Category Archives: Political Psychology

FTAC: Observation: Arab Refusal of Culpability for the Middle East Conflict

21 Wednesday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Egypt, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Gaza, Gaza Suzerain, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Jordan, Palestinia, Political Psychology

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Prompt: mention of “Israel apartheid” (a standard trope in the anti-Semitic wings of the New Old Now Old Far Out and Lost Left) and “letting the refugees return”.

How about ending Arab apartheid and absorbing the Arab refugee generations whose first were abandoned between armies in 1948?

http://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300172348/palestine-betrayed

http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/article/enough-said-false-scholarship-edward-said

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

Oh, and how about giving the Palestinians their money back, considering the manners in which Arafat and Abbas became multi-millionaires and Haniyeh and Mashaal billionaires.

Sustaining the MEC supports feudalism, makes crooks wealthy, and extends for Palestinians The Preoccupation with the Jews.

Prompt: Israel is the sole cause of the refugee issue.

Arab absence of empathy and favoring of an anti-Semitic posture and related supremacist assumptions at the end of WWII led to the refusal of terms and the subsequent genocidal (river to the sea) gang-up on the new Jewish State. The “Palestinians” — Egyptian and Jordanian Arabs, migrants also to the fields of the new agricultural economy of the day — had been encouraged out of the way of battle with hopes the Jews would be gone when it was over.

It didn’t work out that way.

It takes a mighty and malign narcissism to refuse culpability for a disaster like the one dealt to the Arab refugees of 1948 (never mind the 800,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands that would follow in the wake of the war) and then to turn the same bereft population into a political “poker chip” for the enrichment of a criminal few unconscionable enough to spend decades manipulating hate in the cause of their own aggrandizement.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/09/23/ftac-these-too-are-palestinians/

It appears that given a choice between encouraging conflict and undertaking development, the Jew-hating and once Soviet-loving portion of the Arab bloc invariably persists in poisoning the Palestinian mind, keeping the conflict alive, and handily siphoning off the world’s charity to line its own pockets in related systems of patronage, not that any should want “powerful families” to find themselves bereft of their portion of the take.

Related on BackChannels

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

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

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FTAC: A Note Involving C. S. Lewis, Bush in Iraq, and the Updating of the Modern Apprehension of Character in Leadership

14 Wednesday Jun 2017

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

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Prompt:

My contention is that good men (not bad men) consistently acting upon that position [imposing “the good”] would act as cruelly and unjustly as the greatest tyrants. They might in some respects act even worse. Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under of robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber barons cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some points be satiated; but those who torment us for their own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to heaven yet at the same time likely to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on the level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.

The C. S. Lewis quote met a rejoinder involving the Bush Era war in Iraq.

Ask hungry children, also the Kurds and the Marsh Arabs about Saddam.

Bush and the neocons did the right thing but focused too much on “regime change” and seemingly not at all on cultural transition. In the long run, which now characterizes what I believe Iraq has been about all along, natural cerebral and less natural political evolution have a codependent relationship, i.e., the more intelligent we become as a species, the more empathetic, reasoning, and thoughtful we must become as well — or perish in our own nuclear plasma.

C. S. Lewis may not have known that he was addressing a recognizable kind of evil in “good” character, and that would be the do-good messianic character of the malignant narcissistic (related look-ups: bipolar disorder; narcissistic personality disorder. In such people, power becomes the power to visit suffering on others with impunity. This is something that made the Soviet Era Communist Party and its machinery so execrable; it is also the same thing that has made the “Islamists” and their zombie-think intellectual machinery and very real criminal muscle also deeply repugnant to mankind. One may note similar cause and narrative in the Christian “inquisition” and numerous royal and sectarian conflicts.

Let’s not take the words of great writers such as C.S. Lewis as being beyond reproach by way of improved knowledge and new observation and updating.

Regarding Islam’s internecine issues and political psychology: the rancor should come down in geopolitical numbers and scope as feudal methods in power and the medieval worldview become more difficult to “sell” against the full suite of modern administrative alternatives and their presence in the fast becoming archaic fortresses of the medieval mode.

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FTAC: “Claims regarding Iran’s innocence . . . .”

14 Wednesday Jun 2017

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

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Claims regarding Iran’s innocence in relation to global terrorism are fallacious. The state supports Hezbollah and Hamas and is itself an immense kleptocracy — http://www.reuters.com/investigates/iran/#article/part1 .

As regards Sunni-based terrorism, a fair look-up of “Zawahiri, Russia” should straighten that out. In the wake of the Soviet defeat in the 1980s, the criminals appear to have picked up on the CIA/ISI method of producing a treasury-draining proxy (Charlie Wilson’s Taliban) and throwing it back at the west.

The Kingdom has invested heavily in western success (via Kingdom Holdings) and has embarked on cultural updating sufficient to produce an iconic set of accomplished women — https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/11/02/sixteen-women-the-kingdoms-most-powerful/ . However, sigh, in the medieval worldview, the legitimacy of kingdoms rest on the persuasive power of clerics.

My trope for all dictatorships: “Different Talks — Same Walk!”

