Notes from the Left Coast

Drummond Pike’s Blog

As happens on many Monday mornings, I peruse my accumulated email – an unending slog through a backlog that seems to grow no matter what I do. This morning, I found this picture along with an email from one Victoria Watts of Survival International, who was announcing they were opening a new office in Berkeley.

I’ve heard of the group and that they do good work, so, with my cup of green tea in hand, I opened the photo.What struck me in this simple picture of the vitality of life in another part of the world was the contrast to my morning’s dose of sad news from the Middle East: a general declaring that we have too few troops in Afghanistan, a diplomat suggesting that if Israel bombed the Iranian nuclear labs it would save us many complications, and the ‘confession’ by an Iraqi held in connection with recent bombings that killed over 100 innocent souls.

As I cross into my sixth decade, and my fourth in this work, I am as befuddled as ever by the choices and priorities we make as a species to engage in unending violence toward one another instead of taking care of one another as this gentleman so clearly is doing with his child. What is it that makes so many of us – mostly male - so certain that our way is the right way, and anyone with a different notion is dirt.

Not so long ago, Robert McNamara died. He was one of the “best and the brightest” – those remarkable Ivy League educated folks who joined the Kennedy’s in the last great political paroxysm of progressive change 50 years ago. After the assassination, he stayed on as Johnson’s Secretary of Defense and, under his leadership, helped drive the US into its now iconic nightmare of Vietnam. Many things were used as rationales for that sad debacle – the Cold War, the Domino Theory, Contain China, the need for the US to be seen as the Superpower, the cause of democracy, the defense of the free enterprise system, and many more.

Virtually none of these stood the test of time. They were corrupt intellectually, and they corrupted all who subscribed to them who knew.

The question of our time is, do we accept that coexistence with fundamentalist governments is impossible – so impossible that we are willing to sacrifice young soldiers to impose our will over them? If one witnesses the longest of these regimes – Iran – it is hard to avoid that their challenge is far more internal than external. McNamara died a broken man, falling into tears in a recent interview as he recalled the mistakes he made the failure of his leadership at the time.

Will those who are leading us now, who are calling for more troops for Afghanistan, or bombs for Iran, will they learn from our past mistakes?  I’d hate to see Mr. Gates or Mr. Obama sitting in tears some decades from now as they reflect on their decisions.

A week ago, I attended the Global Progressive Forum, organized by Poul Ryup Rasmussen, former Prime Minister of Denmark and held in the Parliamentary hall of the European Union – an amazing space for such an event. It is called the Hemicycle and is a large oval space surrounded by 3 floors of “sky booths” containing the translators who were borrowed from the EU for the purposes of this two-day session. For an American, at least of my generation, it is with some embarrassment that I watched many of the representatives from various African, South American, Asian, and European countries in a facile way move between languages depending on who their audience happened to be. Me, I was consigned to grabbing the earphones whenever the speakers departed from English. (I’m happy to say that both of my children have avoided the mono-linguistic shortcomings of their father…)

A second, equally simple, observation at the GPF was the comfort that virtually the entire rest of the planet has with the idea of socialism and, perhaps more to the point, social democratic systems where the state plays a far more important role ensuring the social welfare of all its citizens and workers. America’s often outright hostility and deep skepticism of the role of government – not to mention the idea that government can be as well run an enterprise as any private organization of similar scale – has confused me for years. After all, my parents generation benefitted from the astonishingly successful governmental intervention in both the domestic economy and in international relations with more success than any other period in modern history. Government was the answer to the Depression and to the rise of fascism across the globe. No private enterprise could have achieved either outcome, much less had the foresight that was the Marshall Plan and the reconstruction of Japan and Korea. Yes, and the same generation was on duty when Vietnam happened and the Cold War flourished, but as a whole, there were an awful lot of good things about that era, and one has to think we may well be headed into a similar time. Lord knows, there are as many compelling challenges on the table.

May we live in interesting times.

Sy Hersh’s recent piece (New Yorker Magazine, July 7 & 14 , 2008 Issue) is one of the most frightening pieces I have read in years. In it, with his deft storytelling, he paints a picture of a struggle between the military command structure and the White House (primarily Dick Cheney) that has been pursuing an independent strategy to destabilize Iran.

