gregory-Hicks-suffered-for-speaking-out-video – 5/9/2013.

Related more recently by former diplomat Gregory Hicks:

When asked about security at Benghazi on Sept. 11, Mrs. Clinton has repeatedly asserted her lack of responsibility. Initially, she said that she never read any of the reporting on security conditions or any of the requests for additional security, claiming that “she delegated security to the professionals.” More recently, she stated that “[I]t was not my ball to carry.” But the law says otherwise. Sound familiar?

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/09/11/what-benghazi-attack-taught-me-about-hillary-clinton.html – 9/11/2016.

The Benghazi attack and Hillary Clinton’s explanations — it was a video that did it, but no it wasn’t; security was left to the experts, she reportedly said, but the buck had been by law made to stop at her own desk . . . and she delegated downward and away from herself — became strong talking points for conservatives.

Now there comes a full suite of talking points for liberals questioning President Donald J. Trump’s (” . . . you grab ’em by the pussy”) character and the weight of complex business and political relationships involving “Moscow”, the metonym here for the “Russian State” as headed by Vladimir Putin.

Posted by mtvnations February 13, 2017.

Putin’s Kiss is available for viewing via Amazon by purchase or by subscription to Amazon Prime.

BackChannels assumes, or presumes, that readers wish not to live in President (Forever) Putin’s “Nashti” proto-fascist state (for further reference, enjoy in the World Affairs Journal  Malik Kalyan’s “Mysterious Circumstances Surrounding Russian Murders, Deaths” (March 3, 2017).

Well then . . . .

Are you making the allegation that President Obama conducted electronic surveillance of Trump Tower in your capacity as President of the United States based on intelligence or law enforcement information available to you in that capacity?

If so—that is, if you have executive branch information validating that either a FISA wiretap or a Title III wiretap took place—have you reviewed the applications for the surveillance and have you or your lawyers concluded that they lack merit?

https://www.lawfareblog.com/ten-questions-president-trump – 3/4/2017.

In Benjamin Wittes’ piece, eight additional question follow for President Trump as regards alleged wiretapping by former President Obama.

Let’s move on with moving back in memory.

There’s the Steele report —

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/01/17/address-christopher-steeles-2016-report-involving-president-elect-donald-j-trump/ – 1/17/2017 & https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/01/14/trump-vs-steele-an-emerging-credibility-gap/ – 1/14/2017

Add to the above, the continuing FBI investigation of Trump-associated relationships with “Moscow” (3/4/2017).

Add: The Flynn resignation.

Add: The Sessions recusal.

Worst of all: Rachel Maddow’s connecting the dots between a Russian mogul and a Trump real estate sale, which would not be so bad were Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross not at the center of (the art of) the deal (Feb. 27, 2017).

Trust me?

When an obscure blogger asks that question, it’s time to roll out the ROTFLMAO!

However, please do note this blog’s — this blogger’s — providing ample reference to many (most) of the most reliable sources in journalism and the think-tanks.

When an American President asks / demands trust, that’s something else.

Posted by The Guardian, March 3, 2017.

David Remnick’s most powerful bona fide: the Pulitzer Prize winning Lenin’s Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire (1993).

Posted by CNN, February 28, 2017.

The complete quotation having to do with absolute power and corruption: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”

Published February 8, 2017 in The Chicago Tribune (by Steve Chapman):

Asked about Melissa McCarthy’s portrayal of him on “Saturday Night Live,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer had some advice for the actress: “Dial it back.” May I suggest the president adopt that phrase as his administration motto?

So far, Donald Trump has made it a practice to obliterate every known limit and pump up every grievance. Harvard law professor and former Reagan administration official Charles Fried, marveling at the president’s Twitter volleys at federal judges, said, “There are no lines for him. There is no notion of, this is inappropriate, this is indecent, this is unpresidential.”

