[PEN-L] U.S. Senate Rejects Bill with Iraq Withdrawal Timeline
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/16/news/congress.php U.S. Senate rejects bill with Iraq withdrawal timeline By Jeff Zeleny and Carl Hulse Wednesday, May 16, 2007 WASHINGTON: Democrats who are highly critical of President George W. Bush's Iraq war strategy suffered a stinging defeat on Wednesday when the Senate overwhelmingly rejected a measure to cut off money for the military campaign by March 31, 2008. The measure, in the form of an amendment to an unrelated water-projects bill, was effectively rejected, 67 to 29, with 19 Democrats voting against it in a procedural vote. Sixty yes votes were required for the measure to advance, meaning that it fell short by 31 votes. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Deepening class struggle in Venezuela
On 5/17/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie wrote: Iran demonstrates that an oil exporter can achieve food self sufficiency in key staples if the government tries (see below), but Venezuela's agricultural labor force as percentage of the total labor force was 6.9% in 2004 (16.8% in 1978), whereas Iran's is 24.7% in the same year (40.7% in 1978), so Venezuela may be too far gone to aim to reduce food import. It is meretricious in the extreme to compare Venezuela and Iran, as I have already pointed out. Regarding comparison of Iran and Venezuela, Hugo Chavez doesn't agree with you, nor would researchers who do comparative work on political economy (it's hard to find any other pair of countries whose assets are more similar to each other than Iran and Venezuela). See Greg Wilpert's 2005 report on Venezuela's land reform below -- many of the problems identified in it have not been effectively addressed. What Venezuela can learn from Iran includes infrastructure investment and support programs (ranging from education, research, credit, insurance, distribution of seeds, guaranteed prices, etc. -- see ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/meeting/010/ag355e.pdf), without which land reforms are not as effective as they can be. I'm sure Chavez and his comrades are open to learning from other countries' experiences. http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1529 Venezuela's Land Reform Land for People not for Profit in Venezuela Tuesday, Aug 23, 2005 By: Gregory Wilpert – Venezuelanalysis.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Problems with the Land Reform Despite the advances that have been made with the land reform, relative to the enormous expectation raised by Chavez's Bolivarian Revolution, and based on the country's past experiences with the issue and relative to experiences in other countries, Venezuela's peasants are quite frustrated. There are at least five problem-complexes that are the cause of this frustration and are hindering the land reform process in Venezuela. One can summarize these problems as involving the legal framework, general insecurity and impunity, weak peasant organization, poor infrastructure and support, and economic problems. Weak legal framework The combination of legal challenges to land redistribution and the poor quality of Venezuela's land title registry has made the expropriation and redistribution of privately held land extremely difficult and slow. This situation has also affected the redistribution of publicly held land because in many cases large landowners claim to own lands that the Venezuelan state also claims to own. Even though the government has been relatively rapid with the handing out of land use rights, many feel these are legally insufficient. Recent high-profile efforts to take over land that the state considers to be illegally held (such as the Hatos Piñero and El Charcote), moved the issue of the legality of privately held land to the front burner for a while, but once press attention died down, the effort to resolve these land dispute cases seemed to die down too. This lack of ocupación previa is also a critical weakness in the legal framework for the land reform. General lawlessness and impunity Further complicating the land reform is the relatively lawless, insecure, and chaotic situation in Venezuela's countryside. Peasants not only have to deal with ruthless landowners who are intent on maintaining control over their latifundios, often with use of hired assassins and bullies, they also have to deal with drug smugglers, irregular military forces (such as Colombia's paramilitary group and an emerging Venezuelan paramilitary counter-part), and corrupt Venezuelan police and military forces. Even though the peasant group CANEZ has tried to call attention to the more than 130 assassinations of peasant leaders, their efforts have had little success, and the government has been very slow to deal with the problem. Only in July 2005, for the first time, did CANEZ and another organzation, the Frente Ezequiel Zamora, organize a protest in Caracas to demand government action. The National Assembly finally responded shortly after the protest and formed a commission to investigate the assassinations. Weak peasant organization Complicating things further is the fact that Venezuela's peasant organizations are very weak, in part because the history of a collapsing agricultural economy due to Dutch Disease. This means that even though they have a sympathetic government, they are not in a position to exert pressure on the government so that it makes sure the land reform is fully implemented. If Venezuela had stronger peasant organizations they could probably accomplish much in terms of social oversight over the land reform process. Also, more pressure would probably mean stronger law enforcement when it comes to investigating and prosecuting those responsible for the 130 assassinations of peasant leaders. A result of the weak level
Re: [PEN-L] Deepening class struggle in Venezuela
On 5/17/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: Regarding comparison of Iran and Venezuela, Hugo Chavez doesn't agree with you, nor would researchers who do comparative work on political economy (it's hard to find any other pair of countries whose assets are more similar to each other than Iran and Venezuela). Hugo Chavez doesn't agree with me on what? That Iran and Venezuela have much in common and two nations must support each other. Venezuela, unlike Iran, has not been compelled by external circumstances such as economic sanctions to develop its domestic industry and agriculture so far, so Venezuela has a harder task of having to voluntarily do so (which few oil exporters do). How to do so is a question that leftists might be interested in if they wanted to be of use to the Bolivarian Revolution. Venezuela doesn't need uncritical cheer-leaders -- it could use research. See Greg Wilpert's 2005 report on Venezuela's land reform below -- many of the problems identified in it have not been effectively addressed. What Venezuela can learn from Iran includes infrastructure investment and support programs (ranging from education, research, credit, insurance, distribution of seeds, guaranteed prices, etc. -- see ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/meeting/010/ag355e.pdf), without which land reforms are not as effective as they can be. I'm sure Chavez and his comrades are open to learning from other countries' experiences. I guess that your evasion of my points on the White Revolution land reform are to be expected. The Shah's White Revolution did not bring egalitarian rural development that the Iranian Revolution of 1978-9 has, and you would have known that if you had read my previous posts: shorty before the revolution, near the end of the Shah's regime, GINI indexes for both urban and rural areas, as shown in Figure 5: The Gini Index of Inequality of Household Expenditures, 1971-04 on p. 27, rose to all-time highs (Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, Revolution and Redistribution in Iran: Poverty and Inequality 25 Years Later, August 2006, pp. 26 and 34 http://www.filebox.vt.edu/users/salehi/Iran_poverty_trend.pdf), which the revolution corrected and has held down. http://web.worldbank.org/external/default/main?pagePK=51187349piPK=51189435theSitePK=312943menuPK=64187510searchMenuPK=312984theSitePK=312943entityID=90341_20041207102532searchMenuPK=312984theSitePK=312943 Primary Health Care and the Rural Poor in the Islamic Republic of Iran Amir Mehryar 2004 Abstract: Rural households in Iran have traditionally been the most disadvantaged segment of Iranian society, not only in terms of income and political power but also in accessing basic public services, including health. A major achievement of public policy in Iran over the past 20 years has been the improvement of rural health and the near elimination of health disparities between higher-income urban populations and the rural poor. For example, in 1974 the infant mortality rate was 120 and 62 per thousand live births for rural and urban areas, respectively. By 2000, however, both the level and the differential of infant mortality had declined considerably, to 30 for rural areas and 28 for urban ones. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Petropolitics in Latin America
Do the estimates below seem accurate to you? http://www.thedialogue.org/publications/2006/winter/arriagada.pdf Petropolitics in Latin America A Review of Energy Policy and Regional Relations Genaro Arriagada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Stagnant production: While Venezuela has vast reserves, it has not raised production levels.The UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) reports that Venezuela's gross domestic product (GDP) grew 17.9 percent in 2004, a rebound from the severe downturn of 2002 and 2003. Estimates for 2005 set growth at about 9.3 percent. However, ECLAC also adds that …expected GDP growth will not come from oil production, which has yet to recover to pre–strike levels as a result of insufficient investment. These factors have led Venezuela to produce at levels below OPEC ceilings. Sector strength will depend exclusively on world price increases, as […] capacity for expanded production remains extremely limited. Assessing how much production has fallen is difficult without reliable PDVSA figures. While the company says production has returned to 2000 and 2001 levels -- about 3.1 million barrels per day (bpd) -- independent reports estimate that it did not exceed 2.7 million bpd. Investment: To maintain current output, Venezuela's oil industry requires considerable annual investment, especially in exploration and production. Evidence indicates that PDVSA investment falls significantly short of these minimum levels. PDVSA's plan for 2005-2010 calls for investing $6.3 billion from public sources and an extra $2.5 billion from private sources. While no official figures are available, 2005 estimates indicate that slightly over half the PDVSA target will be reached, less than $3.5 billion. Private investment is also predicted to fall short of the target due to uncertainty about foreign property rights and investment policy. These estimates indicate that oil output will continue to slide or, at best, remain at current levels. PDVSA investment falls short of the investment levels of other state-owned regional oil companies. Estimates show that PEMEX, the state-owned Mexican petroleum company, invested more than twice as much as PDVSA in 2003. The Brazilian state-owned oil company, Petrobras, invested over 150 percent more. It recently announced annual investments of $12 billion through the year 2010 -- more than three times as much as PDVSA. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Venezuela Lets Councils Bloom
One thing that Chavez and his comrades are doing extremely well is to create an environment in which people learn to govern themselves. No one can take away that invaluable education and experience from them, and they are likely to make the right decisions when oil prices go down, those who are called Bolivarian bourgeoisie as well as the opposition who are temporarily on the defensive get restive, and hard economic decisions must be made. -- Yoshie http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/16/AR2007051602547.html Venezuela Lets Councils Bloom Critics Say Chávez Backs Local Bodies to Boost Central Control By Juan Forero Washington Post Foreign Service Thursday, May 17, 2007; A10 CARACAS, Venezuela -- Nelly Baric calls herself a Chavista, a die-hard follower of President Hugo Chávez. Roberto Naguanagua doesn't, saying he's an opponent of the populist, nationalist government. But both Baric and Naguanagua are eagerly participating in one of Chávez's most far-reaching experiments -- community councils that, with money, government consent and popular support, could redraw the way government works in this country. Thousands of councils have been founded nationwide, and they have made decisions on almost everything from trash collection to school construction. Though no one -- not even Chávez -- has said with certainty just how far community councils will go, many inside and outside government say the idea is to steer Venezuela away from municipal councils and mayors and hand funding and decision-making directly to the people. If this works, community councils could bury city hall, but something better will be born, said Naguanagua, a teacher who, like Baric, belongs to the council of La Hacienda Maria, in Caracas, Venezuela's capital. The councils have been buoyed by success stories in some neighborhoods and tarnished by cases of corruption and incompetence in others. But overall, the process of grass-roots decision-making is providing a street-level view into how one of Latin America's more intriguing leaders is trying to bring what he calls a revolution to his country. Even with the mistakes, the people are emerging, the poorest people, occupying spaces that were occupied before by those blind, hardened classes, José Vicente Rangel, who was replaced as vice president in January, said in an interview. That is the central point of what is happening in the country. Some opposition leaders, though, are less certain, suggesting that the councils could be manipulated by a president who already has control of the National Assembly, the judiciary, the state oil company and the country's purse strings. Leopoldo López, the mayor of the affluent Chacao district of Caracas, said he and others are concerned that the councils are designed to usurp funding and political power from the municipalities, the few remaining entities on the political map where the opposition remains active. He notes that as part of a constitutional reform the president is planning, government specialists have sought to eliminate as many as 200 of the country's 335 municipalities. The focus on community councils could speed that process, he said. They want to ensure one government, where the central government controls local government, López said. They want to eliminate the middle ground, the governorships, the mayors. Teodoro Petkoff, a left-leaning newspaper editor and a government minister before Chávez came to power, said giving power to the people through community councils could be a magnificent idea. But Petkoff, a steady critic of the government in the pages of his irreverent newspaper, Tal Cual, said he does not trust Chávez to permit the councils to function independently. He noted that the Soviets tried a similar experiment, ostensibly to let the people rule directly, but that it failed miserably as party bosses centralized power. For me, there's no doubt that a man with such hardened centralized concepts as Chávez will, in a constitutional reform, eliminate any kind of decentralized process, Petkoff said. Even in the government, some of the more independent-minded thinkers have concerns. Rigoberto Lanz, a sociologist and a top adviser in the Ministry of Science and Technology, said the councils seem to be operating in fits and starts, without a mechanism for making truly big decisions. And while the idea would in theory democratize Venezuela, he said, he wondered whether the councils would not counteract the administration's hold over government. It's a metaphor that may not mean a lot or, on the contrary, may mean the progressive empowerment of the people, Lanz said. But there could be an immediate clash with a counter-logic that is culturally and structurally in place, and that's the logic of the state. Meaning, all the people power is automatically in an anti-state orientation. In the neighborhoods, it's hard to find anything but bubbling enthusiasm for the councils. Council members are
[PEN-L] Bolivarian Bourgeoisie: Creada Confederación de Empresarios Socialistas de Venezuela
This is an aspect of Venezuela seldom discussed by the English-speaking Left. -- Yoshie http://www.rnv.gov.ve/noticias/index.php?act=STf=2t=46788 En Caracas Creada Confederación de Empresarios Socialistas de Venezuela La nueva confederación se vinculará con todas las áreas empresariales: comercio, servicios, turismo, agroturismo, agricultura, ganadería, pesca, construcción, tecnología, transferencia de tecnología, importación, exportación y otros. Prensa Web RNV/ABN 9 Mayo 2007, 08:06 PM Con el respaldo de cerca de 500 mil empresarios de todo el país y de 23 cámaras gremiales, este miércoles se efectuó en Caracas el lanzamiento oficial de la Confederación de Empresarios Socialistas de Venezuela (Conseven). Así lo informó el presidente de la Confederación de Agricultores y Ganaderos de Venezuela (Confagan) y titular electo de Conseven por los próximos dos años, José Agustín Campos, quien se mostró satisfecho por la asistencia de más de mil 400 empresarios al acto de creación de esta asociación de apoyo al modelo socialista. Campos explicó que la nueva confederación se vinculará con todas las áreas empresariales: comercio, servicios, turismo, agroturismo, agricultura, ganadería, pesca, construcción, tecnología, transferencia de tecnología, importación, exportación, contingencia y empleo, entre otras. Agregó que la meta de esa organización gremial es fomentar la inversión de empresarios nacionales y extranjeros y la incorporación de todos los industriales con una visión progresista y socialista de país, para lo cual acudirán a instancias nacionales e internacionales y difundirán un mensaje de confianza. Entre las organizaciones participantes en Conseven se encuentran Empresarios por Venezuela (Empreven), Cámara Bolivariana de la Construcción (CBC), Cámara de Comercio Venezolano-Caribeña (CCVC) y la Federación Venezolana de Entes Productivos (Fedevep). -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Deepening class struggle in Venezuela
On 5/17/07, s.artesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On a different note or maybe not-- Yoshie, there is absolutely no correlation between percent of population engaged in agriculture and food self-sufficiency. On the contrary, the correlation is usually negative. The lower the percentage of population required for food production, the higher the gross output. Simple, really-- substitution of machinery, technique for labor. Productivity in agriculture being a result of overall productivity. Agriculture in the United States is a good example of that (cf. http://www.ers.usda.gov/Data/AgProductivity/), but presumably that is not the kind of agricultural development that the Venezuelan government plans on emulating. Venezuela's agricultural situation is not due to too few people engaged in food production, It is striking that the proportion of people engaged in agriculture in Venezuela is already close to the range of the North. What might it mean to implement land reform in this context? It seems to me that the problem also has a lot to do with the gap between the natural environment of the country and a historically new but now predominant consumption habit: http://www.fas.usda.gov/pecad/highlights/2005/07/July2005/Venezuela_Jul05.htm Venezuela: Agricultural Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wheat According to the U.S. Agricultural Attache, wheat production in Venezuela is negligible. The little wheat produced in the Venezuelan Andean region is milled and consumed close to where it is harvested. The lack of temperate climatic conditions and suitable land for planting the crop are the main reasons for limited production. Though it produces virtually no wheat, Venezuelans consume large quantities of bread, crackers, pastries and pasta. Despite the current economic recession in Venezuela, wheat consumption has remained strong since pasta and bread are low-cost basic staples of the Venezuelan diet and constitutes much of the diet of poorer Venezuelans. The consumption of pasta has grown in the past 5 years, as low-income households began to substitute it for meat in their diet due to falling disposable incomes. Per capita consumption of pasta is the second highest in the world behind Italy at 14 kg per year. Currently, wheat consumption in Venezuela is second only to corn, and at 47 kg per capita per year amounts to 37 percent of total national grain consumption. Venezuela imports virtually all of its wheat requirements, and at an estimated 1.6 million tons in 2005/06 wheat makes up 70 percent of all grain imports. Venezuela ranked 16th in total wheat imports in 2004/05, with the world's top-5 importers being Egypt (7.7 million tons), China (7.0), Japan (5.7), Brazil (5.0), and Algeria (4.5). -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Deepening class struggle in Venezuela
On 5/17/07, michael a. lebowitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 22:37 17/05/2007, you wrote: http://www.fas.usda.gov/pecad/highlights/2005/07/July2005/Venezuela_Jul05.htm Venezuela: Agricultural Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wheat According to the U.S. Agricultural Attache, wheat production in Venezuela is negligible. The little wheat produced in the Venezuelan Andean region is milled and consumed close to where it is harvested. The lack of temperate climatic conditions and suitable land for planting the crop are the main reasons for limited production. Though it produces virtually no wheat, Venezuelans consume large quantities of bread, crackers, pastries and pasta. Despite the current economic recession in Venezuela, wheat consumption has remained strong since pasta and bread are low-cost basic staples of the Venezuelan diet and constitutes much of the diet of poorer Venezuelans. The consumption of pasta has grown in the past 5 years, as low-income households began to substitute it for meat in their diet due to falling disposable incomes. huh? The USDA stats mainly come out of the data through 2004, and based on what Mark Weisbrot, et al. have to say about the poverty trends in Venezuela (which I had posted to PEN-l at http://www.mail-archive.com/pen-l@sus.csuchico.edu/msg23077.html), which shows that It's only in 2005 when Venezuela managed to get back out of the hole created by the opposition's sabotage and come back to the 1999 level (when Chavez assumed presidency), I doubt the USDA is making the stats up. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Re: [PEN-L] Bolivarian Bourgeoisie: Creada Confederación de Empresarios Socialistas de Venezuela
On 5/17/07, michael a. lebowitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 22:13 17/05/2007, you wrote: This is an aspect of Venezuela seldom discussed by the English-speaking Left. -- Yoshie http://www.rnv.gov.ve/noticias/index.php?act=STf=2t=46788 En Caracas Creada Confederación de Empresarios Socialistas de Venezuela Patience and a sense of irony are essential virtues for a Bolshevik. I was looking into historical stats of commodity prices and found this: The Recent Rise in Commodity Prices: A Long-run Perspective, Reserve Bank Bulletin, April 2007, http://www.rba.gov.au/PublicationsAndResearch/Bulletin/bu_apr07/rec_rise_com_prices_long_run_pers.html. Low interest rates in the USA, dramatic economic growth in China, political instability in the Middle East, etc. have combined to produce commodity booms, especially oil boom, in recent years. That has allowed not only Venezuela but also other countries whose economic circumstances are relatively similar to it to pursue policies that, to various degrees, break with the Washington Consensus, while also making it possible for the bourgeoisie of their countries to make good profits (discontent as hard-line capitalists still are). But I don't think that we have as much time as the Reserve Bank of Australia suggests we might: There are good reasons to believe that strong demand from emerging economies in particular may continue for several decades. That said, as long as the bourgeoisie exist in your nation, it's better to subordinate them to the state than vice versa. The Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Russia is Yevgeny Primakov now, which is a good sign, and in Iran, One interesting fact about the Iranian economy is that the only institution representing the private sector has been the publicly run Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Mines. This entity, which understands itself as the representative of the private sector, is overshadowed by the state sector -- to the extent that the president of the chamber is proposed by the Minister of Commerce (Bijan Khajehpour, Domestic Political Reforms and Private Sector Activity in Iran, Social Research, Summer 2000, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2267/is_2_67/ai_63787344/print). I love Iran as you know, and I also regard the development of Russia under Putin favorably overall, but neither says it is or will be socialist, so I judge them by capitalist standards. In contrast, the Venezuelan government has set itself up as the standard bearer of 21st Century Socialism, a new model that is even better than Cuban socialism (which is my favorite model of state socialism), so it has raised expectations, including mine! -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] West Asks If Musharraf Is Dispensable
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/World/Europe/West_asks_if_Musharraf_is_dispensable/articleshow/2050626.cms West asks if Musharraf is dispensable 16 May, 2007 l 0014 hrs ISTlRASHMEE ROSHAN LALL/TIMES NEWS NETWORK LONDON: Seven years after General Musharraf seized control, Pakistan's continuing unrest and political turmoil may have set the clock ticking for the military dictator with Western capitals finally asking the loaded question: Is Musharraf dispensable? In a significant loss of support for the General, hitherto rock-solid and well-supported ally of the Andlo-American coalition in the so-called 'war on terror', Western commentators said on Tuesday that Pakistan's crisis had 'reached boiling point'. Even as diplomats sent the 21st-century equivalent of urgent telegram despatches from Islamabad to European capitals, leading commentators described the General's escalating problems as a moment of truth for him and the Washington-London axis that supports him. In its lead editorial on Tuesday, wittily titled 'General unrest', The Guardian asked, How long will he (Musharraf) be able to carry on? Identifying one of the General's major headaches as a protest by the very elites — middle-class lawyers and bureaucrats — who supported the General's attempts to clean up the country's corrupt political class when he took over seven years ago, the paper said today, the military ruler is looking to many of the middle class who supported his coup, as if he has passed his sell-by date. It ended, on a grave note of warning for Washington and London to ration its support for Musharraf, It is not elections that beckon, but a state of emergency... America's chief regional ally in the war on terror is in the biggest crisis of his political and military life. The Financial Times similarly editorialised dolefully that General Musharraf's determination to be re-elected president while staying on as head of the army has led him into a political blind alley. It commented that the Pakistan president is now in danger of forfeiting western support and recommended Musharraf do what he first promised — engineer a transition back to democracy. His allies should try to persuade him to hold a general election, step down as army commander and then stand, out of uniform, as a candidate in a presidential election. It said, The Pakistani president is elected indirectly, being chosen by a college of the upper and lower houses of parliament and the four state parliaments. It is a risk for Musharraf, but one worth taking. Given the economic record of which he boasts, there is a good chance he would win. In yet another editorial note of caution, The Independent said the greatest challenge to President Musharraf's authority since he took power could not be explained simply by going back to Pakistan's troubled tryst with democracy. Even as the paper acknowledged that Since its foundation, Pakistan has been a complex and unstable country, it insisted that even by such turbulent standards, this represents a major crisis. At the heart of the matter is the position of President Musharraf. The press comment on Pakistan's very visible disarray chimes with the view of Western diplomatic observers who believe it may be growing increasingly difficult for Washington and London to overlook the embarrassing reality that Musharraf heads a military dictatorship. Observers say the General's refusal to regularise his position may become increasingly difficult for the West to sweep under the carpet with Pakistan widely believing Musharraf dismissed Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry because he wanted a more obedient figure at the head of the judiciary in case of a constitutional challenge to his position after the November elections as Pakistan's president and army chief. But in a noteworthy piece spelling out the realpolitik aspects of Musharraf's troubled situation, The Guardian's Simon Tisdall pointed out that Washington and London's continued support is measured in the following terms — hunting down Al Qaida, disrupting local connections to terror cells and networks in the West and pacifying Afghanistan. These, said Tisdall, are key benchmarks for continued Western support but growing impatience with Musharraf's track record in Western capitals could not hide one key fact: unless the West finds a credible successor who will continue to support US policies, Washington and London may find it better to continue to work with Musharraf despite his shortcomings. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Neo-Cons Driving Iran Divestment Campaign
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=37687 POLITICS-US: Neo-Cons Driving Iran Divestment Campaign Jim Lobe WASHINGTON, May 10 (IPS) - Neo-conservative hawks who championed the invasion of Iraq are leading a new campaign to persuade state and local governments, as well as other institutional investors, to divest their holdings in foreign companies and U.S. overseas subsidiaries doing business in Iran. While stressing that U.S. military action against Iran's nuclear programme should not be taken off the table, they call their divestment strategy the non-violent tool for countering the Iranian threat. And, like the run-up to the Iraq war, the campaign has attracted bipartisan support. Democrats, including those who strongly oppose the George W. Bush administration's Iraq policy, see divestment, as well as other proposed economic sanctions against Tehran, as a way to look tough on Iran short of going to war. I'm not yet ready to suggest the use of military force... but one has to stay on alert that that time could come sooner rather than later, James Woolsey, who served briefly as former President Bill Clinton's CIA director, told an Ohio legislative committee this week in support of a bill that would ban investments by the state's pension funds in companies operating in Iran or in any other country the State Department lists as a state sponsor of terrorism. Terror-free investing will not solve the problems... but I think it's an important part of the comprehensive package, added Woolsey, a prominent neo-conservative associated with the like-minded Foundation for the Defence of Democracies (FDD). The new campaign, the brainchild of the far-right Centre for Security Policy (CSP), is designed to put pressure on the Islamic Republic to abandon its nuclear programme, end its support of anti-Israel groups like Palestinian Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah, and perhaps even to push (it) toward collapse, according to FDD president Clifford May, by depriving it of foreign investment and commercial ties with other countries. According to a report released here Wednesday by the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute, which is collaborating with the CSP, Iran has signed more than 150 billion dollars worth of investment and commercial contracts with foreign companies based in more than 30 countries since 2000, including more than four billion dollars with U.S. overseas subsidiaries. The initiative, which is modeled after the anti-apartheid divestment campaign against South Africa of the 1980s, is also backed by major pro-Israel and Jewish groups, including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, and local Jewish Community Relations Councils whose membership is worried that Israel will be threatened by a nuclear-armed Iran. Potentially at stake are billions of dollars controlled by state pension funds and other institutional investors that have invested money in companies -- based mostly in Europe and Asia -- operating in Iran. According to CSP, New York pension funds alone own nearly one billion dollars of stock in three Fortune 500 companies tied to Iran. Iran's ability to fund its nuclear programme and sponsor terrorism would come to a grinding halt without revenue gained from foreign investors, according to CSP, which, along with the American Enterprise Institute and FDD, was a leading advocate for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Last year, Missouri became the first state to order one of its pension funds to divest its shares of all companies that do business with Iran and other countries on the State Department's terror list. Last month, both houses of the Florida legislature unanimously approved a bill banning the investment of state funds in companies with commercial ties to Sudan and Iran's energy sector. Iran-related divestment bills are expected to be approved over the next month by legislatures in Ohio, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and California, according to Christopher Holton, the head of CSP's Terror-Free Investing programme. Similar bills are also being considered in the legislatures of Texas, Georgia, Maryland, and New Jersey and will soon be introduced in Michigan and Illinois, he told IPS. The sudden proliferation of state divestment measures comes amid renewed efforts in Congress to tighten and expand the scope of existing legislation against Iran. Under the 1996 Iran Sanctions Act (ISA), which, among other provisions, bans U.S. companies from doing business in Iran, the president is required to impose a range of economic sanctions against foreign companies that invested more than 20 million dollars a year in Iran's energy sector, which accounts for about 80 percent of its foreign-exchange earnings. The same law, however, permits the president to waive such penalties if he deems it in the national interest. Worried that imposing sanctions would anger key U.S. allies, President Bush has consistently exercised his waiver authority,