Two things astonish: first, what was long thought a settled matter about the ability of the military command structure to oversee all field activities involving the use of lethal force, particularly important in a theater of operations such as the Middle East where what happens in a neighboring country can have very direct impact on our troops on the ground, turns out not to be the case. After all the scandals involving White House sanctioned “special operations,” Congress finally locked down the ability for independent action outside the military lines of command via the 1986 Defense Reorganization Actl…or did it? Remember the Iran Contra debacle? (more…)

One of my Sunday morning rituals is to read Frank Rich’s column in the NY Times “Week in Review” section. Rich is such a refreshing voice these days, speaking truth to power in such an erudite fashion, and how necessary he is now that the doyens of public opinion have decided to add William Kristol to the regular weekly line-up of pundits. The latter seems caught between competing shortcomings: often on the facts, but now increasingly on their interpretation.

But it is neither Rich nor Kristol that caught my attention this Sunday. No, it was…..the “Public Editor”! This fellow, Clark Hoyt, is intended to referee when folks get factually out of line – often relatively minor transgressions. But this column – hmmm – how to say? It was mind-blowing. You see there was this column on May 12th authored by one Edward N. Luttwak, the military historian, in which he basically said that Obama would be unwelcome in the Muslim world because he was an “apostate” for having rejected his father’s religion and followed his mother’s Christian tradition. He argued quite convincingly that nothing could retrieve Obama from his fate and that he would be subject to assassination that authorities in Muslim countries could do nothing about because Islam sanctions the murder of apostates. For those of us who so want Obama, or anyone else, to return the U.S. to a positive and respected role in the international community, the column was disturbing to say the least, for it undermined our hopes for a renewed era of international comity.

So….more than TWO WEEKS LATER….it all turns out to be a bunch of hooey. Check out Hoyt’s column yourself. He couldn’t find an Islamic scholar who agreed with this wacko historian Luttwak. Not a one. And the editors of the Times? It turned out they hadn’t even asked a scholar to comment. They “consulted the Koran” (the editors, that is) and reviewed articles, but no experts were sought out. One actually might begin to question the judgment of the Times’ Editorial Board, if I can say such a blasphemous thing. Does that make me an apostate?

Yesterday morning’s NY Times editorial on the embarrassing revelations that the National Security Council deliberated on the specific “harsh interrogation methods” (that were to be applied in specific cases) reminded me of Michael Kieschnick’s blog a week ago. Provocatively entitled, “Which Torture Method did Cheney Prefer?” it got me thinking.

My response? Simple: dogs. Big, barking, threatening dogs straining at their leashes wanting to sink their teeth into kneeling, naked, blind-folded prisoners. Yes, I’m quite sure of it. Cheney is a hunter guy. He even shoots guns, as his friend Harry Whittington can attest (they say all the birdshot was successfully removed). So, it’s my guess that Cheney made sure they used dogs to “harshly” interrogate those poor souls.

Just how is it that this guy, multiply deferred from the Vietnam draft as a student and then as an expecting parent, ends up as America’s chief of revenge? For isn’t that really what this torture stuff is all about? Getting “them” back for the 9/11 attack?

If we as a people have come down so far on the ladder of civilization that revenge motivates policy, we have fallen far indeed. The corruption of our principals is exceeded only by the corruption of our politics. It is truly time for change.

It’s an incredible spring day in NYC today, and I’m reflecting on our latest marker: more Americans have died in Iraq than died on 9/11. One wonders if our misguided taste for revenge has run its course, since how else does one explain what we’ve done?

Arrived today to spring in NYC. Blossoms on the trees, people soaking up the sun. Why do I keep thinking about Guantanamo? Probably because I watched an old Democracy Now podcast about this kid held there since he was 15. I wonder what his spring is like.

Also of interest:

Gitmo: The New Rules of War Documentary Clip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrcO_l9iELg

How do you sign up to do torture? Where is that dotted line filled out saying that, “no, I don’t mind seeing another human being scream in agony, agony that I cause in the name of something or in the interest of ‘intelligence’?” The answer, according to Stanford’s Phillip Zimbardo, one of our nation’s experts on the subject, is that people don’t sign up. They absorb the permission from the system they are a part of.

At the recent TED Conference in Monterey, Zimbardo set forth his trim assessment that there are essentially no “bad apples”, which is how the military explained Abu Ghraib. In fact, he asserted, there aren’t even bad barrels. Instead, there are bad barrel makers – the designers of the system – that really hold responsibility. If you need any reinforcement for this argument, just read JoAnne Wypijewski’s extraordinary article in the March/April issue of Mother Jones. It will curl your hair. They have created a system that will not learn from its experience and will not accept responsibility for the wrong that was done. In so doing, they damage us all even more.