Perhaps the word order in this post’s title needs to be changed from the alphabetical “credibility, integrity, trust” to what comes first and last:

Integrity –> Credibility –> Trust

Although this piece would seem to end with Trump, it may be thought to go back some decades to Carter and Reagan (remember “Iran-Contra”?), to Mr. Clinton (how would you define what is and what is not sex) and forward to Obama and Clinton and the New Guy, but it’s that last with whose grandiose posturing and promises and tweets the nation awakes or falls to sleep.

–33–

Information Space in the Feudal Mode

01 Wednesday Mar 2017

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Posted by eOne Films, October 26, 2012.

Synopsis of a Different Kind of Script

Putin’s mission: sustain feudalism in service to political absolutism and reap the benefits of sustained conflicts and, eventually, subjugated and taxed populations.

KGB method: Reflexive Control via the indirect channeling of terrorism to promote the authoritarian nationalism certain to weaken EU / NATO cohesion and favor the development of political environments subject to the control by the wealthiest and most powerful of personalities.

Western Response Most Adverse to Democratic Modernity: in former Moscow-aligned organizations or personalities, adoption of “active measures” and forms of perceptual control, including the “false flag” painting of events, to channel popular perception in service to greater political power.

Western Response Most Favorable to Democratic Modernity: strongest possible emphasis on empiricism, integrity in investigation, and the promotion and retention of American and associated constitutional methods, principles, and values.

In the feudal mode, “the masses” — BackChannels finds the term itself degrading — may be controlled by disinformation, disingenuous information, framing, innuendo, rumor, and suspicion.

In the modern mode, the curious and the reasoning of the public may sift and evaluate for strong information — valid, reliable, significant, and straight.

North Americans and Europeans accustomed to political decency may wish to evaluate whether they really want to have the Feudal Mode installed in the future experience of their own presently democratic and modern rule-of-law states.

Whodunit?

The Fallen Headstones Mystery

Blake, Aaron.  “Trump is flirting with the idea that anti-Semitic incidents are false flags — yet again.”  The Washington Post, February 28, 2017.

BackChannel’s day began with related coverage in The Jerusalem Post “Trump reportedly questions authenticity of JCC bomb threats” (February 28, 2017)” and in the New York Daily News — “Trump suggests Jewish community is spreading anti-Semitic threats” (February 28, 2017).   This editor’s response:

I would question the authenticity of each posture or pretense presented, and I should think a good detective would start with the accuser. Again, we have been made to enter an era marked by the potential for KGB-style “false flag” and other manipulation. Where some people dare the improbable — do the unthinkable — the numbers (what are the odds?) may not help them.

I find the Linda Sarsour side of the story deeply suspect given her relationship with Hamas.

What if Jews and Muslims accomplished the vandalism together, and then made a show of amity in the wake of tragedy?

In the feudal mode — where power is concentrated by a force in personality that generates immense wealth and patronage without regard for common law — and in the mind supporting the feudal worldview (blessed with imagination but cursed by limited access to applicable data, critical research and reasoning skill, and relevant knowledge), what, however improbable, is not possible?

In this imbroglio, to accuse either Jews or Muslims — or representatives of either — of engaging in a “false flag” operations draws immediate condemnation as either anti-Semitic or Islamophobic — and therein lies the beauty of medieval manipulation and political theater and the greater horror of it as well.

What happens when power play magus?

Syria — and the incubating of ISIL as useful tool for Moscow and the depopulating of the state to present the west with a major headache.

Ukraine — and so-called “hybid warfare” to run Ukrainians off their land (a lesser known part of that conflict’s story) and regain a measure of control over the productive capacity of the state or state political criminals.

What will happen to the western public IF subjected to continued “reflexive control” and artifice in the presentation of political event?

Whatever the answer may be, it’s unknown to BackChannels.

However, BackChannels would attempt to armor the “American Mind” against so many feudal methods of perceptual control even though an obscure foreign policy / political science / political psychology blog cannot begin to do what perhaps the American Intelligence Community (IC) needs must do in defense of the Constitution and the related cohesion and integrity of the state itself: set the record straight.