Re: [PEN-L] Pakistan's Nuclear Forces, 2007
On 5/16/07, Ulhas Joglekar [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The Bulletin Online http://www.thebulletin.org/ Volume 63, Number 3 / May/June 2007 Pakistan's Nuclear Forces, 2007 Robert Norris Pakistan, which has a nuclear arsenal of about 60 nuclear weapons is busily enhancing its nuclear capabilities. http://thebulletin.metapress.com/content/k4q43h2104032426/fulltext.pdf I wonder who will inherit them as Musharraf appears on the verge of getting dumped by the West, though it's not clear if he has also lost the support of the military. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Court Overturns Turk Officers' Sentences in Blast
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L16638054.htm Court overturns Turk officers' sentences in blast 16 May 2007 08:58:46 GMT Source: Reuters DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, May 16 (Reuters) - Turkey's Supreme Court overturned a 40-year jail term on Wednesday imposed on two paramilitary officers over their role in a controversial bombing two years ago, the state-run Anatolian news agency said. The bombing of a bookstore in the eastern town of Semdinli shined a spotlight on Turkey's so-called deep state, code for elements in the security forces and state bureaucracy ready to take the law into their own hands in pursuit of their aims. The blast, which killed one person, sparked riots across Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast amid claims by mainstream media that security forces had deliberately planned it to stir up unrest in the region, long blighted by separatist violence. The Supreme Court quashed the sentences of 39 years and five months dished out to each of the two non-commissioned officers, Ali Kaya and Ozcan Ildeniz, saying there had been shortcomings in the investigation. The court recommended their case be re-examined by a local military court. The case, peppered with controversy, has been seen as a test case of European Union candidate Turkey's judicial system. Last year a public prosecutor was fired after he accused the head of Turkey's military General Staff, Yasar Buyukanit, of organising an illegal group to carry out the bombing. Buyukanit was head of Turkey's land forces at the time of the blast. The prosecutor said Buyukanit was trying to foment unrest and harm Turkey's bid to join the European Union. The armed forces denied all the accusations. Buyukanit recently described the Semdinli affair as a legal disaster. The EU has expressed concern over the sacking of the official and has demanded a full and transparent investigation. A former guerrilla of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) is also serving a 40-year jail sentence for the Nov. 9, 2005, attack in the small border town near Iran and Iraq. Security forces have been battling the PKK since it launched its armed campaign for an ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984, in a conflict that has claimed more than 30,000 lives. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Neo-Cons Driving Iran Divestment Campaign
On 5/16/07, Daniel Davies [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Divestment campaigns are almost a clear sign of someone who doesn't know what they're talking about. I meant to pass this on earlier this week; hedge fund manager Cody Willard talking about the Darfur divestment thing. Some of it will be rather grating to a pen-l audience in that he is quite unsentimental about making money out of other people's misfortune. But his underlying economic point is IMO very sensible; if you persuade Shell to divest from Darfur then voila - a $200bn economic entity that no longer cares about Darfur. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/bda5df12-f4ce-11db-b748-000b5df10621,dwp_uuid=d8e9ac 2a-30dc-11da-ac1b-0e2511c8.html apologies for the mammoth URL by the way The Darfur divestment campaign has been going on longer than the Iran divestment one. Has it even had any financial impact at all on Sudan's government? I've been wondering if it's not so much intended to actually have a big impact on politics in Sudan as to keep the issue alive here in the USA, the UK, and the rest of the West. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Iran, FAO, Biofuels
http://www.iranmania.com/News/ArticleView/Default.asp?NewsCode=51598NewsKind=Current%20Affairs http://www.iran-daily.com/1386/2842/html/economy.htm#s227361 FAO approves Iran new energy proposal Monday, May 14, 2007 LONDON, May 14 (IranMania) - The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has approved Iran's proposal to use new energy sources instead of biological fuels which have become a threat to global food security, Iran Daily reported. Iran's permanent representative at FAO, Javad Tavakkolian, told IRIB that the proposal was made at FAO's 33rd meeting of Global Food Security Committee. The meeting was aimed at discussing solutions to issues concerning hunger and malnutrition. The first issue the meeting focused on was countries such as the US and Brazil that use agricultural products to produce ethanol, Tavakkolian said. Iran proposed that solar energy and wind power could replace bio-fuels produced from agricultural products such as corn and sugar cane which not only has detrimental effects on the environment but is also harmful to the agricultural sector, he continued. The meeting also focused on studying the capabilities to ensure global food security. Iran has been heading FAO's regional office for the Near East and is considered successful in the fields of grains, protein and dairy products. Iran has also become self-sufficient in wheat and can be ranked among wheat exporting countries. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Deepening class struggle in Venezuela
On 5/16/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: NY Times, May 17, 2007 Clash of Hope and Fear as Venezuela Seizes Land By SIMON ROMERO snip The violence has gone both ways in the struggle, with more than 160 peasants killed by hired gunmen in Venezuela, including several here in northwestern Yaracuy State, an epicenter of the land reform project, in recent years. Eight landowners have also been killed here. It looks like government has not achieved full control yet. Democracy has its costs. Before the land reform started in 2002, an estimated 5 percent of the population owned 80 percent of the country's private land. The government says it has now taken over about 3.4 million acres and resettled more than 15,000 families. Global Exchange says that By the end of 2003, the government had signed 9,000 cartas agrarias providing about 60,000 peasant families with more than 5.5 million acres of land, far surpassing their target of 3.5 million acres (Land Reform in Venezuela, http://www.globalexchange.org/countries/americas/venezuela/venezuelalandreform.pdf), and Fred Fuentes says that By the end of 2004, at least 2 million hectares had been redistributed to 100,000 families, but nearly all of it was idle state-owned land. In a report on Venezuelanalysis.com on Sept. 26, Gregory Wilpert noted that 'it was not until early 2005 that the Chavez government turned its attention to privately held land' (12 Oct 05, http://www.greenleft.org.au/2005/645/33621). Is Romero only referring to the acres of private land taken over and given to peasants? But Venezuela, unlike many of its neighbors, has long imported most of its food, and uses less than 30 percent of its arable land to its full potential, according to the United Nations. A good part of the reason is the havoc that its oil wealth plays on the economy, with a strong currency during times of high oil prices making it cheaper to import food than to produce it at home. Meanwhile, vast cattle ranches take up large areas of arable land. Iran demonstrates that an oil exporter can achieve food self sufficiency in key staples if the government tries (see below), but Venezuela's agricultural labor force as percentage of the total labor force was 6.9% in 2004 (16.8% in 1978), whereas Iran's is 24.7% in the same year (40.7% in 1978), so Venezuela may be too far gone to aim to reduce food import. ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/meeting/010/ag355e.pdf FOLLOW-UP OF THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE WORLD FOOD SUMMIT PLAN OF ACTION NATIONAL REPORT Country: Islamic Republic of Iran Date of Report: 7 May 2006 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The value added of agriculture sector grew by annually 3.4 percent to 54,521 billion rials in 2003 from 35,094 billion rials in 1991 at 1997 constant price. In the same period, the share of agriculture in the GDP slightly declined from 14.3 to 13.7 percent, which was due to fast growth rates also in other sectors of the economy. The share of agriculture in capital investment, as a source for stimulating growth and development, in the last decade was annually about five percent. Agricultural exports grew by annually 5.1 percent to $1.48 billion in 2004 from $776 million in 1991. In this period the average share of agriculture in total employment was about 22 percent. Although this percentage was slightly less than that of the base year (24.6 percent), but the absolute number of people employed in agriculture had experienced a constant increase by annually 2.5 percent to 4.3 million in 2004 from 3.2 million in 1991. The trends prevailing since the last reporting period for WFS follow up largely reflect the general trend over the last two decades in which the sector has experienced tremendous development at all levels and components. In the last 25 years, agriculture production increased by annually 2.4 million tons to 88 million tons in 2004, from just 25.6 million tons in 1977. The breakdown of these figures is, respectively, field crops to 65 million tons from 19.5 million tons, fruits to 14 million tons from 2.7 million tons, livestock products to 9.3 million tons from 3.3 million tons, and aquatics to 0.47 million tons from only 50,000 tons. These figures mean that the per capita agricultural production almost doubled to 1,300 kg in 2004 from 753 kg in 1977. In the last decade, several successive droughts hit agriculture and rural life in different parts of Iran. Still the sector managed to even speed up the pace of growth and development, as a result of robust policies. The nation achieved self-sufficiency in wheat after several decades, while it imported about seven million tons of wheat just a few years ago. The total agricultural imports reduced by 100 percent and exports increased by 50 percent, which in aggregated led to a positive agricultural trade balance after thirty years. The following section provides a brief account of the major subsectors of agriculture in the period 1994-2004. . . . . . . . . . . . .
[PEN-L] The Flight from Iraq
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/magazine/13refugees-t.html The New York Times May 13, 2007 The Flight From Iraq By NIR ROSEN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . From the Iraqi perspective, the greatest loss has been the flight of the professional class, the people whose resources and skills might once have combined to build a post-Saddam Iraq. It seems, however, that precisely because they are critical to rebuilding Iraq and less prone to sectarianism and violence, professionals are most vulnerable to those forces that are tearing Iraq apart. Many of them are now in Syria. An hour's drive from Damascus, in Qudsiya, there has grown up an Iraqi neighborhood complete with a Baghdad Barbershop and an Iraq Travel Agency. Off one alley, in January, I entered a hastily constructed apartment building, rough and unfinished, the concrete and cinder blocks slapped together. The carved wooden doors to each apartment were in stark contrast to the grim, unpainted hallways. Inside one such apartment lived a doctor named Lujai — she refused to give her family name — and her five children. Omar, at 15, was the oldest; the youngest was just 2. A family-medicine specialist, Lujai arrived in Qudsiya last September from Baghdad, where she had her own clinic and her husband, Adil, was a thoracic surgeon and a professor at the medical college. They were the same age and from the same town (Ana, in Anbar Province), and they had been married for 15 years when Adil was murdered. Right after the invasion of Iraq, Lujai told me, Shiite clerics took over many of Baghdad's hospitals but did not know how to manage them. They were sectarian from the beginning, she said, firing Sunnis, saying they were Baathists. In 2004 the problems started. They wanted to separate Sunnis. The Ministry of Health was given to the Sadr movement — that is, to the Shiite faction loyal to Moktada al-Sadr. Following the 2005 elections that brought Islamist Shiites to power, Lujai said, the Sadrists initiated what they called a campaign to remove the Saddamists. The minister of health and his turbaned advisers saw to it that in hospitals and health centers the walls were covered with posters of Shiite clerics like Sadr, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim. Shiite religious songs could often be heard in the halls. In June of last year, Ali al-Mahdawi, a Sunni who had managed the Diyala Province's health department, disappeared, along with his bodyguards, at the ministry of health. (In February, the American military raided the ministry and arrested the deputy health minister, saying he was tied to the murder of Mahdawi.) Lujai told me that Sunni patients were often accused by Sadrist officials of being terrorists. After the doctors treated them, the special police from the Ministry of the Interior would arrest the Sunni patients. Their corpses would later be found in the Baghdad morgue. This happened tens of times, she said, to anybody who came with bullet wounds and wasn't Shiite. On Sept. 2, 2006, Lujai's husband went to work and prepared for the first of three operations scheduled for the day. At the end of his shift a patient came in unexpectedly; no other doctor was available, so Adil stayed to treat him. Adil was driving home when his way was blocked by four cars. Armed men surrounded him and dragged him from his car, taking him to Sadr City. Five hours later, his dead body was found on the street. As she told me this story, Lujai began to cry, and her confused young children looked at her silently. She had asked the Iraqi police to investigate her husband's murder and was told: He is a doctor, he has a degree and he is a Sunni, so he couldn't stay in Iraq. That's why he was killed. Two weeks later she received a letter ordering her to leave her Palestine Street neighborhood. On Sept. 24 she and her children fled with her brother Abu Shama, his wife and their four children. They gave away or sold what they could and paid $600 for the ride in the S.U.V. that carried them to Syria. Because of what happened to her husband, she said, as many as 20 other doctors also fled. In Qudsiya, Lujai and her brother pay $500 a month in rent for the three-bedroom apartment they share. The children attend local schools free, but Iraqis are not permitted to work in Syria, so they depend on relatives and savings for their survival. Twenty-five members of their family have fled to Syria. Four days before I visited them they heard that a Sunni doctor they knew had been killed in Baghdad's Kadhimiya district, where he worked. He was married to a Shiite woman. He was a pediatric specialist, Lujai told me. We needed him. In some ways, despite the ethnic and religious motives of most of the Iraqi factions, the Iraqi civil war resembles internal conflicts in revolutionary China or Cambodia: there is a cleansing of the intelligentsia and of anyone else who stands out from the mass. The small Iraqi minorities — Christians and such sects as the
Re: [PEN-L] Fwd: [A-List] The Flight from Iraq
On 5/14/07, Leigh Meyers [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/14/07, Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/magazine/13refugees-t.html The New York Times May 13, 2007 The Flight From Iraq By NIR ROSEN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . From the Iraqi perspective, the greatest loss has been the flight of the professional class, I stopped reading right there... Look at it this way: even without war, the South tends to lose a lot of its educated people, in whose education the nation's surplus got invested, to the North, which gains valuable human resources without paying for their creation. War vastly aggravates that problem. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] 2001-2006: The First Recovery with Declining Total Mfging Hours Worked
2001-'06: The First 'Recovery' with Declining Total Mfging Hours Worked: www.uscc.gov/trade_data_and_analyses/industry_job_trends/2006/B%20Weak%20US%20Job%20Recovery.pdf -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] EGYPT: Labour Unrest Spreads
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=37717 EGYPT: Labour Unrest Spreads Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani CAIRO, May 14 (IPS) - Workers in Cairo's vital public transport sector threatened to go on strike earlier this month if the state did not meet their list of demands. The incident was only the latest in a spate of strikes and protests in recent months that local commentators attribute to the steadily rising cost of living. These workers' actions are a result of the crushing economic situation, Magdi Hussein, secretary-general of the Labour Party, officially frozen by the government since 2000, told IPS. But with the current political upheaval in Egypt, workers have begun breaking down the wall of fear by wielding the weapons of the strike and the sit-in. On May 1, some 3,000 employees of the state-run Transportation Authority, including drivers, ticket collectors and maintenance workers, threatened a general strike, demanding better pay and benefits. In a show of force, workers briefly prevented buses from departing from a major depot in the capital's Nasr City district. After calling for a sit-in strike until their demands were met, transport workers were joined on the following day by an estimated 1,000 employees of Cairo's state-run Metro Authority, who produced a similar list of demands. Two days of subsequent negotiations resulted in a promise from the transportation ministry that workers' complaints would be looked into. The ministry further vowed to issue a decision on the matter later this month. We held the sit-in because we demand our basic rights, which are stipulated by law, a leader of the Metro workers' labour action told IPS. But if we aren't granted our basic rights, we'll call for a major sit-in strike in earnest. According to Ali Hashem, editor-in-chief at the government-run Dar al-Tahrir print house and a specialist on transport issues, the ministry will most likely meet most, if not all, of the workers' demands. The ministry is committed to improving public transport services, he told IPS. But this can't be done without improving the situation of the workers in the sector. Egypt has seen an unprecedented number of organised labour actions in the last six months. Since the beginning of this year, more than 50 strikes and labour protests have been called, with 11 in the last week of April alone. Labour actions have been organised in several of Egypt's most important industries, in both the public and private sectors. In addition to pubic transport, these have included the textiles, construction and industrial manufacturing sectors. The biggest labour action was in December, when some 25,000 workers participated in a strike at the state-owned Egypt Company for Spinning and Weaving in the Nile Delta city of Mahalla. After three days of striking, which reportedly cost the company some 12 million dollars, workers' demands for promised bonuses were finally met. Saad al-Husseini, MP from Mahalla and secretary-general of the Muslim Brotherhood bloc in parliament, described the strike as the spark that inspired other oppressed workers in Egypt to press for their rights. He went on to cite the main reasons for the success of the Mahalla action. Workers held a peaceful strike and didn't threaten any of the company's assets, they didn't insult the government and they didn't get sidetracked by other political issues, al-Husseini told IPS. Notably, the recent labour unrest has been marked by the absence of official union representation, with most actions being independently organised by workers themselves. The reason for this, say labour organisers and commentators, is that the Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF) -- the only legal union representation available -- has largely failed to protect workers' rights. They claim that the ETUF lacks genuine independence and ultimately answers to the ruling National Democratic Party of President Hosni Mubarak. In many cases, along with better pay and benefits, strike organisers have also demanded the removal of their official union representatives. Our union has always sided with the state rather than siding with us, said the organiser of the metro sit-in, who did not wish to be named. Hashem agreed, saying that official unions had completely failed to protect workers' interests. In fact, they have traditionally stood on the side of the government against the workers, he added. According to Hussein, the ETUF has always been stocked with government loyalists who take their directions from the ruling party rather than from the workers they claim to represent. If workers have no bona fide union representation to speak for them, he said, the decision to strike comes easily. Spokesmen for the government, meanwhile, have suggested that clandestine communist groups or unlicensed workers' associations have had a hand in organising the recent wave of strikes. Late last month, authorities shut down the Cairo-based Centre for Trade
[PEN-L] Pakistani Cities Virtually Shut Down by Strike
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSISL2673220070514?src=051407_1258_TOPSTORY_strike_shuts_down_pakistani_cities Pakistani cities virtually shut down by strike Mon May 14, 2007 10:06PM EDT By Kamran Haider KARACHI (Reuters) - A Pakistani opposition strike virtually shut down Karachi and other major cities on Monday after nearly 40 people were killed and about 150 wounded in Pakistan's worst political street violence in two decades. Authorities banned demonstrations in Karachi and declared a public holiday across Sindh province after the weekend violence in the city, which began when Pakistan's suspended top judge tried to meet supporters. The government has authorized paramilitary troops to shoot anyone involved in serious violence in Karachi, Pakistan's biggest city, which has a history of bloody feuding between ethnic-based factions. City police chief Azhar Farooqi said security forces had stepped up patrols and the situation was under control. There was no violence on Monday though the city was tense. The city is totally paralyzed. Shops are closed and very little public transport is on the roads. People are scared, Farooqi told Reuters. Government attempts to remove Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry over unspecified accusations of misconduct leveled on March 9 have outraged the judiciary and the opposition. The judicial crisis has snowballed into a campaign against President Pervez Musharraf and is the most serious challenge to the authority of the president, who is also army chief, since he seized power in 1999. The opposition strike, called to protest against the violence, saw shops and markets closed in all major cities including Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar, Rawalpindi and Quetta. It was the first time since Musharraf took power that a strike call had been so widely observed. While stirring opposition to Musharraf, the violence in Karachi has also raised the specter of bloody feuding that plagued the city in the 1980s and 1990s. The opposition blames the government and the pro-government Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), which runs Karachi, for the violence. Musharraf said Chaudhry ignored appeals not to visit the city. In Islamabad, opposition politicians stormed out of parliament shouting the general is a killer, referring to Musharraf, and MQM is a killer. A Supreme Court hearing into a petition by Chaudhry against an inquiry into the misconduct accusations was due to begin on Monday but was put off for a day. Musharraf has called for the courts to be allowed to settle the case and has criticized lawyers for politicizing it. He has also ruled out a state of emergency and said elections due late in the year would go ahead. COURT OFFICIAL KILLED In another twist to the escalating crisis, gunmen shot dead a Supreme Court official who Chaudhry's lawyers said was a witness in the case. Police said they did not know why the official was shot. Relatives said it was a targeted killing. The leader of an Islamist opposition alliance petitioned the Supreme Court calling for Musharraf's removal as president and army chief as he had violated his oath by taking part in politics while in uniform and for dragging the army into politics. Musharraf promised to quit as army chief by the end of 2004 but backed out of the commitment. Constitutionally, he is due to give up his army post by the end of December but he is believed to be reluctant to do so. Analysts have speculated Musharraf's motive for seeking to oust Chaudhry was aimed at removing a possible obstacle should his plans for re-election run into constitutional challenges. In Karachi, the commander of paramilitary forces said the priority for his 13,000 men was averting ethnic strife. Most of those killed when gunmen took over the streets were opposition supporters, including ethnic Pashtuns. Their MQM rivals are mostly the descendants of migrants from India. (Additional reporting by Faisal Aziz in KARACHI and Zeeshan Haider in ISLAMABAD) -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] legal query
On 5/13/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: in what countries and legal traditions does the government officially own land and/or subterranean mineral rights and only lease them to the users? All mineral deposits, as well as many other things, are public property in Iran. In recent years, Article 44 has come under attack from Rafsanjani, reformists, and Ali Khamenei himself (cf. Iran's Leader Urges Moves to Boost Private Sector, 20 February 2007, http://www.iranmania.com/News/ArticleView/Default.asp?NewsCode=49852NewsKind=Current%20Affairs), but public ownership of oil and gas is still sacrosanct, excluded from any talk of privatization, which has itself more or less stalled, due to a variety of pressures (workers' protests, left Islamists inside and outside the Ahmadinejad administration, the US-led campaign for more and more economic sanctions, etc.). The buy-back system that Iran employs in relation to foreign firms in the oil and gas sectors is not a lease. A foreign firm that participates in the buy-back system become a contractor that works with Iran's government: Iran's main mechanism for granting contracts is the Buy-Back scheme, whereby the contractor pays for all the investments, receives compensation from NIOC in the form of an allocated production share, and transfers the operation of the field to NIOC after a fixed period (Muhammad Sahimi, Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part IV: Economic Analysis of the Program, 7 December 2004, http://www.payvand.com/news/04/dec/1056.html). http://www.iranchamber.com/government/laws/constitution_ch04.php The Constitution of Islamic Republic of Iran Chapter IV Economy and Financial Affairs Article 44 The economy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is to consist of three sectors: state, cooperative, and private, and is to be based on systematic and sound planning. The state sector is to include all large-scale and mother industries, foreign trade, major minerals, banking, insurance, power generation, dams and large-scale irrigation networks, radio and television, post, telegraph and telephone services, aviation, shipping, roads, railroads and the like; all these will be publicly owned and administered by the State. The cooperative sector is to include cooperative companies and enterprises concerned with production and distribution, in urban and rural areas, in accordance with Islamic criteria. The private sector consists of those activities concerned with agriculture, animal husbandry, industry, trade, and services that supplement the economic activities of the state and cooperative sectors. Ownership in each of these three sectors is protected by the laws of the Islamic Republic, in so far as this ownership is in conformity with the other articles of this chapter, does not go beyond the bounds of Islamic law, contributes to the economic growth and progress of the country, and does not harm society. The [precise] scope of each of these sectors, as well as the regulations and conditions governing their operation, will be specified by law. Article 45 Public wealth and property, such as uncultivated or abandoned land, mineral deposits, seas, lakes, rivers and other public water-ways, mountains, valleys, forests, marshlands, natural forests, unenclosed pastures, legacies without heirs, property of undetermined ownership, and public property recovered from usurpers, shall be at the disposal of the Islamic government for it to utilize in accordance with the public interest. Law will specify detailed procedures for the utilization of each of the foregoing items. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Russia's Stabilization Fund: Interview with Economy Minister German Gref
On 5/13/07, raghu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/12/07, sartesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Just kidding. Or maybe not. I really don't know how an individual would do any of it. But state power is a big leg up for a collectivity. Anyway, I don't have the answer. Any process that would put me, or any group, collective, party like me in a position to direct petroleum revenues would have that figured out locally first.. It is quite tricky. After all what is the meaning of the foreign reserves in this Stabilization Fund - is it not just claims on the future output of US workers? If Russia does not have an immediate pressing need for US goods why should they feel compelled to buy stuff just because they have a dollar surplus? The fund is not so dollar-dominated. http://en.rian.ru/business/20070110/58838072.html Russia's Stabilization Fund up 7% month-on-month Jan. 1 19:12 | 10/ 01/ 2007 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Stabilization Fund resources were initially intended to be invested in highly-liquid debt securities of foreign states, but instead are now being converted into foreign currency and placed in Federal Treasury forex accounts with the Central Bank. According to the Finance Ministry's investment formula, U.S. dollars account for 45% of the Stabilization Fund's foreign currency, euros make up 45%, and 10% is in British pounds. I am sure Russia would love to buy some of the real riches that the US has i.e. technological know-how. But I suspect the US does not want to sell any thing other than consumer goods or services. So this dollar surplus is really nothing more than a huge burden. Under these circumstances there is one truly wonderful thing that Russia/China/Japan can do with those dollars - give it away to the indebted nations of Africa. Give it all away not loan it as in foreign aid. That would be ultimately in the best interests of both Russia and the US as well as Africa. Of course it will never happen... The Russians are far more interesting than the Chinese or the Japanese in this respect, for the former are not as directly dependent on the US market as the latter, and the former have the kind of geopolitical ambition about Central Asia, West Asia, and North Africa that the latter lack. Maybe you can pitch the idea of a Russian-led Eurasian Development Bank to Yevgeny Primakov, Russia's most influential Eurasianist. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