They all produce leaders who look good on the outside — well, maybe Qadaffi’s a stretch on that — but turn out irredeemably ugly on the inside. I call them “MaligNarcs”, short for “Malignant Narcissists”.

The greater east-west framework: feudal methods, medieval worldview v modern democratic rule of law and the constraint of power by representative means. On that, the House of Saud has a long history with “the English” and may be expected to lean westward with time. The same may not be said today of Moscow / Moscow-Tehran and all the related phantoms of the Soviet Era.

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FTAC – A Note on Clinton’s Post-Cold War Knowledge

13 Tuesday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Political Psychology, Politics

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The Soviet Union officially dissolved itself in bankruptcy on December 25, 1991. It did so with plans for the survival of the privileged of the Party — reference: Karen Dawisha’s groundbreaking book _Putin’s Kleptocracy_.

KGB Colonel and today President Putin has ditched the old banner, Communism, for “State Capitalism” and rebuilt essential elements of the Russian cultural-political experience: KGB/FSB, Centralized Power (that would be himself), and Aristocracy (“the oligarchs”).

The general public’s knowledge of the Cold War has been dimmed by time and the passing of a generation that needed to impart a base of knowledge in foreign affairs to the general public and failed to do that.

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

Putin has displayed preference for other autocrats — Erdogan, Orban, Le Pen, Trump — and the cause for that has been the reinstalling of the feudalism and the medieval worldview in the states of the European Union and NATO, and he gotten far with that project using Islamic Terrorism as a goad to getting there.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/03/11/reflexive-control-process-allahu-akbar-terrorism-new-nationalism-neo-feudalism/

Read a little bit considerately, independently (no spin — your thoughts only), and quietly.

And look up “Zawahiri, Russia”.

Clinton, for all the many faults of the family and its character, knew the post-Cold War history and what it meant for the United States of America and the open democracies of the west. I don’t defend her; I didn’t vote for her. What I’ve come to observe — and I edit Back-Channels — are the processes by which my fellow Americans have been driven toward polarized extremes.

If BackChannels didn’t post it here, it would be lost somewhere beneath Sean Hannity’s latest Facebook comment about Susan Rice, a thoroughly partisan info-morsel for his hungry crowd — better to preserve it in an obscure blog that matters — or should matter — more and more as the free world, the European Union, and NATO approach Putin’s politically absolute and frequently criminal Moscow.

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FTAC: Kurds, Trump, Democracy

10 Saturday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Political Psychology

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The gang was indulging in Trump bashing and only loosely discussing the surfacing of the “Kurdish Question” — should Kurdistan become a state representing the autonomous self-determination of 35 million souls now subjugated in suzerainty across five states: Armenia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey?

Not to poop on the party, but you know that’s what I’m going to do. 😦

Prepare.

🙂

On the surface and pro-Kurdistan:

–The Kurds have been producing a rapidly developing and modernizing society;

–The Kurds appear inherently communal and tolerant in their views of themselves and others;

–Of course, the Kurdish Peshmerga and separate men’s and women’s defense units form the advanced line against ISIS in Iraq and Syria;

–For a glimpse of Utopian values in place, it would be hard to beat the experience of Rojava (enjoy the look-up).

On the surface and negative:

–Since we’re all just one big family, what’s your may be theirs, at least in the minds of remote brigands;

–The suzerainties (Armenia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey) support about 35 million people governed by many chiefs. Having been defeated by the arms of militarized states, they’re seeking a sub-state state of confederation, which may work for peace and prosperity but remain far from the American and other western experiences;

–Finally, the push-back against stronger states involved a guerrilla movement / terrorist organization aligned with the Soviet Union (1978) known as the PKK, and although the organization has been displaced by updated banners, it may be that the same personalities continue the good fight for autonomy and statehood. (Look-up Kyle Orton’s piece in The New York Times).

I explore a little bit at a time from the desktop; try to get in some background reading; and certainly try to “meet” (virtually) personalities much closer to the politics at hand.

The United States has betrayed the Kurdish desire for independence numerous times; however, noting that, the Kurdish leadership has also leaned back toward Moscow — effectively a dictatorship today — in its development politics, rather like India and Pakistan in earlier days playing east against west and back and forth, the ambivalence of the west would seem understandable.

http://www.nrttv.com/EN/birura-details.aspx?Jimare=6333 – “A Russian Revolution: Can the Rosneft Deal Reverse Kurdistan’s Fortunes?” by Megan Connelli. 

Between the Feudal and Modern Worlds

I’ve gotten the impression that the Kurds in earlier days had used the mountains as their defensive barrier against the barbarism of others, but the greater world and changes in the technology of martial force have put them in the position of leveraging decent ideals and values, would that they would keep to them.

Those who patiently make their way through my words (more than once) know that I regard Putin’s Russia as representing feudal absolute power bent on compromising the economies, ideals, and values of the EU and NATO states, and toward that end, Russia has gotten its way with Erdogan in Turkey, a NATO signatory but no longer NATO in at least official spirit. Putin’s preference in leadership has involved other autocrats, and not so much for exacting cooperation, which he gets, but most for reinstalling the feudal and medieval worldviews in the modern democracies.