Ellis, Ralph and Eric Levenson.  “FBI investigates Jewish cemetery vandalism in Philly.”  CNN, February 27, 2017.

How is it possible that an act of vandalism on the scale reported — in Philadelphia’s Mount Carmel Cemetery, some “75 to 100 headstones were topped” according to CNN — produced no claims (by person or organization), no witnesses — none that have been in any way publicized, at least — and to date no suspects.

What has been produced: innuendo, rumor, suspicion, each a part of the shifting — and at times easily manipulated — perceptions well known to feudal lords and their loyal subjects.

Addendum – March 4, 2017 and Forward

Greenfield, Daniel.  “Pro-Palestinian Black Muslim Leftist Arrested in Jewish Center Bomb Threats.”  FrontPage, March 3, 2017. The number of incidents associated with Juan M. Thompson: eight, a fraction of the total calls made to Jewish centers.

–33–

FTAC: On the Edge of a Feudal American State

27 Monday Feb 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, North America, Philosophy, Political Psychology, Politics, United States of America

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Context: in light of dozens of bomb threats and two acts of vandalism against Jewish targets, the chatter turned to the JDL, which in the United States remains an FBI designated terrorist organization (the same has been left to operate in Canada and Great Britain).  The matter of reevaluating the too obvious public appearance of anti-Semitic acts in America came up between Jews and here fits with the notion that a part of the nation seems now driven toward the revival of feudalism.

The commission of political violence before the Larger Force of the State renders the same very small and degrades and tarnishes the nobility of the actor. Now we reached a super-generational changing of the political guards. Angela Davis is 73 years old; Noam Chomsky is 88 years old. The Baby Boomers are counting on their retirement funding or the state to east them into death, and the New Guards of the Culture are climbing into their positions and making their marks.

In the framework of time, that is where these attacks on Jewish targets are taking place.

I have on Back-Channels noted an increasingly stark choice for modern bodies politic: do ye wish to remain “Modern” — cooperating, multicultural, mutually respectful beneath the benevolent and firm umbrella of secular-humanist / Greco-Roman / Judeo-Christian law developed atop much bloody argument about political power, or may ye wish to slide back into the feudal slime hoping to come out on top with the authoritarian who says he really likes you?

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/02/27/ftac-reflexive-control-feudalism/

Conflict — equipment, manpower, research — is a money-maker for a lot of people employed and invested in related fields. Give it a thought: to really be kind to our neighbors, perhaps we should all just thin ourselves out. God only knows Americans have the firearms to do it to themselves.

Maybe Black Lives Matter would like to weigh in on this business about an America / EU / NATO that trends toward feudalism and the potential for the conflicts of all-against-all. The same would make the Arab, “I against my brother; my brother and I against my cousin . . . .” sound awfully quaint.

BackChannels reach on Facebook has been broad and not terribly shy; however, hateful events — bomb threats, the desecration of cemeteries — promote suspicions, and one may now wonder at the purposes of those who commit such acts, which appear to no longer involve one city or community center and at least one mysterious miscreant.

The bomb threats number in the dozens; the attacks on two Jewish cemeteries now involve two cities.

Has someone been going down a call list?

Has someone been driving from one place to the next?

Many who follow politics at many levels — diplomacy, foreign affairs, international relations, warfare and terrorism — have picked on some far ahead or far out concepts, e.g., that Obama made the United States “post-Constitutional” or that we are living in a modern “post-fact” world — or a world comfortably supporting “alt-facts”.  How is one to reject the arrival of so ambiguous and ambivalent a political philosophy?

For the time being, the United States of America remains a “constitutional democracy”, and perhaps one with a security community that has its own backbone when it comes to the defense of the nation against “all enemies foreign and domestic”.

BackChannels suggestion to those vulnerable to being goaded into violence against pet targets on the basis of assumptions based on the constructs of swirling conspiracies or shadow and uncertain empirical evidence: cool it.  Let’s not drag ourselves backward several hundred years in the way of the ill-educated, ill-informed, and paranoid.

Reject manipulation.

–33–