On 5/12/07, Marvin Gandall [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie wrote: On 5/11/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: so Hubbert's Peak is due to nationalizations? Setting any talk of a peak aside, the FT is basically saying that state oil companies tend to limit access and give less than maximally favorable terms to oil multinationals based in the West. That line of thinking no doubt has and continues to fuel the empire's foreign policy. = The article's real beef about nationalized oil is that there is inherent political pressure on state oil companies to direct their revenues to social programs and other state spending rather than to exploration and the development of new supply which would hold oil prices in check. Except in the Gulf states, which have no obligation to most of their populations, that is correct, but political pressures are not inherent. Till the rise of Chavez, PDVSA, already a state company, gave great deals to capital. Political pressures have risen in recent times in an increasing number of countries, however, and while the oil boom lasts, more countries are likely to see challenges from below clamoring for more redistribution of oil profits. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
On 5/12/07, Michael Hoover [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/11/07, Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: the FT is basically saying that state oil companies tend to limit access and give less than maximally favorable terms to oil multinationals based in the West. Yoshie to what meaningful extent is state property (whether in politically left or politically right countries) 'public' or 'social'... michael That a company is nominally a state enterprise doesn't mean that the people benefit much from it, let alone have control over its activities. A great struggle over PDVSA, which was already a state enterprise before the Chavez administration, is an example of that fact. But any power elite and ruling class, even of the most right-wing, who run a functioning state of an independent nation have to provide for the public at least enough to fend off any backlashes against them monopolizing profits. That is why the Gulf states are such great assets for the empire, for they are not nations, a majority of their labor forces being migrants, for whose social reproduction (from education to retirement) the Gulf ruing classes do not have to pay, so their profits get handily recycled back into the financial centers at the core of the empire. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
On 5/12/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: it's interesting that the article misses the fact that even if these countries don't invest in exploration for and exploitation of possible new oil reserves, those reserves will still exist. That is not a political issue. Oil companies know that reserves exist out in the world, unexplored and untapped. What they are concerned about is whether they are made available to them and on what terms. The same goes for the ruling classes and power elites of the empire in general: they know that unexplored and untapped reserves exist, but how much of them will be consumed by the peoples of the oil-producer nations, and how much of them will get exported, and on what terms, is a concern for them. There's a fundamental problem with the view that these countries are failing to subsidize the oil-consuming countries, at least in the short run. It assumes that high oil prices are resulting from the behavior of those nasty nationalizers. It's more likely, I think, that the high prices are instead the result of high demand for oil (Chinese, Indian growth, etc.) and a lot of temporary falls in supply (Iraq, Nigeria, etc.) and the normally inelastic nature of both supply and demand [*]. While the rates of growth in China, India, etc. will eventually slow down, the secular trends in most nations, even the Gulf states, are rising fossil fuel consumption everywhere. As many parts of the South have hardly begun to provide electricity for all, and their better-off consumers are just now beginning to acquire automobiles and the like en masse, the trends are likely to continue, provided capitalism keeps running. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Lumpen Militariat in Post-Ideological Conflict in Africa
In March 1973, Ali A. Mazrui published an article titled The Lumpen Proletariat and the Lumpen Militariat: African Soldiers as a New Political Class (Political Studies 21.1: 1–12). The term Mazrui used, lumpen militariat, to describe a class of semi-organized and semi-literate soldiers who, kept out of the circle of clientelism, increasingly begin to demand a share of power and influence, is clearly more useful today than in the 1970s. One of the phenomena discussed in The New Face of Warfare by Fatin Abbas (28 May 2007, http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070528/abbas), as well as the books reviewed by it (Jimmie Briggs's Innocents Lost, P.W. Singer's Children at War, and Ishmael Beah's A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier), is the problem of the lumpen militariat in a post-ideological conflict -- war as the end in itself rather than a means to achieve an ideological end (such as establishing a republican or socialist state), fought by soldiers with no ideological commitment, their only motive being to stay alive and eat enough in the midst of dire poverty and hunger -- who recruit children as young as five: It is in Africa, considered to be the epicenter of the child soldier phenomenon. . . . In the 1991-2001 civil war between Sierra Leone's government and the rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF), as many as 80 percent of all fighters were between the ages of 7 and 14. In the two waves of civil war that engulfed Liberia between 1989 and 2003, up to 70 percent of government and rebel combatants were children. In the recent war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), ignited in 1996 by Laurent Kabila's revolt against Mobutu's regime, roughly half the fighters (between 30,000 and 50,000) were child soldiers. (Abbas) Unfortunately, the review as well as the books reviewed confuse this predominantly African phenomenon, arising out of the ruin of failed states and in turn ruining failing states in the only continent that has seen absolute as well as relative declines in living standards in recent decades, with a very different phenomenon of young men and women, only slightly under 18, joining such ideological armies as FARC. What's the difference? An ideological conflict can result in a state that is better than the ancient regime before the conflict; a post-ideological conflict, often endless, never does -- if it ends and results in a state at all, it merely establishes the dictatorship of the militariat (no longer quite lumpen as they acquire state power), quite often a new ethnocracy to boot. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
On 5/12/07, Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The article the set off this discussion did not mention the disinclination of the private petroleum companies to contribute to productivity. Instead of exploration, they use their cash hordes to buy each other's companies. They do little for modernization. If that's the case, why do state companies, even the one in Venezuela today, seek oil multinationals as partners, contract them for exploration and development, and so forth? I thought that was because state companies didn't necessarily have capital and/or technology. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
On 5/12/07, Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In saying little, I should've been more precise to event at the adjective -- relatively; meaning relative to their cash flows. At least historically, multinationals tended to use their outdated equipment in Third World settings, employing their most modern technology at home. It would not surprise me that Venezuelans could benefit from various computer-controlled technologies that domestic companies had not yet adopted. I see. Has the Venezuelan government made a demand on multinationals about the quality of technology they employ in Venezuela? It would seem to make sense for governments in the South to aim for technological transfer as much as possible, though struggles I have read about re-nationalization appear to mainly concern ownership, control, profits, taxes, etc. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Turkey Moves to Popular Vote for President
Barring a coup, an upshot of the current conflict in Turkey seems to be to give more power to presidency, whichever party wins in the upcoming elections. -- Yoshie http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2007/05/11/MNG37PP4UA1.DTLtype=politics Turkey moves to popular vote for president Islamic party says changes will help solidify its power Laura King, Los Angeles Times Friday, May 11, 2007 (05-11) 04:00 PDT Istanbul -- Parliament voted with only one dissenting vote Thursday to approve a constitutional amendment to choose Turkey's president by a popular vote, giving even greater weight to midsummer elections that are already shaping up as a divisive referendum on the role of Islam in government. The 376-1 vote by lawmakers opens the door to holding presidential and parliamentary elections simultaneously, on July 22. However, the package of electoral reforms could still be blocked by a veto from Turkey's resolutely secular President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, with whom the ruling party is at odds. Under the reform measures, the president for the first time would be elected by a popular vote rather than by parliament and could serve up to two five-year terms rather than a single seven-year term. Lawmakers' terms would be shortened from five to four years, and it would be much easier for the majority party to muster a quorum in parliament -- an issue that took on outsize importance in recent weeks amid a polarizing struggle over the presidency. The ruling Justice and Development Party, known by its Turkish initials AKP, says the changes will help solidify its hold on power. The vote represented a victory for the party, which has its roots in political Islam, after an unexpected political battering over the past month. Is this the revenge of the AKP? asked Mehmet Ali Birand, who anchors the main prime-time newscast on Turkey's Channel D. Turkey is embroiled in a bitter political confrontation that arose when the AKP tried to put forth a candidate to replace Sezer, whose seven-year term in the largely ceremonial post was to have ended next week. The political opposition, with the aid of the staunchly pro-secular courts and military, managed to block the election of the party's candidate, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul. Opponents said Gul would not respect Turkey's constitutionally mandated separation of religion and state. The foreign minister insisted he would. Large street protests, threats from the military and a court ruling that hinged on the technical question of what constituted a parliamentary quorum ultimately forced him to step aside. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for early elections, in which his party is expected to keep its majority and perform well. But opposition parties also have begun forming alliances that could force Erdogan's party into a coalition government. The opposition could still seek to block the reforms approved Thursday. The president has veto power, which Sezer could exercise. He also could insist that the changes be put to a referendum, which would make it virtually impossible for them to become law in time to affect the current contest. The ruling party has been harshly criticized for pushing through major changes to the electoral system in the final weeks of this government's reign. Critics said such a task would have been better left to a new parliament. But Erdogan and his party have in turn accused opponents of acting undemocratically by invoking a threat of military intervention to block Gul's candidacy. Four Turkish governments in the last 50 years have been driven from power by the army. Making the presidential election a popular vote rather than a parliamentary vote would make it much more difficult for opposition parties to use technical and legal means to deny the AKP the presidency. The more secular-minded opposition is already alarmed by the AKP's signals that it will seek to strengthen the powers of the president, who under the current system is largely limited to making judicial appointments and vetoing laws. Opposition parties have long considered the post, until now always held by an avowed secularist, a counterweight to the influence of more Islamist-leaning parties in parliament. This article appeared on page A - 20 of the San Francisco Chronicle -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] news from Iran.
On 5/12/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: from SLATE: The Wall Street Journal reports that Iranian hardliners are currently battling to rid their country of ... Western-style neckties. it's about time they've chosen a good cause. The WSJ claims that it's new (at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117892880341600648.html), but this is a periodically recurring culture conflict in Iran, fitfully revived by the police, which answers to The Leader: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20010819/ai_n13919133/print Chicago Sun-Times, Aug 19, 2001 Clamping down on Tehran 'decadence' Hard-liners target T-shirts, ties Ali Akbar Dareini TEHRAN, Iran--Police in the capital have issued an order forbidding restaurants from serving women wearing makeup, stores from selling T-shirts emblazoned with movie stars, and men from going to work in neckties--a symbol of Western decadence. The order was the latest measure by the hard-line judiciary to crack down on so-called social vices in a campaign that reformists say aims to undermine President Mohammad Khatami's efforts to ease Islamic regulations on public dress and behavior. The police are under the direction of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who also appoints the head of the judiciary. The orders were issued late Friday and carried Saturday by the official Islamic Republic News Agency. A similar order was issued by police in the holy city of Qom, IRNA reported. Reformists insisted the rules had no legal basis. Reaction in Tehran's streets was mixed. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] SCIRI Drops Khamenei, Al-Hakim Calls for US-Iraq Security Agreement
A new development that is probably very good for my dear Islamic Republic of Iran. If Islamo-Stalinist Ali Khamenei is not smart enough to drop SCIRI and Al-Akim, the other way around would have to do. I hope Sadr will be able to put together a multi-sect coalition against the US occupation and one day establish a new republic in Iraq friendly to its most important neighbor. -- Yoshie http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/2745/Iraqi_Papers_Sat_SCIRI_No_More Iraqi Papers Sat: SCIRI No More? Principal Shi'a Party Allegedly Distances Itself from Iran By AMER MOHSEN Posted 19 hr. 47 min. ago In what is, by far, the most important news item of the day, Az-Zaman and al-Hayat have reported that the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) has decided to change its name, break with the Iranian clerical establishment and replace the Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamena'i with Najaf-based Ali al-Sistani as their spiritual authority. Az-Zaman said that these decisions were part of a new program for the party that was announced during a two-day general conference (in which the party's current leader, 'Abd al-'Azeez al-Hakeem was re-elected for a new mandate). SCIRI officials discussed aspects of these radical reforms with the press, even though the resolutions of the conference will not be publicly disclosed until Saturday. The scope and details of the SCIRI reforms remain unclear. While a party official told Reuters that the changes are intended to Iraqify the party, by making Ayatollah Sistani –- who resides in Najaf -- its new spiritual authority, a rupture with Khamena'i and the Iranian-inspired Islamic Revolution would signify an enormous shift in the party's ideology. http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6627860,00.html Al-Hakim Calls for 'Security Agreement' Saturday May 12, 2007 10:46 AM By HAMZA HENDAWI Associated Press Writer BAGHDAD (AP) - The leader of Iraq's largest Shiite political party on Saturday called for a security agreement'' to be negotiated between Iraq and U.S.-led forces to outline the authorities of each side in a further indication of growing frustration over America's role in Iraq. Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim did not give more details of the proposed pact. In the past he has repeatedly complained that the U.S. military's lead in the fight against Sunni insurgents hampered the work of Iraq's Shiite-dominated security forces, which he contended were better qualified to fight the insurgents given their knowledge of the terrain and language. We are working toward reaching a security agreement to define the authority of each side,'' al-Hakim told a news conference after a two-day meeting of his party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Al-Hakim also announced the party's name will be changed to the Supreme Islamic Council of Iraq'' - dropping the word revolution'' to reflect the new political realities in the country. Al-Hakim's comments coincided with an ongoing campaign by lawmakers loyal to anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to get parliament to adopt legislation demanding a timetable for the withdrawal of the U.S.-led troops in Iraq and a freeze on the number of foreign forces already in the country. Officials said this week the proposed legislation has been signed by 144 members of the 275-member house, but it is not likely to retain the support of all of them if it is put to a vote. However, that more than half the house signed on the draft is a reflection of the growing impatience of many Iraqis with the continued presence of foreign troops in their country and the failure to end a four-year-old Sunni insurgency and an enduring campaign of terror by al-Qaida. Addressing the same news conference, senior al-Hakim aide Hummam Hamoudi sought to play down the significance of a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign forces, saying it was more important to reach a timetable for the training and equipping of Iraqi troops. Al-Hakim's party - a senior partner in the coalition government of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that has been in office since May last year - was founded in Iran in 1982 with the assistance of Tehran's ruling clergy to fight Saddam Hussein's regime, toppled by the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. In theory, the party's Badr Brigade militia has been disbanded and turned into a political organization, but its former militiamen are known to have infiltrated the security forces. Al-Hakim said his party remained committed to the creation of a semiautonomous region in Iraq's mainly Shiite south, but stressed that such a move hinged on popular support. A federal Iraq is a key plank of the party's ideology, but politicians from the once-dominant Sunni Arab minority insist that federalism would eventually lead to the breakup of the country. Federalism was enshrined in a new constitution adopted in 2005. We are working for the creation of a region in the center and south ... under the mechanisms provided by in the
Re: [PEN-L] SCIRI Drops Khamenei, Al-Hakim Calls for US-Iraq Security Agreement
On 5/12/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: A new development that is probably very good for my dear Islamic Republic of Iran. If Islamo-Stalinist Ali Khamenei is not smart enough to drop SCIRI and Al-Akim, the other way around would have to do. I hope Sadr will be able to put together a multi-sect coalition against the US occupation and one day establish a new republic in Iraq friendly to its most important neighbor. -- Yoshie Onu okurken, gulmek istiyorum. Reading it, I want to laugh, you say? Too bad that the development in Iraq didn't wait for Iran's workers to develop their own working-class anti-imperialist Iraq policy that you dreamt of (at http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2007/05/10/iran-on-the-brink-part-two/)! :- -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Russia, Asia Strike Pipeline Deal
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117901087289601168.html?mod=googlenews_wsj Russia, Asia Strike Pipeline Deal Associated Press May 12, 2007 7:17 p.m. TURKMENBASHI, Turkmenistan -- Russia announced a deal Saturday to dramatically increase the amount of natural gas it moves from Central Asia to Europe, a key victory in a growing rivalry with the West for the region's vast energy resources. Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leaders of the region's main energy producers, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, agreed to build a pipeline running from Turkmenistan through Kazakhstan and into Russia's network of pipelines to Europe. The three presidents also said that, with Uzbekistan, they would revamp the entire Soviet-built pipeline network that carries Central Asian gas to Russia. Along with two oil deals, the new gas agreements are a blow to U.S. and European efforts to construct oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia that would cross under the Caspian Sea, avoiding Russia, and connect to Europe through Azerbaijan and Turkey. The deals mean that Russia would control the bulk of Central Asian energy exports, boosting its role as a major supplier of oil and gas to Europe and strengthening Western fears that Moscow could use its energy clout for political purposes. Russia supplies a quarter of Europe's gas and is its second-biggest supplier of oil. European fears of excessive energy reliance grew after Moscow briefly halted gas supplies to several ex-Soviet neighbors. The shutdowns in 2006 and 2007 took enough gas out of the pipeline network to reduce deliveries to the EU. Mr. Putin sought to assuage such fears, saying in the Turkmen city of Turkmenbashi on the Caspian shore: We take our role in the global energy sector very responsibly. But when asked whether others could join the new pipeline project, he answered with a curt, No. It's enough to have three countries, Mr. Putin said. The new pipeline's cost was not announced, but the ITAR-Tass news agency cited a 2003 estimate putting it at around $1 billion. Other details, such as how the costs would be split among the three nations, were also unavailable. The presidents ordered their governments to sign an agreement outlining the deal's specifics by Sept. 1. Mr. Putin said construction would begin in mid-2008. The EU has long pushed Russia to ratify an energy pact that would give independent producers access to its export pipelines and oil and gas fields, but Mr. Putin has bluntly rejected the demand, saying it was against Russia's interests. There have been no independent audits of Turkmenistan's gas reserves, but the CIA estimated that it has more than two trillion cubic meters of proven natural gas reserves. Mr. Putin said the new pipeline may carry at least 20 billion cubic meters of gas annually by 2012, while Russian Industry and Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko told reporters that it could eventually carry 30 billion cubic meters a year. Copyright (c) 2007 Associated Press -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Venezuela
On 5/10/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: http://iran-daily.com/1386/2830/html/economy.htm#s223692 12m Below Poverty Line Almost 12 million people live below the poverty line while two million are in absolute poverty, a member of Majlis Social Commission said. snip That's nothing to write home about, although I am sure that you will find reasons to crow over the fact that the per capita figures for poverty in Guatemala or Bangladesh are worse. A good comparison is with Venezuela, which has some way to go to catch up with Iran in this respect. In Venezuela, The Gini coefficient was 0.45 during 2006. According to government statistics, the percentages of poor and extremely poor among Venezuelan population were 33.9% and 23.2%, respectively, in 2006. These high ratios are due primarily to lower real wages earned by employees, and high rates of un- and underemployment (Background Note: Venezuela, February 2007, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/35766.htm). -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Venezuela
On 5/11/07, sartesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No doubt about it. Venezuela is not utopia. But this, the progressive nature of a society, is not just a question of equal distribution. It is also a question of development of the organs of class power. And in this regard, with the Bolivarian circles of Venezuela, the neighborhood and factory organizations, Venezuela is surely more progressive than Iran. Here, we have an interesting contrast. It is said that Venezuela's democracy is protagonistic, and protagonism is to a certain extent fostered and nurtured by the government, not just demanded from below; whereas Iran's democracy has been antagonistic. While I like the former, there is much to be said about the latter, in my view. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Venezuela
On 5/11/07, s.artesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I honestly do not know what protagonistic democracy and antagonistic democracy mean. I was,am referring to classes. The social forces, the old conflict between means and relations of production that has triggered both the struggle in Iran and Venezuela, propelled in both cases the working class, urban and rural poor, forward. In the case of Iran, the struggle has been suppressed, not resolved, at the expense of the workers. In Venezuela, it has not. In neither Iran nor Venezuela has any struggle been resolved. Such resolution is not possible under class society. In both Iran and Venezuela, as well as any other place where class society with exploitation and other oppressions exist, struggles exist, some of which directly concern means of production, while others, like women's activism for gender equality, are indirectly shaped by and in turn shape struggles over means of production. It's hardly the case that social struggles have been suppressed and disappeared in Iran -- the state of Iran will never manage to do so -- in fact, it's one of the countries where workers, women, etc. are most politically active and engaged. It's through such conflicts in the real world that workers and others have to develop their political consciousness. Yoshie rejects out of hand the validity of even attempting a class, economic, social analysis of Iran That is hardly the case. What I insist on, however, is to evaluate the state of social struggles based on accurate information. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Venezuela
On 5/11/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Protagonistic democracy -- cf. Mike Lebowitz's BUILD IT NOW -- refers to grassroots and participative democracy such as the Bolivarian circles. It really isn't the opposite of antagonistic democracy (i.e., democracy within a class system). It also doesn't automatically abolish antagonistic democracy, but can form the basis for doing so in the future. It's true that protagonistic democracy is not necessarily opposite of antagonistic one, but how many strikes, etc. that are of, by, and for workers (i.e., those that are unrelated to oligarchy's sabotage) have happened in Venezuela since the beginning of the Bolivarian Revolution? North-South refers to a relationship within the structure and dynamics of imperialism. Protagonistic-antagonistic has nothing to do with that. Protagonistic doesn't link to ideas about the exceptionalism of struggles in the third world as much as the current exceptionalism of the struggle in Venezuela. It's also been seen in other places and times, including in the U.S. As far as I can see, protagonism hasn't caught on even in the rest of Latin America. Today's imperialism, as well as directions of many post-colonial states, especially after the fall of the second world, has caused increased divergences among third world nations. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Venezuela
On 5/11/07, michael a. lebowitz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Quick rule of thumb--- the opposite of 'protagonistic democracy' is not 'antagonistic' but 'representative democracy'./m True, but I've been thinking of relative absence of sharp antagonism and emphasis on deliberation and cooperation within the Bolivarian Revolution (as opposed to the kinds of sharp class and faction conflicts you see in Iran). The most prominent conflicts in Venezuela are the ones between those who support the revolution and the oligarchy that oppose it. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Russia's Stabilization Fund: Interview with Economy Minister German Gref
Unlike, for instance, Iran and Venezuela, Russia has been very cautious about spending windfall oil profits in the current oil boom. That has meant that the Russian record on inflation is better than those of Iran and Venezuela, but the ever growing Stabilization Fund has generated political debate. What would you spend it on if you could have your say? Spend more on pensions, unemployment benefits, health care, education, etc.? Invest in infrastructure like pipelines or RD for basic and applied sciences with a view to developing hi-tech sectors? Loan it to private companies so they can expand and hire more people? Create state enterprises where the market has failed to produce internationally competitive companies? What do you think of the Economic Minister's view below? -- Yoshie http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20070501/64714247.html Interview with Economy Minister German Gref (Part 1) 14:15 | 01/ 05/ 2007 Question: Mr. Gref, what means does the government have to contain the growth of the Russian currency against the U.S. dollar and the euro? Is the government thinking about how to help Russian exporters suffering from the strengthening ruble? Answer: The strengthening of the national currency definitely pleases us, but, as you have said, this process affects our exporters. The Russian Central Bank maintains the ruble's exchange rate by means of huge interventions. This process is adjustable and is constantly being improved. In 2005, for example, the Central Bank introduced a two-currency basket as a new operational benchmark for currency interventions. This increased the volatility of the U.S. dollar's rate against the ruble, but reduced that of the euro's rate against the ruble. In the beginning, the euro accounted for 10% of the basket and the dollar for 90%. As players on the domestic foreign-exchange market got used to new conditions, the Central Bank revised the basket, increasing the share of the euro. Now the ratio is 0.45 to 0.55 in favor of the dollar. This allows fluctuations in the ruble's effective rate to be leveled out in a flexible and deliberate manner. Q.: How will the Stabilization Fund be used? How will the government be able to put this money into the economy without provoking a surge in inflation? A.: So, you are also interested in the most popular question in Russia now, How should we spend the Stabilization Fund's money? In fact, the danger lies not in spending the state's huge savings, but in making ill-considered attempts to spend it on the country's domestic needs, thereby accelerating inflation. This is a difficult subject, because it is necessary to determine the exact ratio of monetary and non-monetary components when spending the savings. I believe that we are partially succeeding, at least judging by the gradually falling influence of the money supply on the growth of consumer prices. You can judge for yourself: the average annual growth of the money supply in Russia in 2004-2006 was over 40%, i.e. 30% higher than the inflation rate in the same period. The anti-inflation plan drafted by our ministry and adopted by the government in May 2006 had a decisive influence on reducing the inflation rate. This is a set of measures designed to slow down the growth of consumer prices, particularly utility and housing tariffs. As a result, in 2006 utility bills grew almost twice as slowly as in 2005 (17.9% versus 32.7%). The government pursued a tough tariff policy toward monopolies. These two factors helped to reduce the inflation rate in 2006 from 10.9% to 9%. Judging by the first three months of this year, we are staying within the planned figure for 2007, 8%. We have been reducing inflation by 1-2 percentage points annually and hope to reach 5%-5.5% by 2010. As to the Stabilization Fund, I can say that we plan to divide it into two parts: a Reserve Fund, equaling about 10% of GDP, and a Future Generations Fund. The Reserve Fund will serve as an airbag in case of a drastic reduction in budget revenues in order to finance mandatory spending. In 2008, we plan to take 163.7 billion rubles from the Stabilization Fund to pay off foreign debt. The three-year budget does not stipulate spending any money from the Stabilization Fund in 2009-2010. Q.: Could you please explain how the Russian Investment Fund will be used and how it will function? Will it consist entirely of money from the Stabilization Fund? What is its present size? A.: The goal of the Investment Fund is to provide state support to investment projects of national importance. We have already decided on the selection process, required documents and methods of monitoring investment projects. They will be co-financed by the private sector; there must be a clear division of responsibilities between the government and the private investor. Finally, they should not lose money. There is a wide choice of such projects in the social and economic sectors, infrastructure and high-tech. There could also be projects aimed at