Now: tell me how Putin has done so far and where Donald J. Trump fits in that scheme.

That, I believe, is what the fussing is all about in Washington.

Do Americans want a real democracy and greater cohesion around it or rather another of the world’s sham democracies masking elite governance and kleptocracy (that’s how things usually work out with autocrats)?

You decide.

–33–

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?

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FTAC: MEC – Passing Into History (One Hopes One Day Soon)

04 Sunday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Gaza, Israel, Middle East, Palestinia, Political Psychology, Politics

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Q: “Is it our psychology or our nature that prevents us from being peace loving people?”

A: As regards the “middle east conflict”: _malign and manipulated_ psychology.

Post-WWII, post-Nazi Germany, Soviet Era agitation-propaganda leveraging anti-Semitic sentiment –> “Paranoid Delusional Narcissistic Reflection of Motivation“, i.e., the myth that the Jews were out to take over the middle east —

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

_Reflexive Control and the Encouragement of Absolute Nationalism_

Terrorism promotes intense concern with basic security wherever, however, and for whatever reason politically-focused violence takes place. In crayon fashion here (I’m pressed for time this morning), political violence associated with the Palestinian cause, from the air hijackings of the 1970s to the latest murder by car, essentially promotes Israeli nationalist fervor and the western program. The deeper problem: it never helped the Palestinians but rather the piratical leaderships drawing income from the sustaining of the conflict. Arafat passed away a multi-millionaire; Abbas has accumulated a similar share of wealth; Haniyeh and Mashaal have developed reputations as billionaires.

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

Israelis and Palestinians genuinely tired of near 70 years of artificially sustained conflict — and the “information / disinformation psychology” has been a part of keeping things just as they have been — may need to bring these questions up with “Moscow”.

Historically, Moscow has been intensely anti-Semitic — https://conflict-backchannels.com/2016/12/27/excerpt-1920s-the-spread-of-hate-russia-germany-laqueur/ — but under Putin’s guidance, somewhat opposite today. Things have changed even though Putin continues to foster or control or appreciate (choose any option) kleptocratic absolute power. This seems to me something Palestinian intelligentsia need to consider and research independently.

I often note that “the Hebrews are back in the Land of the Hebrews”, a trope that lends emphasis to authentic ethnolinguistic cultural affiliation with land. At the moment, there are fewer than 7,000 living language cultures on the planet, and each developed their language somewhere at some time. Baloch, Kurds, Hebrews, Pashtun have land claims as do others. I may grant that after 70 years of isolation and wicked disinformation, the Palestinians need not be the leading edge of “Arab pan-nationalism” which should have passed away with the Soviet Union (at the end of 1991). One may urge reconsideration for having become unique but perhaps misguided by the politics of a much earlier era and, all may hope, one passing finally into history.

 

End the Preoccupation With the Jews!

Easier said than done?

The world’s political science scholars may be unraveling the relationship between Stalin’s Russia and Hitler’s Germany in the first half of the 20th Century,  and today there’s plenty for reading as regards Moscow’s efforts to sustain a piratical feudalism even as it runs short on ready cash and the rest, less ready, appears sunk in western assets and banking institutions.

Change, so BackChannels may observe, must come slowly where it involves BIG Family, Military, and Religious Institutions.  In the feudal mode, money moves along more by way of relationships than by way of merit or virtue.  That’s life.  Such themes will never be black and white but they may be better balanced for ethical and moral merit — greater rule of law; greater real justice — in the long run.

Whether the latest assault on innocents will be quelled by security organizations or grown into an absurd set of what should be archaic struggles based in race and religion and any number of assorted lesser discriminators — black/white; Asian/European; gay/straight; single/married; poor/rich; etc. — we together shall see.

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FTAC: Dismissing the Mockery of the Mocking Bird

01 Thursday Jun 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Gaza, Israel, Middle East, Palestinia, Political Psychology

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The conversational partner wished to play Atticus on behalf of the Palestinians apparently beset by Israeli nationalist — “Zionazis” in the more fervent of anti-Semitic Lost Left circles.

The analogy fails, Mohammed, because the integrity in the American lawyer who would pursue justice — the truth — before an angered and bigoted mob would not find the interlocutors for the Palestinians, i.e., the clans, organizations, and leaders who have funneled so much money away from the Palestinians, particularly honest or sympathetic.

https://www.algemeiner.com/2017/05/29/norway-demands-palestinians-return-funding-for-youth-center-named-after-infamous-terrorist/

When the Soviet Union dissolved in bankruptcy, the nascent new Federation managed amid the ensuing non-state crime and chaos to sustain certain aspects of the old architecture and relationships, including those with extremists, but the SU really is gone, and practically every one of its former satellites prefers autonomy to renewed subjugation.

What choice — or choices — have the Palestinians today between Abbas and Haniyeh?

Everyone remembers the Palestinian children who died building tunnels into Israel to abet assault. http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/180400/hamas-killed-160-palestinian-children-to-build-terror-tunnels No modern and sane adult should wish to re-read the story and call it “resistance”.

Why placate or pander to such a mob?

–33–