In her step by step excavation of the way the military has “held itself accountable”, she outlines in detail what we all know: the grunts on the ground paid a heavy price – many with years in prison. But NONE of their commanding officers has had anything more than a hand slap. It is truly remarkable, and, surprise, surprise, the press is oblivious. No coverage. No outrage. No accountability.

At one point, she recites what we may recall from early press reports – Secretary Rumsfeld received daily briefings on the intelligence gathered. He was focused on Abu Ghraib and had urged the use of the “strong” tactics used to achieve the intelligence as has often been reported. Everyone in the military knew that he and the Vice President believed in harsh tactics. That virtually all the intelligence was garbage seems beside the point. That no one holds any responsibility nor has been held accountable for one of the worst chapters in American history, and, arguably, one of the contributing factors to America’s precipitous decline in international circles.

Somehow, the defender of liberty and freedom and democracy has become the perpetrator of inhumanity, violence, and torture in the name of the emergency of terrorism. How was it that the Nazis explained why Jews needed to be rounded up? What emergency deprived them of their civil liberties?

Military necessity is used to justify the harshest measures of the state – the deprivation of a citizen’s rights. Has it ever been proven worthwhile? Outside of the mind-numbing, fiction of “24” on television, I don’t think so.

The List

I want to share with all of you something I recently shared with Lorenzo, Jane, Mike A and Farnaz, for their persistence in working with a new client, the “List” project.

This all started with a phone call from a very perplexed young man intent on starting a new program to advocate on behalf of the hundreds, even thousands, of Iraqis who have worked for American interests in the war (as translators, drivers, cleaners, etc.). Turns out we Americans were fine having them work for us there, but now that they are targeted for having done so, we have no interest in offering them visas to come here and avoid almost certain death. Instead, we are consigning them to questionable fates in refugee camps in Syria and Jordan. He had a deal to become a program with Amnesty fall apart (they wanted to charge him 35% overhead!) and was at a loss.

In the course of two or three days, Tides redirected a grant from the Tides Foundation, set him up as a consultant in the Tides Center, and got him moving through the process to become a full Tides Center Project within 60 days. He couldn’t believe it. This is from my email to this extraordinary team - clearly all Cranes at heart! - after learning what they had all accomplished.

“I want to appreciate just how amazing this team was. They were responsive, thoughtful, and so smart. I was really impressed. I know from talking with this particular client that his [terrible] experience with Amnesty - one of the most respected institutions around - was the opposite of what he experienced with Tides. I really hope that he can appreciate what happened here.

A special thanks to Lorenzo, for moving through the Foundation’s processes so adroitly. Just splendid. Sometimes, we find a client for whom we want to go out on a limb. In this case, if he achieves half of what he has set out for himself, I think we will all take pride in having helped the work.

“What I hope we all can take away from this is a lesson in discerning those situations where time is of the essence, and recognizing what a difference creative work-arounds and adroit intake can make. I know we cannot do this regularly, but when we can, its impact can be huge.”

I want to highlight a new Tides donor, Ishmael Beah, who hosted a “tea discussion” with Tides staff on the afternoon of the New York launch. Ishmael is a 26 year old whose new Tides fund will support young people in his native Sierra Leone, where he was a child soldier.

Now an activist, and author of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, Ishmael serves on many international human rights commissions, and is a brilliant writer with a captivating presence. During the discussion, Ishmael elaborated on the inspiration behind his fund and his plans for implementation.

Ishmael Beah Fund

Ishmael has lived through the kind of death and destruction that most of us cannot imagine. His work with Tides is one of his ways healing and creating change. The purpose of the Ishmael Beah Fund is to assist in the rehabilitation and reintegration of former child soldiers as they transition back into their communities after years of captivity and torture. It will support projects run by local organizations in Sierra Leone and other African countries that deal with the rehabilitation and reintegration of children who have been used as weapons in war.

Rene Joslyn in NYC is Ishmael’s Philanthropic Advisor, and she facilitated the tea discussion last week. Kudos, also, to Gary Schwartz for having the vision to secure Ishmael as a donor.

As a token of his appreciation, Ishmael gave a signed a copy of his book to Tides. It is inscribed to the Tides San Francisco Office, and was delivered via Berit and Gary to me. I encourage you to read it, as it is a remarkable story of the resilience of the human spirit and a great reminder of why we do this work.

For more details about his book, and life see videos at
http://www.alongwaygone.com/media.html
.