[PEN-L] Putin Promises More Focus on Projects
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8OOAF780.htm The Associated Press April 26, 2007, 9:21AM EST Putin promises more focus on projects By ALEX NICHOLSON BW Exclusives President Vladimir Putin on Thursday promised billions of dollars to spur on the ambitious social and infrastructure projects undertaken during his tenure, saying that Russia has fully recovered from its precipitous economic fall following the Soviet collapse. In his state-of-the-nation speech, the Russian leader said more money had to be put into improving the lives of Russia's citizens, many of whom have been left behind during the crash in the 1990s and the recent oil-fueled economic recovery. Many find themselves with insufficient pensions and unable to afford to move out of deteriorating Soviet housing. Average incomes had doubled since 2000, he said, and claimed that the country became the world's No. 1 oil producer in 2006. Now Russia has not only completely overcome the long fall in its production, but has become one of the 10 largest economies of the world, he told lawmakers and top government officials. In the seven years of Putin's presidency, analysts estimate that Russia has earned US$750 billion (euro550 billion) from sales of oil and gas, amid record world prices. The nation's finance ministry has resisted the temptation to spend that bounty, despite intense pressure from other corners of the Cabinet. Instead, companies' windfall oil profits have been taxed and put into a stabilization fund to cushion any possible price drop as well as to avoid spiking inflation. But with the country's currency reserves now the world's third largest and the stabilization fund at US$108 billion (euro79 billion) analysts say Russia is at no risk of an overnight return to the financial doldrums it saw after the default of 1998. Many argue that more state revenues should be used to modernize the economy -- large parts of which are still dilapidated or antiquated. In his speech, Putin made it clear that the time had come to put more of the money into improving the lives of Russia's citizens. He proposed a 250 billion ruble (US$10 billion; euro7.5 billion) fund to repair housing and resettle residents. It is inadmissible for a country with such reserves accumulated from its oil and gas revenues to be at peace with the fact that millions of its citizens live in slums, he said. To large applause, he suggested that part of the bill could be footed from money raised in the bankruptcy auctions of the OAO Yukos oil company. The company was brought to its knees in a state-led tax campaign critics said was aimed at silencing its jailed former owner Mikhail Khodorkovsky. For ordinary Russians that might be seen as a just use of the funds: Khodorkovsky was widely reviled in the 1990s as one of many tycoons who parlayed his close ties to power into vast wealth. After the speech, Sergei Ivanov, first deputy prime minister and a leading contender to succeed Putin once he steps down next year, echoed the call for more social spending. At a certain time, an enormous amount of money was stolen from the state. Now this money is returning, and that state has decide to spend it on the most destitute, he said. Putin said that 100 billion rubles (US$3.9 billion; euro2.9 billion) should go toward improving Russia's crumbling roads. A thorough overhaul could see the country's gross domestic product boosted by 3 percent, he asserted. Also well-received was Putin's call for a mechanism that would see the government match every 1,000 rubles (US$39, euro29) put into citizens' private pension plans. Currently, nearly all retirees receive government pensions. Lawmaker Gennady Seleznyov, a former Communist and former parliament speaker, warned that Putin's vision was far from the reality and the promises of previous speeches had come to little. Economic inequality is growing -- growing at a significant pace, from year to year, he said. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: If secular parties make an unexpected comeback in the upcoming elections, I'll chalk it up to the raki and bikini votes. ;- Geee Yoshie, you did not get the point! It is not about the raki and bikinis. It is about the raki and topless females on the beaches. By the way, let us see how well Louis did in his Turkish course. Louis, please translate this into Turkish: We don't need no education, We don't need no thought control. If you don't think the above is related to my objection to both the AKP and Military, then I have no choice but to conclude that I failed to communicate my ideas to you. It is possible that the Turks are finally getting political education that is not thought control, in real life not in school, through the current social conflicts. Leftists in Turkey, if they are able and willing, can enter into them with a view to disentangling modernization from Westernization, asking the Turks to think hard about what kind of modernity they really want. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Strikes in Egypt Spread from Center of Gravity
In terms of sheer numbers, the Egyptian strike wave is comparable to the Iranian one that Andreas Malm and Shora Esmailian document in Iran: the Hidden Power (10 April 2007, http://www.opendemocracy.net/democracy-irandemocracy/hidden_power_4513.jsp) and _Iran on the Brink: Rising Workers and Threats of War_ (Pluto Press, 2007). But in both cases it is difficult to fuse the national and social questions, as Joel Beinin and Hossam el-Hamalawy note in the last paragraph of Strikes in Egypt Spread from Center of Gravity below (not that it's easy to do so anywhere else -- rarely do workers' bread and butter struggles become national political issues which give a new political force a chance to displace the old and become hegemonic). Notice, also, multiple splits in the (broadly defined) left in Egypt. Given the fact that Egypt, unlike Iran, is a client state of the USA, however, it is likely to be easier to fuse the national and social questions in Egypt than in Iran. -- Yoshie http://www.merip.org/mero/mero050907.html Strikes in Egypt Spread from Center of Gravity Joel Beinin and Hossam el-Hamalawy May 9, 2007 (Joel Beinin, a contributing editor of Middle East Report, is director of Middle East studies at the American University in Cairo. Hossam el-Hamalawy is a Cairo-based journalist and blogger.) The longest and strongest wave of worker protest since the end of World War II is rolling through Egypt. In March, the liberal daily al-Masri al-Yawm estimated that no fewer than 222 sit-in strikes, work stoppages, hunger strikes and demonstrations had occurred during 2006. In the first five months of 2007, the paper has reported a new labor action nearly every day. The citizen group Egyptian Workers and Trade Union Watch documented 56 incidents during the month of April, and another 15 during the first week of May alone.[1] From their center of gravity in the textile sector, the strikes have spread to mobilize makers of building materials, Cairo subway workers, garbage collectors, bakers, food processing workers and many others. Like almost all strikes in Egypt in the last 40 years, the latest work stoppages are illegal -- unauthorized by the state-sponsored General Federation of Trade Unions and its subsidiary bodies in factories and other workplaces. But unlike upsurges of working-class collective action in the 1980s and 1990s, which were confined to state-owned industries, the wave that began in late 2004 has also pushed along employees in the private sector. Around the same time the first strikes broke out, the most outspoken pro-democracy street protests in years -- including in their ranks leftists and secular nationalists and sometimes Muslim Brothers -- also appeared. Having spent three years trying to contain the pro-democracy ferment, the regime of President Husni Mubarak has now launched a counterattack on the workers' movement as well. The counterattack comes as many activist workers have shifted their gaze from wages, benefits and working conditions to the explicitly political question of their relation, through the General Federation, to the state. WORKERS AND BROTHERS Notable among the April actions were repeated work stoppages by 284 workers at the Mansura-Spain Company, at which a 75 percent female work force produces quilts and ready-made clothes. They are protesting the sale of their enterprise without a commitment from the prospective new owner, the private sector bank al-Masraf al-Muttahid, to pay supplemental wages and profit shares due them since 1995. The largest private-sector strike to date occurred in the coastal city of Alexandria at Arab Polvara Spinning and Weaving, a fairly successful enterprise privatized in the first tranche of the public-sector selloff during the mid-1990s. On March 24, and again on April 2, nearly half of the firm's 12,000 workers struck to protest discrimination between workers and managers in the allocation of shares when the company was sold, failure to pay workers dividends on their shares, and the elimination of paid sick leave and a paid weekend. Workers last received dividends on their shares in 1997, when they were paid 60 Egyptian pounds (about $10.45 at the current exchange rate). The demands of the Arab Polvara workers indicate that public-sector workers are correct to suspect that, even if privatized firms initially agree to offer pay and benefits similar to those in the public sector (in some cases, the pay is even higher), the requirements of competing in the international market will eventually drive down wages and worsen working conditions. Since there are few trade unions in the private sector, workers lack even the weak institutional mechanism of the state-sponsored union federation to contest the unilateral actions of private capital. The government has charged the Muslim Brothers with inciting the Arab Polvara strike, but there is no evidence that they played any role in this or any other labor action in the last year. Labor
[PEN-L] Throngs Attend Speech by Pakistan’s Suspended Justice
A very promising development. It's great that a poem by Faiz Ahmed Faiz was read at the rally. Things are getting very interesting from Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey to even goddamn Pakistan (who would have thought of Pakistan as a promising candidate for social change from the left?), all getting as contentious as Iran usually is. For all we know, neo-conservatives may get their wish in the end, _democracy across the Middle East_, except that the results of democracy won't be necessarily to their linking. -- Yoshie http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/07/world/asia/07pakistan.html May 7, 2007 Throngs Attend Speech by Pakistan's Suspended Justice By SALMAN MASOOD LAHORE, Pakistan, May 6 — The chief justice of Pakistan's supreme court, suspended by the government after he investigated some of its practices, received an emotional welcome here on Sunday from thousands of supporters. Speaking to the crowd, including many lawyers, the suspended chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, said, The concept of an autocratic system of government is over. He added, Rule of law, supremacy of the Constitution, basic human rights and individual freedom granted by the Constitution are essential for the formation of a civilized society. Those countries and nations who don't learn from the past and repeat those mistakes get destroyed, he said. He said the government had no right to impose laws that violated basic human rights. Mr. Chaudhry spoke at the compound of the Lahore High Court, under the scorching Lahore sun. Seventeen judges from the Lahore High court also attended. Many of the supporters covered their heads with newspapers to escape the heat. Banners urging the independence of the judiciary and denouncing the president of Pakistan, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, hung on boundary walls surrounding the compound. Political workers, who were not allowed inside, listened to the speech outside the boundary wall. It had taken the chief justice 25 hours rather than the usual 4 to reach Lahore, which is considered Pakistan's cultural capital and an important political center. He left Islamabad, the capital, at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday. But his caravan moved at a snail's pace. Hundreds of vehicles followed Mr. Chaudhry as he traveled through various cities of Punjab, the most populous province. Thousands of people stood by the road as the caravan passed by, making victory signs and shouting that General Musharraf should leave office. Mr. Chaudhry's vehicle was showered with rose petals at every stop, and people pushed close to get a glimpse of him. The authorities made no effort to stop the caravan, though opposition parties said political workers had been arrested. The chief justice was suspended by General Musharraf on March 9 on charges of abuse of power and nepotism. Street protests, led by lawyers, began almost immediately. His supporters contend that he was suspended because he had challenged the government on a number of issues. Among them, he had taken up cases of forced disappearances — people believed to have been picked up by Pakistan's powerful intelligence agencies without due process. Human rights groups say that at least 400 people are suspected to have been detained secretly by these agencies since 2001. Lawyers and rights advocates have called the action against the chief justice an assault on the judiciary. Political parties have jumped into the fray. Political analysts have described the protests as the most serious crisis faced by General Musharraf since he took power in 1999. Pakistani officials have accused Mr. Chaudhry of trying to get political mileage out of what they say is a legal matter. His address on Sunday was in response to an invitation from the Lahore High Court Bar Association. He received an emotionally charged welcome that had all the contours of a political protest though he has been careful not to deliver any political speeches or comment on the charges against him. His speech contained some oblique references to the president, but no direct challenges. Throughout the night, thousands of lawyers waited patiently in the court compound for Mr. Chaudhry to arrive. The organizers played music and recitations to stir the crowd. A poem by one of Pakistan's most famous poets, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, was cheered feverishly and greeted with clapping and dancing every time it was played. The poem, written in Urdu, reads, in part: When the mountains of cruelty and torture Will fly like pieces of cotton Under the feet of the governed This earth will quake And over the head of the ruler When lightning will thunder We shall see. Lawyers and political workers here said the words echoed the frustration of many Pakistanis with General Musharraf's rule. Khurram Latif Khosa, a lawyer in the crowd, said of the chief justice, Here we have a man who had the courage to go eye to eye with the military. Zafar Iqbal Jhagra, a politician belonging to Pakistan Muslim League of former Prime Minister Nawaz
[PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Iran (was Iran on the Brink)
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The conditions of the working class in Iran are terrible. An estimated 40 percent live under the international poverty line and according to the Iranian Central Bank itself, more than 50 percent live beneath the government's designated poverty line. In May 2005, the state-run Iran Daily published some statistics that dramatize the growing poverty: Figures collected during the past 30 years indicate that per capita income in Iran has declined 120 per cent [!] based on fixed prices. The income-expense deficit for the urban family during March 2003-04 stood at a 3,300,000-million-rials deficit, up from 2,500,000 between March 2002-03 and 2,300,000 rials in 1997. The gap between the rich and the poor has also been rising, increasing by a minimum and maximum of 1.2 and 3 times during March 2003-04. Did you check the Central Bank of Iran and see if those are actually the stats it provides? To my knowledge there is no article published by it that confirms the above. As for the Iran Daily article, I tracked it down: Stock Market Spurs Economic Growth, http://iran-daily.com/1384/2286/html/focus.htm#65046. This unsigned Iran Daily article is essentially a propaganda article that makes a case for liberalization, arguing that The empirical evidence strongly supports the belief that greater stock market liquidity boosts -- or at least precedes -- economic growth and the removal of barriers to foreign investment can improve the operation of domestic capital markets, and the article's fictional statistics is put to that service. Using the Central Bank of Iran among other sources, Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, a professor of economics at Virginia Polytechnic Institute State University, comes to a very different conclusion in Revolution and Redistribution in Iran: Poverty and Inequality 25 Years Later, August 2006, http://www.filebox.vt.edu/users/salehi/Iran_poverty_trend.pdf. See Table 7: Per Capita Income and Expenditures Per Day in 2004 rials, 1974-2004 on p. 49, Table 8: Poverty Lines, Consumer Price Index, and PPP Exchange Rates on p. 50, and Table 9: Poverty Rates on p. 51. It is clear from Salehi-Isfahani's work as well as other studies* of social and economic change in Iran over the last three decades that the government of Iran, through its fiscal policy and public investment, has diminished poverty and raised the standard of living for working people, though it has failed to change structural economic inequality. What has negatively impacted working people in Iran in recent years is neoliberal reforms (of the sort loved by those who think like the aforementioned Iran Daily article's author) that have led to the rise of economic insecurity: e.g., When the reforms began 60 percent of wage and salary workers were employed in the public sector, compared to 40 percent in 2004 (Salehi-Isfahani, p. 42). * E.g, http://web.worldbank.org/external/default/main?pagePK=51187349piPK=51189435theSitePK=312943menuPK=64187510searchMenuPK=312984theSitePK=312943entityID=90341_20041207102532searchMenuPK=312984theSitePK=312943 Primary Health Care and the Rural Poor in the Islamic Republic of Iran Amir Mehryar 2004 Abstract: Rural households in Iran have traditionally been the most disadvantaged segment of Iranian society, not only in terms of income and political power but also in accessing basic public services, including health. A major achievement of public policy in Iran over the past 20 years has been the improvement of rural health and the near elimination of health disparities between higher-income urban populations and the rural poor. For example, in 1974 the infant mortality rate was 120 and 62 per thousand live births for rural and urban areas, respectively. By 2000, however, both the level and the differential of infant mortality had declined considerably, to 30 for rural areas and 28 for urban ones. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Nationalism and State Ownership Seen as Main Threats to Oil Supply
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/f80f29aa-fe93-11db-bdc7-000b5df10621.html Politics and easy profits signal global oil crunch By Sheila McNulty in Houston Published: May 10 2007 03:00 | Last updated: May 10 2007 03:00 In the oil business, the constant development of new technology has created the adage good fields just keep getting better and better. Companies are able to get more out of oil fields than they expected even a decade ago. Yet if they cannot access those fields, the oil within is not going to come to market. A study by PFC Energy, the respected consultancy, shows world oil supplies might well fall behind growing demand in the long term as political factors limit production capacity increases in key producing nations. The full impact of the nationalisations that took place in the 1960s and 1970s are taking effect now, says Robin West, chairman of PFC Energy. Key national oil companies are not making the needed investment, either because resource nationalism is leading them to block out technologically advanced international oil companies or because they are making so much money from current fields that they do not see the need to reinvest. The report singled out Mexico, Venezuela, Iran and Iraq as declining producers. It listed Russia and Kuwait as stagnant producers and Saudi Arabia - only just - as an expanding producer, with qualifications. Lord Truscott, UK parliamentary undersecretary of state for energy, says countries such as Russia could have problems in future if their national oil companies do not have sufficient funds to invest in new fields, while other countries must attract western investment and technology to increase production capacity. PFC says the Cantarell field, which accounts for two-thirds of Mexico's production, is declining rapidly, yet developing deep-water exploration could hold production steady if not boost it. Venezuela could significantly increase production if it encouraged investment in heavy crude. Yet its move this month to nationalise major fields is likely to have the reverse effect, as the international oil companies get less for their investment. In Iran, prospects for capacity increases are not favourable, given the political environment. Iraq is seen as a wild card. Pre-war production capacity was significantly higher than current levels, but new investment could reverse that trend. PFC lists the stagnant producers as Russia and Kuwait. Russia's production levels are expected to flatten, it says, and without better management and capital, investment inflows are likely to remain flat. That seems especially probable given President Vladimir Putin's statements that current output levels are appropriate. Kuwait's courting of international oil companies to boost production has stalled on political infighting. Saudi Arabia has said future demand for its production may advance its efforts, but Saudi Aramco, its national oil company, has said increasing production too much might run down its reserves faster than the country would like. The impact of continued depletion and stagnation of oil production capacity will not be felt for some time, given that other producers are expanding production, many of them in partnership with international oil companies. In Kazakhstan, Angola and Nigeria, for example, production is expanding with the aid of outside investors, says PFC, which says that Brazil has created a strong and innovative national oil company that funds and develops production increases on its own. The scale of these additions, however, is limited and will peak in relatively short order, PFC says. Whether the declining and stagnant producers will step in at that point remains to be seen. For the first time in this petroleum cycle, the national oil companies have a major responsibility for supporting world oil markets over the long term, Mr West says. The real challenge is whether the national oil companies will meet their responsibility to bring the oil to market,he says. It is unclear whether that responsibility is as important to those countries as meeting their needs at home. For, as Jim Mulva, chief executive of ConocoPhillips, the US's third largest oil company, says: The [national oil companies'] host country may have other strategic objectives, which may limit the speed by which they develop their resources. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/6f017cd6-fe92-11db-bdc7-000b5df10621.html Nationalism and state ownership seen as main threats to oil supply By Sheila McNulty in Houston Published: May 10 2007 03:00 | Last updated: May 10 2007 03:00 Increasing state ownership and rising resource nationalism are emerging as the main long-term threats to global oil supplies, says a report for the industry by an energy consultancy. The report by PFC Energy highlights the shift in power towards state-controlled national oil companies. Multinationals own or have access to less than 10 per cent of world oil resources. Resource nationalism, which is limiting
Re: [PEN-L] Poverty and Inequality in Iran (was Iran on the Brink)
On 5/10/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 06:20 PM 5/10/2007, you wrote: Figures collected during the past 30 years indicate that per capita income in Iran has declined 120 per cent [!] based on fixed prices. The income-expense deficit for the urban family during March 2003-04 stood at a 3,300,000-million-rials deficit, up from 2,500,000 between March 2002-03 and 2,300,000 rials in 1997. The gap between the rich and the poor has also been rising, increasing by a minimum and maximum of 1.2 and 3 times during March 2003-04. Did you check the Central Bank of Iran and see if those are actually the stats it provides? No. It's worth the efforts to track down decent research, to gain accurate information and pass it on to the Americans. But I will say this, about half of the article you cited about poverty reduction in Iran discusses social inequality. Based on the GINI coefficient, Iran is no more equal than it was in 1972 during the dark days of the Shah. Iran's GINI story is more complex than you sum up, for 1972 wasn't the darkest days of the Shah, in terms of GINI. First of all, shorty before the revolution, near the end of the Shah's regime, GINI indexes for both urban and rural areas, as shown in Figure 5: The Gini Index of Inequality of Household Expenditures, 1971-04 on p. 27, rose to all-time highs. Between 1972 and 1977 the Gini index of inequality rose from 0.4 to 0.5 in urban areas and from 0.37 to 0.44 in rural areas. The Gini index declined immediately after the Revolution, to about 0.4 for both rural and urban areas (Behdad 1989, Nowshirvani and Clawson 1994), but rose slightly in the 1980s. These changes in inequality mirror the fall and rise in poverty in the 1980s discussed above. According to household expenditures the period since the end of the war with Iraq has been one of general stability in inequality. Urban inequality which was higher than rural inequality before the Revolution, has been generally below rural inequality for the last twenty years. In contrast to the oil boom of the 1970s, which brought greater inequality, the latest oil-induced expansion of 2000-2004 did not change the level of inequality; if anything it seems to have lowered it. . . . Individual earnings also mark the rise in inequality of earnings in the post reform period (after 1989) more sharply than household expenditures or incomes. Signicantly, the higher inequality of earnings in the post war year has been tempered effectively by non-earned incomes, which appear to have had an equalizing e(r)ect. (Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, Revolution and Redistribution in Iran: Poverty and Inequality 25 Years Later, August 2006, pp. 26 and 34 http://www.filebox.vt.edu/users/salehi/Iran_poverty_trend.pdf). After the reduction of inequality in the early phase of the revolution, neoliberal reforms began, with the Rafsanjani administration, which made the inequality of individual earnings rise especially sharply, and if the overall inequality has been stable despite that rise, it is only because of the redistributional impact of the government's expenditures on entitlements, social programs, and the like. The contours of this change are important to understand. Lastly, the period under discussion is basically the period when many nations, in the core as well as in the periphery, have seen dramatic rises in inequality, most strikingly in the USA in the core and China in the periphery. We ought to recognize the power of Iran's working people to check the state in the post-reform period, which, but for the fear of responses of workers and political instabilities they bring, would have gone further in the direction of liberalization. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: hey, the Henry Jackson Society[1] have come out in favour of the AKP versus the army and secular middle class! http://zope06.v.servelocity.net/hjs/sections/greater_europe/struggle_democratic_turkey/document_view I think that this has a lot to do with the Kurdish Nationalist element of the Decent Left (viz Hitchens). But it is interesting to me at least. Or could it be that the army and secular middle class really lack political merit, whether seen from imperialist or anti-imperialist points of view, and that many across the political spectrum, from the EU and the USA, the Financial Times and the New York Times and the Washington Post, MERIP to WSWS, to liberal and leftist Turkish academics in Turkey and abroad, think that the Kemalist establishment's contention that the AKP is a religious fundamentalist party lacks credibility, at the very least? On 5/9/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have no idea why we need to pick sides in the fight between the Turkish army and the AKP. Did we have to pick sides between the Algerian government and the Islamic movement there? Or between Mugabe and the MDC? The left should stick to backing parties and individuals that are worth backing, like Hugo Chavez or the CP in Nepal. Politics under capitalism, in my view, is rarely polarized between Chavezes and their enemies, Good vs. Evil. Between conflicts like Mugabe vs. MDC and contests like Chavez vs. Rosales, there's a great deal of distance, and in that distance, much of politics happens in countries where states still exist, and there are formations like the PT, the AKP, the CPI(M), and the like that are neoliberal but have mass support to various degrees, so those to their left ought to pay attention to nuances. Remember the CPN(Maoist) didn't win on its own -- it made alliances with parliamentary Marxists against whom they had been fighting and then won together. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Politics under capitalism, in my view, is rarely polarized between Chavezes and their enemies, Good vs. Evil. Between conflicts like Mugabe vs. MDC and contests like Chavez vs. Rosales, there's a great deal of distance, and in that distance, much of politics happens in countries where states still exist, and there are formations like the PT, the AKP, the CPI(M), and the like that are neoliberal but have mass support to various degrees, so those to their left ought to pay attention to nuances. Remember the CPN(Maoist) didn't win on its own -- it made alliances with parliamentary Marxists against whom they had been fighting and then won together. -- Yoshie I have no idea what you mean by paying attention to nuances. I believe that the PT and the CPI(M) (as well as the ANC, Sinn Fein, and the government of China) pursue anti-working class policies. I agree with the kind of attacks on them that can be found in Counterpunch and in the magazine that employs you Attacks on this or that, however sharp, don't do much, unless they come with at least attempts to build viable alternatives to the objects of attacks. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Attacks on this or that, however sharp, don't do much, unless they come with at least attempts to build viable alternatives to the objects of attacks. -- Yoshie How am I supposed to build a viable alternative to the AKP? That's a job of leftists in Turkey. Your job is to build a viable alternative to the DP here. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 10:49 AM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: That's a job of leftists in Turkey. Your job is to build a viable alternative to the DP here. While you're handing out assignments, as long as you're living in the U.S. - and it's been more than 10 years now, hasn't it? - isn't that your job too? So why all the apologetics for Islamists. You've got organizing work to do in the heartland of the USA, our demographic archetype, Columbus, Ohio! Building a viable alternative to the DP* in the USA or the SP in France or others like them, given enduring political and economic stability of the core of the empire, is far more difficult than building viable alternatives to the PT, the AKP, the Congress and the CPI(M), the ANC and the SACP, etc. (these are parties and coalitions that I think fall into the same range of politics in terms of economic and foreign policy, to which the Bolivarians, Iran's left Islamists, Hizballah, and so on are superior), which have shown quite a great deal of ability to build and keep hegemony over working people despite their neoliberal policy. In any case, though, leftists in the North haven't been great examples to emulate, so people in the South have little to learn from us, and if a lot of working people vote for or otherwise support centrist parties, Islamist or non-Islamist, in the South, I want to learn why they do so first of all (until such time as they find better things to do). * Besides, I bet most people on PEN-l don't really want to build an alternative to the DP or rather they are opposed to doing so. I don't know why they don't understand other leftists in other nations often feel the same way about their DP counterparts in their countries. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 1:01 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 10:49 AM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: That's a job of leftists in Turkey. Your job is to build a viable alternative to the DP here. While you're handing out assignments, as long as you're living in the U.S. - and it's been more than 10 years now, hasn't it? - isn't that your job too? So why all the apologetics for Islamists. You've got organizing work to do in the heartland of the USA, our demographic archetype, Columbus, Ohio! Building a viable alternative to the DP* in the USA or the SP in France or others like them, given enduring political and economic stability of the core of the empire, is far more difficult than building viable alternatives to the PT, the AKP, the Congress and the CPI(M), the ANC and the SACP, etc. (these are parties and coalitions that I think fall into the same range of politics in terms of economic and foreign policy, to which the Bolivarians, Iran's left Islamists, Hizballah, and so on are superior), which have shown quite a great deal of ability to build and keep hegemony over working people despite their neoliberal policy. I don't know whether that's really true or not, but that aside, you still haven't answered the question: why doesn't the advice you dispense to Lou apply to yourself as well? It sure applies to me, and I've made, and will make, efforts to build a viable alternative to the DP here, but it's clear that at this point the Americans, including a majority of self-identified leftists including you, are not interested in that or rather are opposed to that. Given that, I have recommended some practical things to do in the meantime, in the area of educational work that may help us work toward détente with Iran, for instance: From: Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: May 6, 2007 10:26 PM Subject: Grassroots Work against Regime Change (was Iran on the Brink) To: PEN-L list PEN-L@sus.csuchico.edu Opposing US, European, and UN policies and aggression against Iran is one thing, and actually stopping them is another thing, and it is the latter that I want to see. What can we be doing to make that actually happen? It seems to me that we need to help the Americans see Iran as a normal country and help them recognize the Iranian government's right to exist, or else they won't get motivated to stop the US campaign for regime change (using all means from sanctions to covert actions to military attacks). For that purpose, it helps more Americans to get to know the Iranians, most of whom do not want regime change, first of all. Rather than tired Marxist rhetoric from individuals who have no institutional power, the anti-intervention campaign would benefit from more people doing the kind of patient grassroots work done by such organizations as Global Exchange, the Fellowship for Reconciliation, and Just Foreign Policy (at http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/issues/iran.html). http://www.forusa.org/programs/iran/ Join F.O.R.'s Fall 2007 Delegations to Iran: Tentatively Scheduled for late September late November Following the success of Fellowship of Reconciliation's two delegations to Iran in December 2005 and May 2006, FOR is engaged in the second phase of our Iran initiative, a project seeking alternatives to the current political standoff between the United States and Iranian governments. FOR is sending a series of peace missions to Iran to affirm friendship and solidarity between the people of the United States and the people of Iran. These delegations allow a diverse and representative group of Western peace activists to see firsthand the realities of life in today's Iran. At the same time, they provide the opportunity for a wide range of ordinary Iranians to encounter citizens of the United States as we really are, beyond the stereotypes that define many views of the West. Your participation will provide you with the opportunity to experience the rich and ancient history of Persian culture and art, meet with members of Iranian civil society, and get a feel for the current climate in Iran. And it will allow Iranians to get to know you. http://www.globalexchange.org/tours/byCountry.html#17 Iran Now more than ever, as the heated debate on the Iran Question continues in Washington, it is crucial for Americans to understand Iran's vibrant society and its many complex facets. In addition to exploring the richness of Iranian history and culture among the ancient ruins of the Persian Empire, we meet with a diverse spectrum of individuals in order to gain a better understanding of this country. Global Exchange has been sending American travelers to Iran since 2000, and through these tours we hope to demystify and contextualize the negative images of Iran, while shedding some light on the many contradictions and realities of life in the Islamic Republic. For additional
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, ravi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 9 May, 2007, at 11:57 AM, Doug Henwood wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 10:49 AM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: That's a job of leftists in Turkey. Your job is to build a viable alternative to the DP here. While you're handing out assignments, as long as you're living in the U.S. - and it's been more than 10 years now, hasn't it? - isn't that your job too? But she is doing that already. Insofar as you and others privilege Western liberal criteria over survival against multiple imminent threats and internal populist activism for a brown nation struggling against your (our) own government, you are in-differentiable from the DP, and any counterbalancing dissemination of information is an act of building a viable alternative. ;-) Leftists in the North basically act as if criticisms of parties, movements, and governments of the South are just a matter of pointing out this or that is wrong, which doesn't help activists in the South, most of whom already know _that_. Instead, they could say, Look, A, B, and C are the biggest problems for you, I think you could be doing D, E, and F instead, and the way to make D, E, and F happen is to do G, H, and I, given what you have in the way of social forces, political factions, and objective economic and international conditions that face your nation, and besides, G, H, and I have been shown to work in a country that is like yours. Then, people in the South can actually take a look at the proposal and weigh its merits and demerits. But such a constructive proposal of an alternative to the status quo is rarely found in discourse on the Left in the North. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, Daniel Davies [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie wrote: Leftists in the North basically act as if criticisms of parties, movements, and governments of the South are just a matter of pointing out this or that is wrong, which doesn't help activists in the South, most of whom already know _that_. I hate to say this, particularly given the context, but the obvious counterexample to this is Iran, where a very large proportion indeed of the local socialist opposition ended up exiled or dead, precisely because they didn't know what was wrong with the Khomeinists. (Specifically, they didn't believe that the Khomeinists wanted to form a totalitarian government.) This is where I differ. It's not so much Mojahedin, Tudeh, Fedai, etc. didn't know who Khomeini and Khomeinists were -- it's that the former underestimated the latter's ability to build hegemony over Iranian society and that the former didn't have enough support in Iranian society to defeat the latter. BTW, if the balance of social forces and political factions had been different, and if Mojahedin (the largest opposition in the early days of the Iranian revolution), on its own or in coalition with other leftists, had taken state power, I'm sure most leftists in the West would have criticized the Mojahedin government in nearly identical terms that they do today's Iranian government. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Opposition Splits While Zimbabwe Slips
Zimbabwe is a good example that shows that the party-government that comes out of the Marxist tradition in some way and its liberal opposition are not necessarily superior to the kind of state and society that exist, for instance, in Turkey and Iran, led by secular nationalists and Islamists respectively, that are more or less mirror images, as Sabri says, in their responses to colonial modernity, each confusing modernization and Westernization, but in different ways. A lot depends on domestic and international political and economic, social and cultural, conditions. -- Yoshie http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/09/world/africa/09zimbabwe.html May 9, 2007 Opposition Splits While Zimbabwe Slips By MICHAEL WINES JOHANNESBURG, May 8 — The last couple of years have been exceedingly tough for the Movement for Democratic Change, the only opposition political party of any note in authoritarian Zimbabwe. Party officials have been beaten with stones and logs; their cars have been hijacked; their posters have been methodically stripped from street poles. In one memorable instance, thugs tried to toss the party's director of security down a sixth-floor stairwell at its headquarters. And those are just the attacks they have endured from their own members. Even more than the Zimbabwean government's frequently brutal abductions and assaults on members of the M.D.C., the internecine brawls are evidence that all is not well inside Zimbabwe's political opposition, the force on which the West has pinned its hopes for democratic change. As President Robert G. Mugabe's 27-year rule enters what many analysts call a terminal phase, the selfproclaimed democratic opposition is near its nadir. The Movement for Democratic Change is split into two bitterly opposed factions, at war over ideology, power and prestige. Each has called the other a tool of Mr. Mugabe's spy service, the Central Intelligence Organization, and each has accused the other of betraying the party's democratic ideals. Now, with a crucial national election looming, the question is whether they can reform their tactics and patch up their differences long enough to mount a serious challenge to Mr. Mugabe — and if they do, whether ordinary people will care. Some Zimbabweans are skeptical. They don't seriously challenge the regime, said Mike Davies, who leads a civic group, the Combined Harare Residents Association. You ask young people here what they want, and their No. 1 answer is 'I want to get the hell out of Zimbabwe.' They don't buy into the M.D.C. Another expert, a political analyst in Harare, the capital, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of expulsion by the government, was dismissive. As a political party, he said, they haven't cut the mustard. An unlikely amalgam of whites and blacks, trade unionists and intellectuals, the Movement for Democratic Change nearly won control of Parliament in 2000, just a year after its founding, and nearly beat Mr. Mugabe in the 2002 presidential contest. But by the end of 2006, repeated miscalculations and sometimes violent infighting had divided the party into two feuding camps, both almost irrelevant. They might still be, had Mr. Mugabe's riot police not severely beaten dozens of opposition members during a protest on March 11, including Morgan Tsvangirai, the popular figure who now heads the party's largest faction. Although Mr. Tsvangirai and his loyalists presided over the party's decline — and not a little of the violence — his photogenic head wound and swollen eye instantly elevated the party's profile in the world press, turning him into a symbol of democratic change in Zimbabwe. For the M.D.C., Mr. Tsvangirai's drubbing could be a godsend. Though the economy is in ruins, millions of citizens have fled the country and most of those who remain resent Mr. Mugabe, the president, now 83, who has declared his intention to seek a new term in elections next March. Zimbabwe's neighbors, belatedly alarmed at the unraveling next door, have appointed President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa to mediate guarantees of a free and fair election. Most political analysts say Mr. Mugabe has already begun his campaign, in his own way. In February his agents began a wave of kidnappings and beatings of hundreds of Movement for Democratic Change leaders — a crusade, critics say, to destroy the opposition's will to contest another election. Faced with that crusade, the two M.D.C. factions have declared a temporary truce and pledged to wage a single campaign against Mr. Mugabe. But with 11 months left before the vote, they have yet to choose a presidential candidate or a parliamentary slate, much less a campaign plan. Brian Raftopoulos, a Zimbabwean political scientist at the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation in Cape Town, says the clock is ticking. They have to agree at the very minimum on a common election strategy and a common nominee for president, he said. I think they've got very little time to do that.
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, ravi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 9 May, 2007, at 2:35 PM, Patrick Linder wrote: Because everyone knows that those people in the South can't be trusted to know for themselves what needs to be done. They need smart people like intellectuals from the North to tell them what is wrong and how to fix it. That model has worked out so well for the World Bank and IMF, Northern intellectuals showing Southern states how to fix their problems, that we should adopt it as our model, rather than listening to those in the South and offering what support we can as they reason out their problems and solutions in a way that might never have occurred to us. While the above attitude is not uncommon (from the West/North towards the South/third world), I am sure that Lou or Doug do not believe they know what's best for the Iranian people! Even Doug and Galloway's psycho-theorising about the Arab/Muslim mind is, IMHO, ill- considered (or perhaps irrelevant), not ill-intentioned. Besides, leftists in the West are not the WB and the IMF, or even like Moscow in the days of the USSR, so they lack power to impose anything on the South. I'm just saying that constructive criticisms with concrete proposals, unlike merely saying I hate this, that, and other things, can be debated by people in the South _if they like_, for them to adopt or reject it. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 2:56 PM, Daniel Davies wrote: I hate to say this, particularly given the context, but the obvious counterexample to this is Iran, where a very large proportion indeed of the local socialist opposition ended up exiled or dead, precisely because they didn't know what was wrong with the Khomeinists. By the way, when I interviewed Hamid Dabashi recently about his history of Iran http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/ Radio.html#070412, he complained about the reportage that Michel Foucault was sending back home, which was very pro-Islamist. As Dabashi pointed out, the 1978-79 revolution was made up of many tendencies, but Foucault only saw the Islamists because that's who was leading him around. Doug Jonathan Rée argues that Foucault was more clear-sighted about the Iranian revolution than many critics of his give him credit for, and he in fact registered his objection to the government that came out of the revolution: The Shah fled Iran in the early weeks of 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini returned in triumph and at the end of March an Islamic republic was ratified in a popular referendum: a classic case, it would seem, of a resurgence of reactionary authoritarian populism. Many of the possibilities that Foucault had canvassed were coming to nothing, and in April he published an open letter to the new Iranian Prime Minister, Mehdi Bazargan, expressing dismay at the abridgment of rights under the incoming government of mullahs. But while he remonstrated with his friends in Iran, Foucault never yielded an inch to his critics in Paris. Despite their accusations, he had not taken it upon himself to advocate Islamic government: He had simply recorded some of the aspirations of the protesters, while trying to dismantle the stale and defensive notions that filled the heads of Western observers. The problem of Islam as a political force is an essential one for our time and for the years to come, he wrote, and we cannot approach it with a modicum of intelligence if we start out from a position of hatred. (The Treason of the Clerics, 15 August 2005, http://www.thenation.com/doc/20050815/ree) You may disagree with Foucault's position, but it's a valid one. Besides, in the end, it is not Foucault that directed the Iranian Revolution -- he is merely one individual. It is the people of Iran, or more precisely the balance of social forces and political factions inside Iran, that determined its initial outcome and has since changed it and continues to change it. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, Daniel Davies [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: yeah I heard that, but I thought he was kind of retrofitting it. Of the small number of Iranian dissidents I know, they all more or less admit that everybody was taken in by Khomeini and nobody expected things to end up like they did. No one expected the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Iraqi invasion of Iran, and so on, and that's one of the biggest reasons why few could foresee the direction of the revolution. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 3:07 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: It's not so much Mojahedin, Tudeh, Fedai, etc. didn't know who Khomeini and Khomeinists were -- it's that the former underestimated the latter's ability to build hegemony over Iranian society and that the former didn't have enough support in Iranian society to defeat the latter. Depends on what you mean by building hegemony over Iranian society. From my interview with Hamid Dabashi http:// www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Radio.html#070412, starting at 41:43: Under the smokescreen of the American hostage crisis, Khomeini brutally suppresses all the alternative voices that existed, destroys the secular left [Q: quite literally, right?] oh oh absolutely, twice, once in 1979-1980 and once in 1986. And while the world's attention is distracted by the fate of 52 Americans, all opposition is destroyed, and a new constitution is drafted and put to a vote. People have the choice, either vote for monarchy or vote for an Islamic republic. The result is proclaimed, 99.99% in favor of an Islamic republic, all opposition eliminated That's the first phrase; the next eight years consist of the elimination of what survives among the opposition. Remember Chavez's counter-coup against the coup that deposed him? When you have hegemony, like Chavez and his comrades, you can beat back those who seek to impose their hegemony by force, and that's what Mojahedin, et al. didn't have. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] The responsibilities of [Western] intellectuals
On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 3:52 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: Jonathan Rée argues that Foucault was more clear-sighted about the Iranian revolution than many critics of his give him credit for, and he in fact registered his objection to the government that came out of the revolution: Dabashi, again, at 40:39: Michel Foucault was absolutely and deadly wrong. He went to Tehran looking for an Islamist revolution and came out with a series of cockamamie articles for Corriere della Sera reading an Islamist aspect into the revolution. Why? Because his handlers were Islamists. The multiplicity of ideological foundations and political forces definitive to the revolution were right in front of his eyes but he couldn't see them. Foucault did see the multiplicity of ideological foundations and political forces -- it's just that he didn't think that liberals or Marxists would be in the leadership: In ridiculing the notion that the secular nationalist or Marxist left would now take center stage and displace the clerics, Foucault made a keen assessment of the balance of forces. Indeed, he exhibited quite a remarkable perspicacity, especially given the fact that he was not a specialist on either Iran or Islam. (Janet Afary and Kevin B. Anderson, Revisiting Foucault and the Iranian Revolution, New Politics, 10.1, Summer 2004, http://www.wpunj.edu/newpol/issue37/Afary37.htm) I think Foucault understood the balance of social forces and political factions did not favor liberals and leftists, as Afary and Anderson say. On 5/9/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 9, 2007, at 4:04 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: When you have hegemony Hegemony is a complex thing that includes mass assent to what's perceived as legitimate power. Khomeini didn't have that; he used state power with weapons and prisons. The fact that Khomeini and Khomeinists used state power isn't evidence in itself of absence of hegemony -- all power elites in control of all states, from capitalist to nationalist to socialist, do so -- hegemony is always backed up by force, as Gramsci reminds us. Given the degree of violence following the Iranian revolution, relatively small in comparison to many similar social and political revolutions, I gather that Khomeini and Khomeinists probably had more hegemony than many other forces, including socialist ones, that came into power before or after them. Moreover, if Khomeini and Khomeinists had not had hegemony, the rest of Iranian society would have followed Mojahedin, etc.'s leadership, before or after they turned to armed struggle. Besides, without Khomeinist hegemony, by now Iran would have gone the way of many other states with similar revolutionary origins. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Turkey's Kurdish Party to Field Independent Candidates
A very interesting development. Why don't all smaller parties (those who decide not to merge to create bigger parties) do this? -- Yoshie http://www.metimes.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20070509-034808-3139r Turkey's Kurdish party to field independent candidates AFP May 9, 2007 ANKARA -- Turkey's main Kurdish party will pitch independent candidates in general elections July 22 in a bid to bypass the high threshold for parliamentary representation, its chairman said Wednesday. We have decided to run in the elections with independent candidates, Ahmet Turk, the head of the Democratic Society Party (DTP), was quoted by the Anatolia news agency as saying. He was speaking after a two-day party meeting in the mainly Kurdish southeastern city of Diyarbakir to decide on their strategy for early legislative elections brought forward from November. Many Kurds have become legislators in Turkey as members of mainstream parties, but pro-Kurdish movements have failed to overcome the 10-percent bar to enter parliament, even though they usually dominate the vote in most areas in the southeast and routinely win the local administrations. Fielding independent candidates may allow them to by-pass the barrier in the elections. Once in parliament, the winning deputies can again regroup under the DTP banner. Turk said they would field independent candidates in areas where the DTP is traditionally strong and back enlightened, democratic candidates in other regions. He gave no further details, but the media has tipped human rights award winner Leyla Zana as one of the party's possible candidates. Zana and several other Kurdish politicians entered parliament in 1991 on the ticket of a center-left party, but they lost their seats in 1994 after the Kurdish party, which they later joined, was outlawed for having links to armed Kurdish rebels fighting the government. Zana, the 1995 laureate of the European Parliament's Sakharov human rights award, and three others spent 10 years behind bars for alleged links with armed rebels. They were convicted on the same charge in a retrial in March, but will not have to go back to jail. Kurdish politicians are routinely accused of being instruments of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has led a bloody separatist insurgency in the southeast since 1984 and is listed as a terrorist group by Ankara and much of the international community. The DTP was set up in November 2005 as a successor of other Kurdish movements, which were outlawed by the courts. It has pledged to try to resolve the Kurdish conflict through peaceful means, but has so far made no progress. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
On 5/9/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Louis: Plus, I have no use for the AKP since I really like my raki, as does my father-in-law. Well said, Louis. I like my raki too and these bloody AKP municipalities do not give liquor permits to newly opened restaurants. To hell with the AKP, if for nothing, for that. What is life without a few glasses of raki with friends, singing and dancing at Bosphorus? Best, Sabri PS: Many public beaches the AKP municipalities maintain already have two sections: one for males and one for females. Forget about topless suntanning, even ordinary swimsuits are not welcome. If secular parties make an unexpected comeback in the upcoming elections, I'll chalk it up to the raki and bikini votes. ;- -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle
http://www.merip.org/mero/mero050707.html Behind Turkey's Presidential Battle Gamze Çavdar May 7, 2007 (Gamze Çavdar is an assistant professor of political science at Colorado State University.) This is a bullet fired at democracy, snapped Recep Tayyıp Erdoğan, Turkey's prime minister and chairman of the country's ruling party, in reaction to the May 1 ruling by the Constitutional Court. The court had validated a maneuver by the opposition party in Parliament to block the nomination of Erdoğan's foreign minister, Abdullah Gül, to accede to the presidency of the Turkish Republic. To deny the ruling party the quorum it needed to make Gül president, the opposition deputies simply stayed home. The pro-government parliamentarians voted on the candidate anyway, but the Constitutional Court agreed with the opposition's contention that the balloting was illegal -- and thus null and void. After Parliament tried and failed again to elect Gül president on May 6, he withdrew his candidacy. As stipulated by the Turkish constitution, the president is chosen by two-thirds majority of the Grand National Assembly, currently dominated by the Justice and Development Party (in Turkish, Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi, or AKP). Built in 2001 upon the ashes of two Islamist parties, the Welfare Party and the Virtue Party, the AKP, sometimes called a soft Islamist or neo-Islamist party, formed a majority government after winning the November 2002 legislative elections. Its preponderance of seats in the 550-member parliament gives the AKP the prerogative of nominating a candidate to be the next president. The AKP government has drawn immense attention from domestic and international analysts because, contrary to widespread images of Islamist parties, it has adopted an ideology of conservative democracy and adapted itself to work within a secular system. The AKP says it is uninterested in establishing the rule of Islamic law. Nonetheless, skeptics in Turkey have come to believe that the AKP's moderation is just a cover for an unadulterated Islamist agenda. Hardly a day goes by without nervous talk of the Islamist threat (referred to as irtica, or regression) and discussion of how to thwart it, including the possibility of military intervention to safeguard state secularism, defined as state control over religion and religious expression. The major actors in the secular political bloc, including the outgoing president, the chief of staff of the Turkish military, the main opposition party and the mainstream media, all raised their voices months ago against the presidential candidacy of an AKP politician -- expected then to be Erdoğan himself. Just behind the surface of public anti-AKP activity, many Turks see the deep state, a shadowy nexus of military and police officers and militants on the far right. Turkey now faces the prospect of a lengthy battle over who will be its next president. Erdoğan has upped the ante by demanding that parliamentary elections slated for November be moved up to the summer -- they are now scheduled for July 22 -- and that the president be elected by popular vote. The presidential and parliamentary contests are the latest round in the long-running fight between the AKP and its state secularist detractors, a fight whose outcome carries great importance for the political future of Turkey. But just as important are the systemic economic, social and political crises whose warning sirens are drowned out, and whose resolution is delayed, in the din of the Islamist-secularist divide. KEEPER OF THE KEMALIST FLAME Choosing a president has often been a source of troubles for the Turkish Republic. Following the death of founding father Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the transition to civilian presidents was anything but smooth, as the civilians needed the backing of the recalcitrant military to be effective. The first experiment with a civilian president turned catastrophic. Celal Bayar, who served from 1950 to 1960, was sentenced to prison by a military tribunal following a coup. In 1973, civilian politicians and the armed forces failed to settle on a candidate, resulting in a prolonged deadlock that was finally overcome after the parties agreed the presidency would pass to Fahri Korutürk, a former admiral. The parliament's futile efforts to select Korutürk's successor came to symbolize the legislature's incapacity and deepened ideological cleavages among political parties, eventually leading to another military takeover in 1980. Top-ranked generals strongly opposed the eighth president, Turgut Özal, whose tenure remained controversial up to his death in 1993. This time, the stakes are even higher for opponents of the prospective civilian president, who are concerned not only about the AKP leaders' Islamist background, but also the increased powers vested in the office of president. The 1982 constitution, a product of the 1980 coup, reinstituted the parliamentary system of the 1961 constitution, but also granted the
Re: [PEN-L] More on Transition, Brenner, Allen, Productivity
On 5/7/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Among these Eurocentric historians farming practices loom larger than any other supposedly objective criterion underpinning the rise of the West. The West is the world of the plucky, inventive yeoman farmer, while the despotic East employed unproductive farming techniques. It's not an East-West thing. Compare the trends in R. Allen's table: in England and the Netherlands, productivity went up, in France it stayed the same, and in Belgium, Germany, Spain, and Australia it declined. The differences are indicative of the different balances of class forces: where capitalists won, productivity went up over time, where feudal lords won, productivity went down over time, where direct producers were strong, relatively speaking, productivity stayed just about the same. That confirms the Brenner thesis. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] More on Transition, Brenner, Allen, Productivity
On 5/7/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: It's not an East-West thing. Compare the trends in R. Allen's table: in England and the Netherlands, productivity went up, in France it stayed the same, and in Belgium, Germany, Spain, and Australia it declined. The differences are indicative of the different balances of class forces: where capitalists won, productivity went up over time, where feudal lords won, productivity went down over time, where direct producers were strong, relatively speaking, productivity stayed just about the same. That confirms the Brenner thesis. -- Yoshie I wasn't aware that there were feudal lords in Australia. It's a typo. The table posted here says Austria. On 5/7/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Basically, the positions one takes on the debate has little to do with current-day politics. In that case, maybe it's time to let go of it. The debate has no apparent implications for what people think of imperialism today and what to do about it. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] the East (of Europe) ain't red.
On 5/7/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Grave errors Neil Clark May 7, 2007 7:00 PM http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/neil_clark/2007/05/grave_errors.html snip In many cases, it's been parties nominally of the left, bought off by capital, which have been doing the dirty work. That seems to be a common trend outside Cuba and Venezuela. The correct response to the tyranny of neoliberalism should not be racism, anti-semitism and homophobia but economic and social policies to increase solidarity. It's time the socialist parties in the region stopped following the socially destructive dogma of Thatcherism and instead tried being socialist. Well, socialists don't believe in socialism any more, certainly not in the North and also much of the South. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Somalia: the Other (Hidden) War for Oil
http://www.blackcommentator.com/228/228_left_margin_somalia_war_oil.html Left Margin Somalia: the Other (Hidden) War for Oil By Carl Bloice BC Editorial Board The U.S. bombing of Somalia took place while the World Social Forum was underway in Kenya and three days before a large anti-war action in Washington, January 27. Nunu Kidane, network coordinator for Priority Africa Network (PAN) was present in Nairobi, and after returning home asked out loud how to explain the silence of the US peace movement on Somalia? Writing in the San Francisco community newspaper Bay View, she suggested one reason I think valid: Perhaps US-based organizations don't have the proper analytical framework from which to understand the significance of the Horn of Africa region. Perhaps it is because Somalia is largely seen as a country with no government and in perpetual chaos, with 'fundamental Islamic' forces not deserving of defense against the military attacks by US in search of 'terrorists'. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] More on Transition, Brenner, Allen, Productivity
On 5/7/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In that case, maybe it's time to let go of it. The debate has no apparent implications for what people think of imperialism today and what to do about it. -- Yoshie Actually, I was inspired to take up the question once again by some posts from Richard of Lenin's Tomb. I promised him a response. It gives me an opportunity to look at Teschke, Albritton, Inikori and Oliver Cox. Maybe you have heard of Oliver Cox. Your employers found his book on the origins of capitalism worth publishing. I generally take my cues from what MR deems important. MR has books by people on both sides of the debate. I personally don't take cues from MR, though, or any particular school of Marxism, for that matter. People who have written for MR don't agree with one another on many things, first of all. Also, leftists in the West need to think most about what MR has said relatively less about (according to McChesney's research): socialist strategy and tactics in the advanced countries, particularly the United States. http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/mcchesney060507.html The Monthly Review Story: 1949-1984 by Robert W. McChesney . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The eventual task of this author will be to critically assess the contribution of Monthly Review in four areas the editors have carefully analyzed over the years: (1) the dynamics of modern capitalism and, in particular, its secular tendency toward stagnation; (2) the nature of existing socialist societies and theoretical discussions of post-revolutionary society; (3) the nature of modern imperialism and Third World revolutionary movements; and (4) socialist strategy and tactics in the advanced countries, particularly the United States. This last area has received less attention than the other three areas in Monthly Review. Nevertheless, it is critical for a full understanding of Monthly Review's Marxism. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] IPSOS Exit Poll for the French Presidential Election
Just as in the US presidential election of 2004, the center left in France nominated, for the 2007 presidential election, the candidate who alienated the far left and didn't motivate the excluded and alienated, so 20% of the left of the left abstained or cast blank votes, and a majority (64%) of the abstentionists in the first round abstained in the second round as well; and yet the center-left candidate did not win a lot of centrist Bayrou votes either: 38% of the Bayrou voters voted for Royal, whereas 40% of them voted for Sarkozy. -- Yoshie http://www.ipsos.fr/CanalIpsos/articles/2208.asp?rubId=19 Nicolas Sarkozy au pouvoir 7 mai 2007 - Avec 53% des suffrages exprimés, Nicolas Sarkozy a été confortablement élu Président de la République Française. Le sondage Ipsos/Dell réalisé dimanche à la sortie des urnes révèle un soutien massif chez les personnes âgées, important dans les catégories supérieures, et une percée dans les milieux populaires, particulièrement au sein des classes moyennes inférieures où il devance Ségolène Royal. Contrairement à l'adage au second tour, on élimine, les questions de motivations du choix montrent qu'il a suscité une forte adhésion derrière sa candidature. Le sondage Avec un rapport de force particulièrement défavorable à la gauche au soir du premier tour, un score gauche plurielle + extrême gauche historiquement bas à 35%, la tâche relevait de la quadrature du cercle pour Ségolène Royal. Pour prétendre à un résultat plus serré, Ségolène Royal devait réunir quatre conditions. Obtenir 90% des reports de voix de la gauche non socialiste, au moins dix points d'avance dans le report des voix des électeurs de Bayrou du premier tour, bénéficier d'une forte abstention chez les électeurs frontistes et d'une mobilisation des abstentionnistes du premier tour en sa faveur. Sur tous ces points, le compte n'y est pas : 72% des électeurs de la gauche de la gauche ont voté Royal mais 20% se sont abstenus ou ont voté blanc, elle partage avec Nicolas Sarkozy les voix bayrouistes (38% contre 40%, 22% de non exprimés), et les électeurs frontistes ont largement choisi le candidat de droite (63%), ne respectant pas les consignes d'abstention de Jean-Marie Le Pen (25% de non exprimés). Au-delà d'une défaite de la gauche, on a surtout assisté hier à la victoire de Nicolas Sarkozy. Alors que la logique on premier tour on choisit, au second tour on élimine dominait les motivations du choix aux précédents scrutins, le vote d'adhésion l'a cette fois emporté : 77% des électeurs de Nicolas Sarkozy avaient envie qu'il soit président, soit 22 points de plus que le taux enregistré chez les électeurs de Ségolène Royal, chez qui l'argument de barrer la route à Nicolas Sarkozy était très présent (42%). A titre de comparaison, seulement 51% des électeurs de Jacques Chirac en 1995 souhaitaient qu'il soit président, contre 43% qui voulaient en priorité barrer la route à Lionel Jospin (*). Le nouveau Président de la République doit la netteté de sa victoire au soutien important des électeurs de plus de 60 ans. Il obtient 61% des suffrages des 60-69 ans, 68% chez les plus de 70 ans. L'hypothèse assez séduisante sur le papier d'un vote féminin acquis à Ségolène Royal est d'ailleurs contredite par l'attractivité de Sarkozy dans cet électorat : les deux tiers des femmes de soixante ans et plus ont voté pour lui. Plus globalement, le bon score de la candidate socialiste chez les 18-24 ans (58%) ne suffit pas à contrebalancer le vote du troisième âge, qui était déjà acquis à la droite en 1995 dans les mêmes proportions ; avec le vieillissement de la population, les contingents deviennent néanmoins de plus en plus importants. Nicolas Sarkozy a par ailleurs obtenu de très bons scores en milieu rural (57%), et dans les villes de moins de 10 habitants (55%). Dans les grandes villes et dans l'agglomération parisienne, Ségolène Royal fait en revanche jeu égal. En plus du soutien des électeurs âgés et ruraux, Nicolas Sarkozy a tué le suspens en réussissant des scores plus qu'honorables dans les milieux populaires et particulièrement les classes moyennes inférieures : 49% des employés et des professions intermédiaires ont voté pour lui, 46% des ouvriers. Il a carrément gagné chez les moins diplômés, avec 51% des suffrages chez les sans-diplôme, 54% chez les titulaires d'un BEP ou CAP. Si 56% des électeurs dans les foyers aux revenus modestes ont choisit Ségolène Royal, le rapport de force est inversé dès la tranche supérieure : 53% pour Nicolas Sarkozy chez les revenus moyens inférieurs. Comme le suggérait Eric Dupin au cours du dernier forum Ipsos avant le 2nd tour, Nicolas Sarkozy a finalement réussi, comme d'ailleurs la droite aux Etats-Unis, à prendre la gauche en sandwich : les riches qui veulent rester riches et les pauvres qui veulent devenir riches l'ont emporté sur la classe moyenne. (*) Sondage Sortie des Urnes BVA/Zenith Data Systems réalisé le 7 mai 1995
[PEN-L] Imperialism Today (was More on Transition, Brenner, Allen, Productivity)
On 5/7/07, sartesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Several things are of note here: first Brenner is specifically attacking and refuting the demographic determinism that sought to substitute population pressures for class analysis, and analysis of class struggle, in the conditions of society in general and agricultural production in partiuclar. I agree with Brenner about the primacy of class struggle in theoretically determining the origin of capitalism, but demographic questions do form the terrain on which class struggle gets fought, and Brenner doesn't deny that. As climate change is expected to cause massive displacement and dispossession in many parts of the South, especially in Asia, and it is already aggravating many existing conflicts over resources, conflicts that get quickly ethnicized in the absence of parties that can present viable political alternatives to seeming zero-sum games over oil, water, etc., it is a mistake to discount demographic factors too much in practical politics. Now the Brenner debate originally was a debate with the Malthusian and neo-Malthusian orthodoxy. It burst forward into a blazing debate within the left after the 1977 publication in NLR of his The Origins of Capitalist Development: a Critique of Neo-Smithian Marxism, in which he takes on Wallerstein, Frank, Sweezy etc. about the specificty of the origin of capitalism, and capitalist social relations-- arguing that that entire line of analysis displaces class relations from economic analyses of development and underdevelopment. Frank and Wallerstein after him essentially argue that the origin of capitalist development in England, France, in Europe is in the underdevelopment of other countries. Accumulation then is not a a class process, but a country, region world process, and it is not a process of reproduction, but of transfer. Accordingly capitalism can be seen to be everything everywhere all the time-- anywhere trade exists, or expropriation of surplus, that's capitalism. snip Certainly more than a few Marxists saw in Brenner's analysis a pretty strong critique of current day third worldism, and the battle was on. Imperialism is best understood as a process of integrating the ruling classes and power elites (overlapping groups) of the world: the ruling classes and power elites of the North, who used to compete with one another in the age of competing empires that Lenin analyzed, are now integrated into one multinational empire under US hegemony, and the process of imperialism has continued to integrate the ruling classes and power elites of the South into that multinational empire. This view of imperialism is compatible with Brenner's analysis _and_ a preferential option for promising nations of the South such as Iran and Venezuela as an interim strategy, especially given the _fact_ that the proletariat of the North at present do not desire transition to socialism _at all_. Those who reject this interim strategy will become implicit or explicit supporters of the empire, as some, like Fred Halliday, Norman Geras, and Christopher Hitchens, already have. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Does It Even Matter if the U.S. Has a Cold?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/business/yourmoney/06view.html May 6, 2007 Economic View Does It Even Matter if the U.S. Has a Cold? By DANIEL GROSS FOR the last several decades, the United States has functioned as the main engine of growth in a global economy that has been moving with synchronicity. We're going through the longest stretch of concerted growth in decades, said Lakshman Achuthan, managing director at the Economic Cycle Research Institute in New York. So you might think that a sharp slowdown in growth in the United States — the domestic economy grew at a measly 1.3 percent annual clip in the first quarter this year, less than half the 2006 rate — would mean trouble for the rest of the global economy. Right? Wrong. As the domestic growth rate has declined sharply in recent quarters, the rest of the world is growing rapidly. India is blowing the door off its hinges. China's economy is expanding at a double-digit pace. In the United States, the Federal Reserve has held rates steady since last June, and its next move will most likely be a rate reduction to stimulate growth. The European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan, meanwhile, have been raising rates — lest their once-suffering economies overheat and spawn inflation. The U.S. slump in the first quarter didn't pull down growth in Europe or Asia, said Brad Setser, senior economist at Roubini Global Economics. The seemingly countervailing trends — deceleration in America, full speed ahead abroad — have led some economists to wonder whether the United States and the rest of the global economy are going their separate ways. Some even suggest — shudder — that changes in the global economy have made the United States a less-central player. Four or five years ago, there was an important switch in the global economy, said Stephen King, an economist based in London for HSBC. Since then, other parts of the world have really grabbed the growth baton from the U.S. Until relatively recently, when the United States sneezed, the world caught a nasty cold. Today, Mr. King says, the United States has sneezed, but the world has gone shopping. Mr. King notes that emerging markets like China, India, Central and Eastern Europe and the Middle East are injecting life into the European and Japanese economies through their enormous purchases of capital goods — all those construction cranes in Dubai, bullet trains in China, oil rigs in Russia. Emerging markets' share of global capital spending has risen from 20 percent in the late 1990s to about 37 percent today, he said. Western Europe is benefiting from rising trade with Eastern Europe, Russia, Asia and the Middle East. As a result, the euro zone, America's largest trading partner, is simply not as reliant on the United States as it used to be, Mr. Setser said. Europe is clearly no longer growing on the back of U.S. domestic demand growth, he said. As other economies increasingly trade with one another, the United States plays a diminished role. But the consensus for decoupling is hardly complete. The United States is still setting the pace, Mr. Achuthan said: We led the world up, and the rest of the world revved up after us. And areas like Europe in particular will be slowing in the wake of our slowdown last year. The cars of the global economic train are still tethered tightly together, in his view. It's less of a decoupling he said, and more like the jerking you get in a train when the first car stops, and then the other ones stop after a bit of a lag. David Rosenberg, an economist at Merrill Lynch, said he believes that the apparent divergence in the world's big economies has more to do with the nature of the growth slowdown in the United States, which has stemmed not from a decline in consumption, but from a decline in investment — specifically in housing. Almost 100 percent of the U.S. slowdown has been due to the housing industry, Mr. Rosenberg said. And housing is an intensely local and national industry — from the real estate broker to the mortgage lender, from Home Depot to interior decorators. Unless you run a sawmill in Canada, international trade isn't directly affected by the decline in U.S. housing, Mr. Rosenberg said. Martin N. Baily, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, says he thinks that it's a good thing for the United States if it's no longer the leader. We have a huge imbalance in our trade, and we need to be a little less of an engine of growth for the rest of the world, and let Europe and Japan, and hopefully China, eventually, pick up the slack, he said. And right now it seems like they're doing so. But Mr. Baily added that we shouldn't be so quick to believe that the world economy is significantly more independent of the United States than it was in the past. I don't think there's been a complete decoupling, he said. A U.S. recession would dramatically slow growth in China and India. THE real test of the decoupling
[PEN-L] Olmert Survives No-Confidence Votes on Failures in Lebanon War
The Labor Party of Israel is just like the Democratic Party of the USA, so Olmert survives, just like Bush. -- Yoshie http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087sid=a_X2MVdZPBAIrefer=home Olmert Survives No-Confidence Votes on Failures in Lebanon War By Jonathan Ferziger May 7 (Bloomberg) -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert survived three no-confidence motions brought by parliamentary opponents after a government commission's report blaming Olmert for being unprepared for last year's war in Lebanon. The motions failed to dislodge Olmert, whose governing coalition controls 78 of the 120 seats in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament. Olmert's Kadima Party and its four allied parties easily defeated the first bill 60 to 28 with nine abstentions and the other two by similar margins. http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticlecid=1178431591687pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull May. 7, 2007 19:25 | Updated May. 8, 2007 3:20 Gov't survives 3 no-confidence motions By SHEERA CLAIRE FRENKEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Hours before the no-confidence votes, the Labor faction decided by a 10-8 margin to allow its MKs to abstain. The move was seen as an indication of Labor's hesitancy to support the Olmert government. The faction looks bad, because we are saying that we are in the government but we are acting like we are not, said Labor faction chairman Yoram Marciano. Marciano and all of the Labor ministers voted with the government, while several MKs, including Michael Melchior, Orit Noked, Shelly Yacimovich, Ami Ayalon, Avishay Braverman and Eitan Cabel abstained. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/07/world/middleeast/07cnd-mideast.html May 7, 2007 Olmert Survives Three No-Confidence Motions By ISABEL KERSHNER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Benjamin Netanyahu, who leads the rightist Likud bloc, called for new elections and told the incumbent government, which has pledged to implement the recommendations of the war report, You are not the solution, you are the problem. The leader of the leftist Meretz party, Yossi Beilin, said that the lack of confidence had penetrated the public, the parliament, and even Mr. Olmert's own Kadima party. Mr. Beilin told the parliament that a government minister from the Kadima party had told him that Mr. Olmert, as prime minister, poses a national danger to Israel. Still, there is no consensus on who, or what, should come next. Mr. Netanyahu is ranked as a favorite for the prime minister's job in recent opinion polls. For that reason, Mr. Beilin has argued that new elections are not necessary, and that the necessary change can come about through parliamentary procedures instead. According to the polls, at least two-thirds of the public would like to see Mr. Olmert go. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] So-called Third Worldism
Some accuse Monthly Review of third worldism. If MR has had more to say about the South than the North, that's because revolutions have happened in the South, not in the North, and the magazine has always liked revolutionaries, socialist or democratic, more than liberals, which socialists and communists of the North in the end have become. Why is that so? Because the North is far richer than the South. That is all there is to it. It has nothing to do with theory. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Travel notes on Turkey from a British socialist
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: (The author is Ted Crawford, an editor of Revolutionary History.) Politics and Society in Turkey, 22-30 April 2007, as seen through a coach window and contrasted with Syria another country with Islamic traditions, claiming to be secular. (1,825 words) snip But what is really striking about Turkey, though articles which I have seen do not sufficiently emphasise it, is the enormous dynamism of the economy as suggested by construction work. Vast numbers of flats are going up, the towns are growing at a fantastic rate, the roads are often new and excellent, so there is a huge effort to upgrade the infrastructure not to speak of the many factories that one could see. No wonder a lot of people have been voting for the AKP. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
On 5/6/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: Those who are concerned about the rise of the Islamist party need to go to the root of the problem. I wish they did but they will not. They are happy as long as their way of life is not threatened and they took to the streets because the AKP threatens it. The way I see it there is no strong anti-war movement in the US because what the US is doing in Iraq and elsewhere does not threaten the way of life of the average American, at least, at the moment. To him or her what is going on Iraq is no different than a video game in which some fictional beings kill each other. When you turn of the video game, everything disappears. As Freud said, denial is the best defense mechanism against trauma. Just trun off the switch and everything disappears. To those who took to the streets in Turkey in the past few weeks, the issue is their way of life threatened by Islamism. Nothing more. They are making a choice between the AKP and Military, and choosing the Military because the Military is not threatening their way of life while the AKP is. Why should they care about anything else? It's true that, for the classes and strata of people who came out for the rallies for the republic, the only issue that matters to them is a religious party vs. the secular state. I just read Ted Crawford's travel notes on Turkey that Louis Proyect posted here. The way Crawford describes Turkey's economy, secular Turks who are of middle to upper classes and strata can't be doing badly. The same economy works for the AKP, though, which seems to be marketing itself as the party of capable administration presiding over good economy, rather than saying much of anything about religion. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] TURKEY: Secularism, Secularism. They Don't Know How to Say Anything Else,
In Turkey (like many other countries where Islam is the dominant ideology of working people), it is the religious party that seeks to win the poor, on the basis of such secular issues as economy and welfare, while secular parties talk only about religious issues, (the Turkish definition of) secularism above all here, as if that were the only issue, apparently sticking to the only S word allowed under global capitalism. -- Yoshie http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/03/AR2007050302052.html ISTANBUL, May 3 -- A few minutes' drive from the Bosporus, beyond the majestic skyline that evokes Istanbul's imperial past, the roads narrow, lined by low-slung buildings of concrete and cinder block. Corrugated iron, occasionally painted, replaces the roofs of stately red tiles. The neighborhood is Umraniye, a telling locale in Turkey's struggle over power and identity. Umraniye is known as a gecekondu, literally built in the night, recalling an Ottoman law that said no one could tear down a house begun at night and finished by dawn. Like the other poor, shoddily built settlements that swathe Istanbul, Ankara and other cities, Umraniye is part of the constituency courted by the party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose populist, religiously resonant politics appeal to the millions of migrants who have flocked to cities prospering in Turkey's economic boom. As Turkey approaches general elections July 22, among its most decisive in years, those voters will be pivotal to the success of the ruling Justice and Development Party, known by its Turkish initials AKP, or the AK Party. Religion is part of that appeal, but conversations here indicate that the allure is shaded in gray. Since the party took power in 2002, many residents say, it has managed to cultivate a reputation that steers between the extremes of religion and nationalism, project an image of relative effectiveness and style itself as an underdog vying with the establishment. All the parties steal in Turkey, and I'm sure the AK Party will steal, too. I know that, but at least they're dealing with the people, said Ergun Yalkanat, a 36-year-old factory worker. They've managed to extend their hands to the people's conscience. One of the most secular of Muslim nations, Turkey is wrestling with a social transformation brought to the fore by this month's crisis over the ruling party's choice for president and the coming elections. Analysts say the secular, Westernized elite that claims the legacy of Turkey's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, is facing the rise of a more religious, conservative and often rural class seeking a place in Turkey's hierarchy, its voice often articulated by the ruling party. Critics say the AK Party has yet to play its hand: Fully enshrined in power, it will promote political Islam and chip away at secular freedoms. Others view the party's ascent as inevitable. It's a vehicle for modernization of the unmodernized, said Dogu Ergil, a political science professor at Ankara University. Or in the words of Rahime Dizen, relaxing near trees on a grassy hill in Umraniye with her friends, gingerly sewing a border for a brown head scarf embossed with a floral pattern: We were sitting in mud before. Her friend Durdaneh Onge, 58, smiled. She raised the hand of her 4-year-old granddaughter, Ebrar. I want them to lead the country, and I want this girl to be president, she said, laughing with the others. Of course! Why not? Everyone comes from a village. They were not all born as prime ministers and presidents. The women listed improvements in the neighborhood, run by the party. They no longer wait in lines for bread and gas. The roads are better, and so is the water. Dizen said she thought pensions should be increased more, but hers was the rare complaint. Across the Muslim world, Islamic activists have forged an organic relationship with their constituencies through social welfare programs, from Hezbollah in Lebanon to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, many of them inspired by the communist activists before them. But by some accounts, the well-organized foot soldiers of the ruling party have honed the grass-roots work to an art, methodically distributing coal and wood in the winter and providing secondhand clothing to the have-nots. The party sponsors the traditional circumcision of young boys, making possible coming-of-age celebrations for those who cannot afford them. It's nothing more than an investment for the election, said Kenan Ucar, 54, a truck driver who voted for a secular party in the last election. They knock on one door and not the rest. But his complaint raised protests at a cafe in Umraniye, where a grapevine snaked up a trellis outside. Hasan Sucu, a 27-year-old who just completed 15 months of military service, told a story. He and his army colleagues used to give a share of their pay to the poorest soldier in the unit. At one point, they learned, the AK Party bought the soldier's family a
Re: [PEN-L] TURKEY: Secularism, Secularism. They Don't Know How to Say Anything Else
On 5/6/07, Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I admit that I know very little about Turkey. The last two times followed the country's politics, I was mostly looking at first the brutal dictatorship that was attacking even liberals and then later oppression of the Kurds. I appreciated that the military did not want to get involved in Iraq. I'm glad I'm not a Turk where I have to choose between religious fundamentalists and the military, but then I'm an American and I have a government which has the worst of both. I have looked at articles about the AKP, written by Turks as well as Westerners, and I have concluded that it is a mistake to think of it as a religious fundamentalist party. It looks to me to be more secularist* than, for instance, the Democratic Party of the USA, relatively speaking. Talking about the AKP as if it were a party of fundamentalists, as secular parties are apparently doing, when evidence of the party's fundamentalism is missing, is only likely to alienate voters from the secular parties, for voters notice a big gap between what they experience and what the secular parties' alarmist rhetoric says they should see. Voters want to hear about economy and other secular issues, first and foremost. It's ironic that's what the AKP is doing whereas the secular parties only talk about religion. * Ahmet T. Kuru puts it this way in Reinterpretation of Secularism in Turkey: The Case of the Justice and Development Party (The Emergence of a New Turkey: Islam, Democracy, and the AK Parti, ed. M. Hakan Yavuz, Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2006, http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~akuru/EMERGENCE.doc): the JDP [the Justice and Development Party, the AKP] is not anti-secular; rather, it defends a distinct interpretation of secularism that differs from that of the Kemalist establishment. The debate between the establishment and the JDP is not simply a conflict between secularism and Islamism, but rather a discussion about the true meaning and practice of secularism itself. Apart from marginal groups, there is an overall consensus on secularism in Turkey. The real debate occurs between the supporters of different interpretations of secularism. * Un millón cuatrocientas mil personas en la 'Avalancha Tricolor': http://www.globovision.com/news.php?nid=43696. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Iran on the Brink
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: These are the kinds of actions that are taking place at an ever quickening pace in Iran today and we owe a debt of gratitude to Andreas Malm and Shora Esmailian for bringing them to our attention. Eventually, the workers will find a way to unite and complete the revolution of 1979 that was interrupted by the bazaari and their mullah allies. It is incumbent on the left to reach out to such forces and not line up behind their enemies in the Islamic Republic. I doubt that you'd be of any help if you did. There's nothing you can do for workers in Iran. Instead of plotting regime change in Iran, your job as a US leftist is to get the Americans motivated to push their US government to stop its Iran campaign as well as other foreign US interventions. Besides, Malm and Esmailian say, It took a generation for a new labour movement to emerge in Iran. The movement that started to appear in 2004 is, however, very different from that of 1979. It does not partake of a more general phenomenon of protest. The autocratic state apparatus in Iran is not crumbling -- on the contrary, it is perhaps stronger than ever; there is no revolutionary fervour in society at large; no bold agitation, socialist, Islamist or otherwise, is pouring out from the universities (Shora Esmailian and Andreas Malm, Iran: the Hidden Power, 10 April 2007, http://www.opendemocracy.net/democracy-irandemocracy/hidden_power_4513.jsp). In short, workers in Iran today want reforms like higher wages, not revolution, so foreigners as well as exiles who try to associate them with their own regime change causes do them disservice by making them look suspect in the eyes of the government as well as the rest of Iranian society. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Iran on the Brink
On 5/6/07, sartesian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Think we have the right to demand better than the commentsfrom Yoshie. These mind you own business, ofay. It's a black thang riff compounded by the smear of calling critical analysis of Iran support for imperialism is one sure way of getting worse than nowhere, and absolutely ensuring that capital goes about its miserable business with little impediment. Those who can't impede capital's business here are not in a position to impede it in Iran. Leave Iran to the Iranian people, and have your revolution here in the USA if you can. But since you are far from that, the first thing to do is to get the Americans to push their government to normalize its relation with the Iranian government, ending its sanctions and covert actions, armed and civilian. Then, workers in Iran, as well as other activists in Iran working for more women's rights and the like, will find it easier to do their job without international tensions that make their government go occasionally paranoid. That's what the authors whose book Proyect is recommending suggests. And that's what we owe the Iranian people. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Iran on the Brink
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In short, workers in Iran today want reforms like higher wages, not revolution, so foreigners as well as exiles who try to associate them with their own regime change causes do them disservice by making them look suspect in the eyes of the government as well as the rest of Iranian society. -- Yoshie What in god's name do you know about what workers in Iran want? I am citing the authors you praise. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Iran on the Brink
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In short, workers in Iran today want reforms like higher wages, not revolution, so foreigners as well as exiles who try to associate them with their own regime change causes do them disservice by making them look suspect in the eyes of the government as well as the rest of Iranian society. -- Yoshie What in god's name do you know about what workers in Iran want? I am citing the authors you praise. -- Yoshie Yoshie, I don't think you truly understand the relationship between reform and revolution. Might I suggest that you take a look at Trotsky's history of the Russian revolution, which is online at MIA. You will find it most edifying, I'm sure. I'll support the Iranian workers against the government if and when they actually demand socialist revolution, but I won't project my wishful thinking upon them when they are not, which fact is documented by such researchers as Shora Esmailian and Andreas Malm among others. Till then, all US leftists' job, as well as my job, is to get the USG to stop its Iran campaign, sanctions, covert actions, armed or civilian, missile strikes, the works, and if possible to get it to enter into détente with the Iranian government. Who knows -- Iranian workers may find it freer to develop their reform struggles into a more ambitious project if their country is not menaced by the empire. On 5/6/07, Michael Perelman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Somalia seems very dangerous at this time. Haiti is suffering an ongoing tragedy. Somalia and Haiti highlight the tragedy of absence of the state and the importance of stopping US interventions like coups and proxy wars that destroy one that exists or prevent people from establishing a new one. We need to do what we can to help other peoples to become free to fight their own struggles, free from what the USG does. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Iran on the Brink
On 5/6/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 6, 2007, at 8:24 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: Leave Iran to the Iranian people Does this advice apply to you, or only people critical of Iran? It applies to people who have failed but should be trying to stop the USG from its foreign interventions, like its Iran campaign of sanctions, covert actions, armed or civilian, and threats of military attacks that make the Iranian government go paranoid and cause the Iranian people to become less free to fight their own struggles, which is the note on which Shora Esmailian and Andreas Malm conclude their article: The west's own confrontational policy is a crucial instrument in the Tehran regime's armoury. Only because the mullahs' claims of encirclement and threat can be made to appear plausible is it possible for them to present themselves as the righteous guardians of the nation. It is precisely this logic that is crippling the labour movement and the other democratic forces of Iran. For every new agent that trespasses on Iranian territory, for every new restriction that is slapped on the country, for every thinly veiled threat of an American or Israeli air blitz another unionist is being apprehended, another strike suppressed, another demonstrator beaten to a pulp. The sense of national danger, primarily of western making, serves the Islamic Republic with the ultimate pretext for persecution. The interests of power-elites in the west and those in Tehran are alike opposed to peaceful, democratic change in Iran. The casualties are the people of Iran themselves, who need the chance to breathe freely in order to remake their country. (Shora Esmailian and Andreas Malm, Iran: the Hidden Power, 10 April 2007, http://www.opendemocracy.net/democracy-irandemocracy/hidden_power_4513.jsp). Stop the USG first, and the people of Iran will find it freer to reform their government and society. The same goes for activism for women's rights, as Hossein Derakhshan notes: http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/hossein_derakhshan/2007/03/iran_awakening.html Iran awakening? Hossein Derakhshan March 16, 2007 11:00 PM Two well-known and moderate women's rights activists have been detained in Iran since last week for participating in a peaceful street protest. The incident has outraged activists in Iran and elsewhere, but there is much more to it. On June 23, 2003, after months of heated debate, the then-reformist parliament in Iran passed a bill, in favor of signing a UN document that would abolish legal discrimination against women. It was a big day for the 14 female MPs, who had tirelessly pushed for the bill in the hope that it would be a serious start to a series of changes in Iranian legal system - and an attempt to repair the Islamic republic's terrible international image on human rights. But the law, to little surprise, was rejected by an ultra-conservative body (The Guardian Council) which has six top clerics and six lawyers and oversees parliament to make sure its decisions are not against the Iranian constitution or the core values of Islam. (Or their reading of those values.) They said the bill violated both Iran's sovereignty and Islamic law. The then-77 year-old secretary of the council, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, an infamous opponent of the reform movement at the time and a strong supporter of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad now, said it was his saddest day of his work on the council, according to an Iranian official. The rejection came after months of lobbying and protests (including street protests) by ultra-conservative clerics and their supporters who opposed the bill - despite a small minority of high-ranking clerics, such as Ayatollah Sane'I, who supported the law and didn't find it un-Islamic. The unlucky bill has so far been passed between various legislative councils and bodies and its future is entirely unclear. Four years later, women's activists in Iran have tried alternative routes to abolish the discriminative laws against women, in areas such as employment, divorce, inheritance and custody rights, among others. Two different approaches have emerged: One approach believes that the best way to silence the conservative critics, who accuse the reform movement of being a Western import with an aim to undermine religious values, is to construct a broad and inclusive manifesto, from bottom up, by mostly Muslim Iranian women, based on the experiences of post-colonial feminists in Asia and Africa. The other approach is focuses around a campaign that wants to create local and international pressure on the Islamic republic by collecting one million signatures from ordinary Iranian women, and use that leverage to raise awareness of and abolish the discriminatory laws. While the former approach tries to work within the current social, political and juridical structure, the latter rejects the structure in the first place and, by using
[PEN-L] The Solidarity Center, US Aid for Regime Change, and Haiti (was Iran on the Brink)
On 5/6/07, Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'll support the Iranian workers against the government if and when they actually demand socialist revolution, but I won't project my wishful thinking upon them when they are not, which fact is documented by such researchers as Shora Esmailian and Andreas Malm among others. Well, that's not true. You denounced the bus drivers, didn't you? To my knowledge, the bus drivers were and are not demanding socialist revolution now. All I said was the workers in the South who get support from the Solidarity Center (one of the NED's core institutions) and the like won't get my support. It's up to workers to choose which is more valuable. (Naturally, most workers, except anti-imperialist workers, would find the Solidarity Center's material support more valuable than what I can offer, which is merely moral support.) I apply this principle across the board, rather than on case-by-case basis, and I do not support any US foreign aid tied to regime change, direct or indirect, anywhere. Since Michael is tired of discussion of Iran, take Haiti, for instance. I agree with Jeb Sprague*, though there are Haitian and Haitian solidarity activists who disagree with him. Kim Scipes has published many articles on the same subject as well, including some that touch on Haiti: Worker-to-Worker Solidarity Committee to AFL-CIO: Cut All Ties with NED, http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/scipes290406.html. * E.g., http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/sprague211105.html Supporting a Leftist Opposition to Lavalas: The AFL-CIO's Solidarity Center and Batay Ouvriye by Jeb Sprague For many activists, academics, and labor historians in the 1980s, the AFL-CIO became the AFL-CIA. Founded in 1961, the American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD) was the AFL-CIO's foreign organizing wing for Latin America and the Caribbean. Along with its counterparts in Africa, Asia, and Europe, AIFLD was used to undermine leftist trade movements, support dictators such as the Duvaliers, and back military coups in Chile and Brazil. Throughout the Cold War, the CIA heavily infiltrated AIFLD, as discussed in Philip Agee's 1984 whistleblower Inside the Company: CIA Diary. Agee fingered Serafino Romualdi as a known CIA asset being involved in AIFLD throughout the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, heading up AIFLD at one point. In 1984, with Baby Doc Jean-Claude Duvalier's consent, the Fédération des Ouvriers Syndiqués (FOS) was founded in Haiti as a conservative pro-business union with the assistance of AIFLD. Following the departure of Baby Doc, the State Department feared radical labor unrest in Haiti, so it increased funding for the FOS. In June of 1986, the State Department, at a White House briefing for the chief executive officers of major corporations, requested AIFLD's involvement in Haiti because of the presence of radical labor unions and the high risk that other unions may become radicalized.1 Members of Duvalier's secret police and the Tonton Macoutes heavily infiltrated the FOS. The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) provided funding, often funneled through AIFLD, to Haitian unions such as the Conféderation Autonome des Travailleurs Haïtiens (CATH) and the FOS. According to Thomas Carothers in his 1994 article, The Ned at 10, the National Endowment for Democracy believed that democracy promotion was a necessary means of fighting communism and that, given sensitivities about U.S. government intervention abroad, such work could best be done by an organization that was not part of the government. During the first seven months of the Aristide administration before the Cédras coup, CATH under the sway of Auguste Mesyeux held a campaign of demonstrations against the government known as the Vent de Tempête (Wind of the Storm). This was the first attempt to put pressure on the Aristide government, mounted by a U.S.-funded union. In March of 1992, after a brief suspension of funding following the first coup against Aristide, AIFLD reactivated its $900,000 program supporting conservative unions in Haiti. Beth Sims, in her 1992 policy report Populism, Conservatism, and Civil Society in Haiti, writes that CATH was once a militant, anti-Duvalierist federation, but in 1990 a conservative wing took over with backing from AIFLD. Following increasing criticism over its international organizing activities, the AFL-CIO disbanded AIFLD and its counterparts, and created in their place the American Center for International Labor Solidarity (ACILS), more commonly known as the Solidarity Center, in 1997, supposedly giving a new face to its international organizing campaigns. The Solidarity Center, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, was launched with the goal of work[ing] with unions and community groups worldwide to achieve equitable, sustainable, democratic development and to help men and women everywhere stand up for their rights and improve their
[PEN-L] Sarkozy Increases His Lead in France
The decline of the far left and the looming defeat of the center left. Sounds like the USA in 2004. But the French at least know how to recover, in the streets, what they lose at the ballot boxes. Not so in the USA. -- Yoshie http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/04/news/france.php Sarkozy increases his lead in France; Royal warns of unrest By Katrin Bennhold and Craig S. Smith Friday, May 4, 2007 PARIS: The French presidential campaign officially closed Friday with the Gaullist front-runner, Nicolas Sarkozy, looking ever more assured of winning Sunday and his Socialist rival, Ségolène Royal, predicting street violence if he is elected. Her warning came after the two latest opinion polls suggested Sarkozy would beat her by a bigger margin than predicted a few days ago, before a combative debate on national television in which Sarkozy kept his cool under rhetorical fire from Royal. Choosing Nicolas Sarkozy would be a dangerous choice, Royal told the radio station RTL. It is my responsibility today to warn people of the risk of his candidacy concerning the violence and brutality that would be unleashed in the country, she said, suggesting that unrest was especially likely in the volatile suburbs that were the site of rioting in 2005. Whoever wins, the 2007 election will go down in history as one that shook France's political landscape. Sarkozy built a united party machine on the right, and while Royal failed to paper over the large cracks in the Socialist party, the emergence of a strong centrist vote for François Bayrou, third-place finisher in the first round two weeks ago, helped change the left. It must now decide whether to jettison traditional socialism in favor of the more market-oriented social democracy embraced by the left elsewhere in Europe. It is these shifts, and strong popular interest in the long months of campaigning that suggest, more than any candidate's promises, that France may now embark on the reforms needed to revive sluggish growth and combat chronic unemployment. Whatever happens on Sunday, politics as we know it has changed, said Bernard Kouchner, a former cabinet minister and veteran Socialist campaigner. This election spells the death of old-style socialism and hopefully the birth of social democracy in France. As his party prepared Champagne and canapés for Sunday night outside his Paris headquarters, Sarkozy swiftly rebuffed Royal's fears of rioting. She's not in a good mood this morning, he told Europe 1 ratio. It must be the opinion polls. The Gaullist candidate, who has led Royal in more than 100 opinion polls, has looked increasingly confident in recent days. A poll released Friday by the Sofres institute suggested that he had more than doubled his lead over the past week, with backing from 54.5 percent of respondents, compared with 44.5 percent who favored Royal. A survey by Ipsos placed him eight points ahead of his Socialist rival. It looks like he might not only win, but win by a landslide, said Brice Teinturier, director of political studies at Sofres. Behind the sound and fury of what seemed a classic right-left duel, a quiet revolution occurred: For the first time, a French election is being decided in the center. The extremes of left and right who usually siphon off votes in the first round of presidential elections and thus must be courted in the second round were marginalized this time. Three out of four voters cast their ballot for one of the three mainstream candidates: Sarkozy, Royal - the first woman to have a serious chance at the French presidency - or Bayrou. With a near-record turnout of 84 percent, they snubbed nine fringe candidates on the far left and the far right, giving the next president a clear mandate for change. Most widely remarked was the resounding defeat of Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Front, who stunningly made it into the second round of the presidential election in 2002. This time, his score was his lowest in two decades. But even more important for economic reform was the poor showing of four far-left candidates, whose rejection of globalization and the market economy have traditionally dampened reform ardor on the left. Two decades ago, the Communist Party was France's third political power and the natural ally of the Socialists, while the centrist camp was little more than an appendage to the Gaullist movement. Today, the Communists have slumped to less than 2 percent, while Bayrou's party won more than 18 percent, making its voters crucial Sunday - and a potential new ally for the reformist wing of the Socialist Party. According to Kouchner, who had urged Royal to strike a deal with Bayrou weeks ago, if Royal wins against the odds she will owe her victory to the center, which will create pressure for a modernization of the Socialist Party and its program. If Nicolas Sarkozy wins, the social democrats in the Socialist Party and like-minded centrists will form a modern center-left opposition
Re: [PEN-L] Gitmo atrocity aiming for rock bottom.
On 5/5/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: from SLATE: The NY [TIMES] off-lead says many Guantanamo Bay detainees are refusing to cooperate with their lawyers because they think they're powerless and/or tools of the U.S. government. The NYT says a recent Department of Justice crackdown on the lawyers' access to detainees and unfavorable rulings on habeas corpus have made things worse. The paper also reports that Gitmo investigators are intentionally undermining detainee trust in their lawyers by—for example—telling them that their lawyers are gay and Jewish. It seems that everything that detainees say to their lawyers can be monitored by the USG. Since the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (in response to Hamdan v. Rumsfeld), legal prospects have dimmed, and at this point, the only thing that being represented by lawyers does may be that it helps the USG whitewash Guantanamo. The only chance for detainees is probably their home governments exerting themselves on their behalf and freeing them after their transfer to home: Associated Press, Most Gitmo Detainees Freed after Transfer: Four-fifths of 'Vicious Killers' Released after Return to Home Countries, 16 Dec 2006, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16227791/). http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/05/washington/05gitmo.html May 5, 2007 Many Detainees at Guantánamo Rebuff Lawyers By WILLIAM GLABERSON Many of the detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, are no longer cooperating with their lawyers, adding a largely invisible struggle between the lawyers and their own clients to the legal battle over the Bush administration's detention policies. Some detainees refuse to see their lawyers, while others decline mail from their lawyers or refuse to provide them information on their cases, according to court documents, writings of some of the detainees and recent interviews. The detainees' resistance appears to have been fueled by frustration over their long detention and suspicion about whether their lawyers are working for the government, as well as anti-American sentiment, some of the documents and interviews show. Your role is to polish Bush's shoes and make the picture look good, a Yemeni detainee, Adnan Farhan Abdullatif, 31, wrote his lawyer in February. Some of the lawyers accuse Guantánamo officials of feeding the detainees' suspicions of the lawyers, a charge Pentagon officials deny. Lawyers said many of the relationships appeared to have deteriorated as the detainees' legal cause has suffered setbacks in Congress and the courts, and as Justice Department officials have begun efforts to limit lawyers' access to detainees, raising new concerns among the detainees about their lawyers' effectiveness. Every lawyer is afraid, every time they go down there, that their clients won't see them, said Mark P. Denbeaux, a professor at Seton Hall University School of Law who represents two Guantánamo detainees. And it's getting worse, because it's pretty hard to say we're offering them anything. The situation is awkward for the lawyers, who have become a considerable force not only in the courts but also in legislative, diplomatic and public debates about detention policies. Tense relationships or outright resistance from their clients could undercut their credibility and complicate their legal work. The Justice Department, in a recent court filing, asked a federal appeals court to limit the number of times lawyers challenging detention could visit detainees and to allow officials to read lawyers' mail to detainees. Some of the lawyers said that court fight would be likely to further weaken their ties to some detainees because it raised questions about whether their communications would be confidential and whether they would be able to continue to see their clients. Some detainees are clearly cooperating with their lawyers and are engaged in regular dialogue with them. In interviews, some lawyers denied there were problems in their relationships with detainees or declined to discuss the difficulties, saying such information would embolden the government. But other lawyers estimated that a third or more of the detainees who have worked with lawyers in cases challenging their detention were now resisting cooperating with them. Of 10 detainees publicly identified by military prosecutors as targets of possible war-crimes charges, many, if not most, either have refused American lawyers or are now uncooperative or uncommunicative, four of the lawyers involved in the war crimes cases said. Some of those detainees face possible life sentences. The relationship of the lawyers with many of the clients who still see us is very strained and tense, said David H. Remes, a Washington lawyer at Covington Burling, who represents 17 Yemeni detainees in efforts to challenge their detention. At times, the lawyer-client battles provide an insight into detainees' attitudes. Mr. Remes said one client grew furious when he learned his lawyers had interviewed his family members in
Re: [PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
On 5/5/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: New York Times: To Turkey's secular elite, Mr. Erdogan and his crowd want to drag the country back to the past. But it is precisely his party's local approach that makes it likely to that he will prevail. If he does, power would shift to the devout middle class he represents and away from the secular elite, which has controlled the state since its founding in 1923. This is rubbish of course. Presenting those who took to the streets in Ankara and Istanbul as the secular elite is misrepresentation of the facts. These events were organized mainly by the fascist/neofascist nationalists supporting and supported by the Military but this does not mean that all of the ones that they were able to mobilize were at such extremes nor does it mean that all of them were elites of any kind. Yes, there were elites among them too, if by that we mean the well to do ones, but there were many middle class folks who were genuinely concerned with the Islamist policies of the AKP among them as well. The question is why such middling sorts, who are merely well-to-do, attend the rallies for the republic organized by the fascist/neofascist nationalists supporting and supported by the Military. Turkey has experienced terrorism by jihadists, for instance, the 2003 bombings of synagogues in Istanbul for which Al Qaeda claimed responsibility. But it's not like the middling sorts are confusing the AKP with Al Qaeda, is it? If anything, jihadists tend to grow in countries where Islamists are excluded from political processes. Why don't the middling sorts try to win in the elections? The electoral laws may be imperfect, but they, the creation of the military as you point out, are not designed to promote the AKP or Islamism. It is also incorrect to claim that Erdogan represents the devout middle class. He neither represents my in laws nor my mother and other relatives, and they are nothing but middle class, whatever middle class means. Furthermore, Erdogan and the AKP have been hard work in the destruction of the middle class that has been going on since the mid-1980s. Who are these New York Times authors kidding? Well, the New York Times can't be expected to provide criticism of neoliberal capitalism. That's not the issue between the AKP and the military either. By the way, the US government seems to be siding with the Military so I wonder whether our nationalists will continue to be anti-US after this change in the US preferences between the Military and the AKP. I doubt that there's any big difference between the AKP and the military with regard to the empire. About the EU, there are nuances, but there seems to be none about the NATO. Anti-American rhetoric that showed up in the rallies, I assume, is just rhetoric. The military seems more concerned about how things will go in the Kurdish area of Iraq than the AKP, though. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
On 5/5/07, Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 5, 2007, at 3:40 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: The question is why such middling sorts, who are merely well-to-do, attend the rallies for the republic organized by the fascist/neofascist nationalists supporting and supported by the Military. Why do people attend antiwar rallies in the U.S. organized by a weird ex-Trotskyist sect? Because they're there, right? The Turkish left isn't big, but there are some leftists there, including those who are friends of MR: http://www.sendika.org/. They have had anti-government protests before and after the rallies for the republic, regarding labor and other issues, including some on May Day, but the middling sorts didn't seem to come out in force for them. Sabri says they aren't elitist, at least not as much as the NYT claims they are, and I'm sure he's right, but they sure don't seem as concerned about workers as they appear to be about secularism. Maybe that's why they can't hope to beat the AKP in the elections. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
On 5/5/07, Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: for what it's worth, the subject should be ward heelers. Being from Chicago, I know that there were many in the city under the old Mare Daley. Heeling gets its name, I believe, from wearing out one's shoe-heels walking around... True, true. Unless secular middling sorts truly see an imminent advent of sharia, mandatory hijab, state-issued fatwas against writers, what have you, would it not make more sense for them to wear out their shoe heels, trying to beat the AKP at its own electoral game, than line up behind fearsome ultra-nationalists? Why not run to the left of the AKP economically to win back working-class votes? -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] TURKEY: Search for Party Alliances
http://english.sabah.com.tr/2EBC8374FE6F48BC8B1A47ABB13C4B8A.html Secularists ask for a merger in the center right parties Tens of thousands of secularist flag-waving Turks rallied for the third big anti-government protest in a month on Saturday asking center right parties to merge as conflict rages over the role of religion in politics. A parliamentary committee on Saturday accepted Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's proposals for constitutional changes to let the people, rather than parliament, elect the president, the Anatolian news agency reported. The changes, which might increase the chances of the ruling AK party's presidential candidate, former Islamist Abdullah Gul, of becoming head of state, could be approved by lawmakers in coming days. Secularists ask for a merger in the center right parties Marchers in the western city of Manisa, estimated by police to number 60-70,000, called on Saturday for the withdrawal of Gul's candidacy. Two smaller protests were held in other west coast cities. Gul's candidacy for head of state and commander-in-chief of the armed forces particularly irritates a military establishment which sees itself as the ultimate guardian of the secular state and has removed four governments in 50 years. Erdogan, whose party has a majority in parliament, has hit back at secularist critics with unprecedented defiance, bringing forward national elections by more than three months. We're here to protect the republic and teach them a lesson. I hope they learn their lesson, marcher Ahmet Bulut said. Manisa is in the hometown of parliament speaker and senior AK Party member Bulent Arinc, who has angered the military for urging debate on secularism. Local media said police had tightened security around his house. The speaker of parliament is Ataturk's enemy, protesters shouted. Two center-right parties, ANAP [cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motherland_Party_(Turkey)] and True Path [cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/True_Path_Party], announced a merger on Saturday which could strengthen opposition to the AK Party at the July 22 general election. Since sweeping to power in 2002 after a financial crisis, the AK Party has promoted liberal economic reforms in a drive to join the European Union and has wooed foreign investors. Some of the EU-backed reforms have reduced the army's formal influence in state administration. Secularists, many of them ordinary Turks, fear that once the AK Party controls parliament and the veto-wielding presidency, it will chip away at the separation of state and religion. Gul was a member of the last government to be pushed from power by the army and spent his honeymoon in a military jail during a 1980 coup. But his party says its record in office shows it respects secularism. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana was quoted on Saturday as expressing support for Gul's presidential ambitions. I am convinced that Foreign Minister Gul would continue his successful work as president, Solana was quoted by newspaper Bild am Sonntag as saying in an article to appear on Sunday. A rerun of the presidential vote is due in parliament on Sunday. But after the constitutional court's ruling that 367 deputies have to be present for the vote to be valid, a quorum is unlikely to be reached. Reuters http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detaylink=110397 Early elections accelerate search for party alliances The presidential election crisis precipitated the Turkish Parliament's decision to hold early elections on July 22, giving a push to the search for alliance and mergers among parties. Significant efforts are being put into uniting the Republican People's Party (CHP), the Democratic Left Party (DSP), the True Path Party (DYP) and the Motherland Party (ANAVATAN). The parties that may be unable to pass the election threshold individually are working hard to pull together, while those expected to win a place in Parliament are being somewhat dilatory in the attempts to unite, further complicating the establishment of a true coalition. However sources in the capital suggest that the will behind the April 27 memorandum is taking steps to help make the mooted coalitions a reality. The first attempt at establishing an election alliance came from the Young Party (GP). GP leader Cem Uzan paid a visit to former President Süleyman Demirel, and GP İstanbul deputy Emin Şirin met with CHP leader Deniz Baykal to discuss possibilities for cooperation in the approaching general elections. No response has been given to the GP's request, but it is said that the CHP may allocate quotas for the party in some provinces where the GP has a considerable following. Baykal's call on the DSP The second surprise came from Baykal, who called on the DSP to unconditionally accede to his party after transferring the party's monies to a foundation. Although they rarely saw eye-to-eye when the late prime minister was alive, Baykal praised Bülent Ecevit, the former leader of the DSP.
Re: [PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
On 5/5/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: Sabri says they aren't elitist, at least not as much as the NYT claims they are, and I'm sure he's right, but they sure don't seem as concerned about workers as they appear to be about secularism. I did not say that they are not elitists or otherwise. All I said was that those people who took to the streets were not a homogeneous group of people. They were mostly urban middle class people well trained in the tradition of Kemalizm but there were those from the rural Turkey as well, in addition to the ultranationalists and the urban elite. Majority of Turkey, to the north of 70 percent of the population, neither has anything to do with Islamism nor do they support the AKP or other hard core Islamist parties. What is described in the English media is a distortion of the reality. Among those 70 percent there are those who are devout Muslims who practice their prayers five times a day regularly but they are not Islamists. Being a devout Muslim is one thing, being an Islamist is another. Devout Muslims who are not Islamists focus on the other world whereas Islamists focus on this world and try to organize it to their liking, whatever their liking is. And those who took to the streets are not concerned about workers to our liking because most of them are obedient citizens of the Republic of Turkey, just as an average American is an obedient citizen of the US, who do not question what their leaders are up to. Most of them were your average Turkish, whatever Turkish means in this context. Traditional Muslims tended to be apolitical and quietist in many societies, and to this day that may be true in Turkey as well as elsewhere. The same probably goes for the irreligious, though; as you say, most citizens of many societies, whatever their religion, are obedient citizens who don't question the status quo or get involved in politics to change it. In any society, though, politics gets decided by those who are politically active, with the result not necessarily reflecting the general will of the total population comprising both the politically active and the politically inactive. The reason why an increasing number of people among the voters who participate in political processes in Turkey (as opposed to those who are apolitical or alienated from them) have turned to Islamism, enough to push the AKP to the top of the polls (albeit merely a plurarity rather than a majority), is that the irreligious people who care about whether the AKP or a secular party is the governing party enough to protest in the streets are not concerned about workers, nor are secular parties big enough to compete with the AKP, no? It looks to me that secularist protesters fail to realize that. It seems that they are now demanding mergers of secular parties to better compete with the AKP. That may help in terms of electioneering, but will mergers simply based on secularism alone, without a platform that appeals to workers and a political network that actually engages them, backed up by grassroots work comparable to what the AKP has apparently done, go far? Those who are concerned about the rise of the Islamist party need to go to the root of the problem. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] [lbo-talk] Kerem Kaya and Sinan Ikinci on Turkey
On 5/4/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: Both sides are wrong in the sense of both being for neoliberal capitalism and imperialism, though nuances exist. But one side is democratically elected, while the other side isn't, Unfortunately, this is not the case Yoshie. Neither side is democratically elected, thanks to the election laws imposed by the Military after the September 12, 1980 military takeover. The Military changed the election laws in such as way that the party they put together would win the election or so they hoped. To do this, they imposed the requirement that to enter the National Assembly each party must get at least ten percent of the national vote no matter how they do in each of the provinces. So if a party wins the election in a province, say, with more than ninety percent of the provincial votes but does not meet the ten percent barrier nationally and another party wins ten percent of the provicial votes but meets the national ten percent barrier, then the latter sends all of the provincial representatives to the National Assembly. In the 2002 election only two parties met the ten percent national barier: AKP and CHP. About forty percent of the electorate did not vote. AKP got about thirty of the votes which translates roughly to twentyfive percent of all of the electorate. But this gave them an overwhelming majority in the National Assembly because of the stupid election laws the Military imposed in 1980. If you call this democratic, then yes, AKP was democratically elected. It's interesting that the law that was meant to favor the military-backed party ended up being the opposite. Still and all, the system that we have here in the USA practically prevents emergence, let alone victory, of any new party, and the system in Japan over-represents the less populated but reliably conservative districts (cf. http://www.fairvote.org/pr/global/japandisparity.htm). Look at various systems of representation (at http://www.fairvote.org/pr/global/country/index.htm), and each has its own problems. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] [lbo-talk] Kerem Kaya and Sinan Ikinci on Turkey
On 5/4/07, Sabri Oncu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yoshie: It's interesting that the law that was meant to favor the military-backed party ended up being the opposite. Not only that, such a strong Islamist movement in Turkey is also the monster the Military created in the 1970s. With a few variations the same pattern has been seen in a number of other countries, too, from Egypt to Palestine to Indonesia. It's clear that at one point they saw Islamists as the lesser evil to secular nationalists or socialists. Where secular nationalists and socialists have gotten already defeated or marginalized, the rulers of the states have made efforts to incorporate more of Islamism (legally or symbolically) into the workings of the state, from Algeria to Iraq under the former Ba'ath government, even while continuing to repress Islamist challengers to their hegemony. I understand this history, but the present character of each Islamist party and movement has to be analyzed case by case. It's certainly true that whether the AKP is 'mildly Islamist' or 'Islamic Democrat' is yet to be seen, for we can never tell how any party or movement, be it secular or Islamist or even socialist, will turn out; but we do know what the military stands for. All of the alternatives where neoliberal anyway. snip Neither of the sides in this battle can be defended or supported. In Turkey,* I think that the best that leftists can do is to stay out of the rallies for the republic and the like and explain how they function, in case some people, unbeknownst to themselves, get exploited by their organizers. I doubt that leftists are in a position to present their own alternative. * In countries like Turkey, Israel, Japan, South Korea, etc., which have long been very much tied to US hegemony, as well as in the USA itself, it's hard to grow any left at all. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Muslims are big players in economy
On 5/4/07, Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Muslims are big players in economy Earnings are considerable, but marketers often overlook them May 3, 2007 BY ALEJANDRO BODIPO-MEMBA FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER snip Comerica may soon offer products that conform to Muslim traditions concerning the lending of money. Under Islamic Law, a person is not allowed to earn or pay interest on a solely owned loan. To address that, Comerica is considering accounts in which both the bank and the individual would be jointly liable for the loan. We hope to offer a full suite of retail and small business products, said Amal Berry-Brown, National Arab/Chaldean American Business Affairs Manager for Comerica. Those products would include business and personal loans and lines of credit. The bank also has printed its brochures in Arabic. Apparently, this side of business is growing worldwide, what with high oil prices. I don't know where exactly the money is getting invested, but I suspect much of that leaves predominantly Muslim nations and gets sucked into financial centers of the North, or perhaps Dubai and places like that. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/01/news/bxatm.php Banks seek out Islamic scholars for new bonds offerings By Will McSheehy and Shanthy Nambiar Bloomberg News Wednesday, May 2, 2007 DUBAI: Sheikh Nizam Yaquby is the gatekeeper to the $1 trillion market for managing Muslim wealth. Yaquby, who lives in Bahrain, said he was on the advisory boards of 40 finance companies, and told Citigroup, American International Group and HSBC Holdings which insurance policies, accounts and bonds they could sell to devout Muslims. Banks cannot find enough scholars steeped in the teachings of Muhammad to accommodate the demand for bonds that conform to Shariah law. Without men like Yaquby to bless the borrowings, none of the $70 billion of Islamic debt outstanding can be traded and companies would have been unable to sell any of the estimated $17 billion in new offerings last year. The credibility of institutions comes from the stature of the Shariah boards they have, said Afaq Khan, head of Islamic banking at Standard Chartered in Dubai, a major underwriter of Islamic bonds. Transactions can get shot down at the structuring stage if scholars don't allow them. Shariah requires that investors profit only from transactions based on the exchange of assets, not money alone, so interest is banned. Bankers sell Islamic bonds, or sukuk, by using property and other assets to generate income equivalent to interest they would pay on conventional debt. The money cannot be used to finance gambling, guns or alcohol. The world's top five banks by assets - UBS in Zurich, HSBC and Barclays in London, BNP Paribas in Paris and Citigroup in New York - all have Islamic units. CIMB Group in Kuala Lumpur is the biggest underwriter of sukuk this year, followed by Standard Chartered in London, Barclays and Citigroup, Bloomberg data show. Sales of sukuk grew nine times faster than international corporate bonds last year and twice as fast as the U.S. market for debt with ratings below investment grade, according to Bloomberg data. The assets managed under Islamic rules will almost triple by 2015 to $2.8 trillion, according to the Islamic Financial Services Board, an association of central banks based in Kuala Lumpur. Getting approval from scholars takes a minimum of two weeks, says Hissam Kamal, head of Islamic finance for HSBC Saudi Arabia. For an established issuer that could tap the conventional bond market in just a few days, there's a significant extra lead time for Shariah compliance, Kamal said. You can't complete documentation and a fatwa in a week. It will be two or three weeks, at best. The Shariah finance industry, born in the 1970s after a 12-fold jump in oil prices, is expanding with crude prices near record highs enriching Islamic nations. The billionaire Maan al-Sanea, one of the largest shareholders in HSBC, plans to use property in eastern Saudi Arabia to raise as much as $5 billion for his Saad Trading, Contracting Financial Services. He will create a trust company called Golden Belt 1 Sukuk that will lease the land to Saad Trading. Golden Belt will pass on the rent paid by Saad Trading to bondholders, avoiding interest. The land's value or what's built on it isn't hugely relevant to the sukuk, said Philipp Lotter, a corporate finance analyst at Moody's Investors Service in Dubai. Its purpose is to provide an asset that Saad Trading can pay rent on. The British Treasury minister, Ed Balls, last month said the government might sell Islamic bonds, following the German state of Saxony-Anhalt and East Cameron Gas, a Texas company. The Japan Bank for International Cooperation plans to sell as much as $300 million of sukuk in Malaysia. Tokyo-based Aeon Credit Service in January became the first Japanese company to sell Islamic bonds. Nakheel PJSC, the Dubai developer building islands in the shape of
[PEN-L] In Political Row, Turkey Advances National Ballot
It seems that the AKP has found a way to divide the secular parties regarding the presidential election. It's also interesting that The bills that Mr. Erdogan's party submitted included lowering the minimum age for candidates for Parliament to 25. This would be a boost for the party, known by its Turkish initials, A.K., because its constituency and supporters are overwhelmingly young. -- Yoshie http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/03/world/europe/03turkey.html? May 3, 2007 In Political Row, Turkey Advances National Ballot By SABRINA TAVERNISE ISTANBUL, May 2 — Turkish lawmakers on Wednesday set national elections for July 22, four months earlier than planned, and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's party submitted a package of bills that would bring it advantages in the coming political battle. Elections had been scheduled for Nov. 4, but on Tuesday, Turkey's highest court annulled Parliament's vote for president, effectively blocking Mr. Erdogan's candidate, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, a close ally with a background in Islamic politics. The ruling created a standoff between Mr. Erdogan's Justice and Development Party and the secular establishment. Speaking with characteristic emotion, Mr. Erdogan delivered what amounted to a counterattack against the secular establishment for blocking Mr. Gul. The court ruling, he said, was a bullet for democracy, and the battle's real winner would emerge through national elections. Turkey's military, which sees itself as the protector of Turkish secularism and has ousted four elected governments since 1960, is unlikely to intervene as long as early elections are held as planned. The bills that Mr. Erdogan's party submitted included lowering the minimum age for candidates for Parliament to 25. This would be a boost for the party, known by its Turkish initials, A.K., because its constituency and supporters are overwhelmingly young. Other proposals were to take the presidential election out of the hands of Parliament and place it in a national vote, a step to prevent the secular establishment from blocking a candidate again. The bill calls for a national election in two rounds, and a president who would serve for five years instead of the current seven. The main secular opposition party is strongly against such a measure, but some smaller ones are in favor, and Mr. Erdogan would need only a handful of additional votes to get it passed. In a largely procedural move, Parliament also set a schedule for a continuation of the presidential vote. Mr. Erdogan's party knows there is virtually no chance that Mr. Gul could be confirmed, but the law requires that a constitutional process like the election of the president continue once it starts. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Islamists as Ward Healers
Much has been written about the AKP, Hamas, Hizballah, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and other Islamists who form mass parties and movements (which are unlike jihadist cells), in the corporate media as well as left and liberal alternative media. Ideologically, they are quite disparate. Hamas and HIzballah, for instance, are compelled to take an anti-imperialist position by their anti-Zionism (unfortunately not the other way around). For that reason, Hizballah finds itself on the same side as secular and Christian leftists when it comes to challenging the Siniora regime's neoliberal policy. Not so with the AKP, which is pro-EU and pro-business and whose country is solidly in the NATO. The Muslim Brotherhood harbors within itself contradictory tendencies which interest liberals and leftists outside the organization in different ways, and they are forced to make a variety of alliances due to the fact that it is the Mubarak regime's main target of repression. None is Jacobin like Iran's Islamists in their revolutionary phase (nor are today's socialists and communists -- perhaps the age of Jacobin revolutions is over, or at least interrupted for the time being), for better and worse. What they have in common, despite ideological differences, is that they come across as ward healers in a good sense in the media's portrayals (in the special case of Hizballah, it de facto functions as a state within a state toward the oppressed, in effect putting a kind of dual power strategy into practice). That reminds me of an aspect of Vito Marcantonio, the aspect that secular leftists in many countries have failed or refused to emulate. -- Yoshie http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/2002/2002-December/027953.html NYT December 1, 2002 'The Loneliest Man in Congress' By JIM O'GRADY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Representing His District He was absolutely legendary for providing services. It was carried out on a colossal scale. He sat in his headquarters all day Saturday and Sunday. People would be given a number and waited. He would briefly speak to them and refer them to someone on his staff or one of his many volunteers. It happened every single weekend. When I researched my book, people would say things like: `Vito Marcantonio saved my son's life. He got us penicillin.' -- Gerald Meyer There was nothing too small for him to take care of. He helped people who couldn't pay the rent or the light bill, or a mother with a son in the Army who hadn't heard from him in a while. -- Fay Leviton If you work in the vineyards and do it without regard to whether people are for you or against you, the people in that community will very often say: `Well, this guy, we didn't like him to begin with. But maybe he's not so bad.' -- Edward I. Koch It was clever politicking. But he also loved people. -- Annette Rubinstein http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/magazine/29Brotherhood.t.html http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20070423/008534.html April 29, 2007 Islamic Democrats? By JAMES TRAUB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . From what I could tell, in fact, the brotherhood in its public oratory sticks to issues of political process, while voters worry about the kind of mundane issues that preoccupy people everywhere. Magdy Ashour said that few voters knew or cared anything about issues like constitutional reform. He agreed to let me sit by his side one evening as he met with constituents. None of the dozen or so petitioners who were ushered into the tiny, bare cell of his office asked about the political situation, and none had any complaints about cultural or moral issues. Rather, there were heart-rending stories of abuse by the powerful, like the profoundly palsied young man confined to a wheelchair who sold odds and ends from a kiosk under a bridge, and who was ejected, along with his meager goods, when a road-improvement project came through. (Ashour promised to go with him to the police station the following morning.) Mostly, though, people wanted help getting a job. One ancient gentleman with a white turban and walking stick wandered in as if from the Old Testament. He was accompanied by his daughter and 3-year-old granddaughter. His daughter's husband had abandoned her, and she needed a job. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/04/world/europe/04turkey.html May 4, 2007 Turkish Party Sees Victory in Grass Roots By SABRINA TAVERNISE ISTANBUL, May 3 — In the course of a single week, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has taken on Turkey's Parliament, its highest court, even its military. Then he called for early national elections. As Mr. Erdogan confronts Turkey's secular establishment, demanding an early popular vote, he is relying on a vast grass-roots network built by his constituents, whose boundless energy has driven recent economic growth. That energy is flowing into living rooms across Turkey in the form of campaign pitches. To Turkey's secular elite, Mr. Erdogan and his crowd want
[PEN-L] U.S. and Iranian Officials Meet at Session on Iraq
Will America be forced to enter into détente with Iran? -- Yoshie http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/04/news/diplo.php U.S. and Iranian officials meet at session on Iraq By Helene Cooper and Jon Elsen Friday, May 4, 2007 SHARM EL SHEIK, Egypt: American and Iranian officials spoke briefly Friday at a regional conference here on the Iraq situation, in a rare direct conversation between representatives of the two antagonistic nations. Ryan Crocker, the United States ambassador to Iraq, said that he and David Satterfield, the senior adviser on Iraq to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, had an impromptu three-minute discussion with an Iranian deputy foreign minister. Rice and Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, did not participate. Crocker would not say what was discussed, except that the conversation was limited to the situation in Iraq. Afterward, Rice said: We have no desire to have difficult relations with anyone in Iran. She said the United States had been very clear that we are prepared to change 27 years of policy and engage in a broad range of issues with Iran if Iran accepts international demands that it suspend its nuclear enrichment program. Whether American and Iranian officials would meet and talk directly here has been one of the major questions surrounding the international conference. On Thursday, Rice met with her Syrian counterpart, the first high-level diplomatic contact between Washington and Damascus in more than two years. The meetings with Syrian and Iranian officials confirm a significant, if unstated, change in approach for the Bush White House concerning relations in the Middle East, analysts throughout the region said. Washington is asking for help, even from foes it has spurned in the past. Under pressure from its Arab allies, the Bush administration has slowly edged away from its position that direct talks can be conducted only as a reward for what it considers good behavior. Iranian-American relations have been especially tense lately, with the United States saying that Shiite militias in Iraq have used weaponry from Iran in attacks on American troops, and with the United States pressing Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program. The United States has no diplomatic relations with Iran and has sought to isolate and contain the country. In opening remarks Friday at the conference, Mottaki did not seem to have changed his country's position toward Washington. The terrorists claim that they are fighting the forces of occupation, while the occupiers justify their presence under the pretext of the war on terror, he said. Therefore, this axis of occupation-terrorism is the root of all problems in Iraq. He said the problems in Iraq were the fault of the Americans, so they should not blame others. At the conference luncheon on Thursday, attended by diplomats from 60 countries, Rice and Mottaki exchanged pleasantries. Rice had planned to approach Mottaki at dinner Thursday evening, held by Egypt's foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit. But Mottaki left the dinner before Rice arrived, and apparently before eating. Iranian officials said that Mottaki was not avoiding Rice; rather, they said, he left because he considered the red dress worn by one of the event's entertainers to be too revealing, according to news services. Today, Sean McCormack, a State Department spokesman, sounded dubious about that explanation. I'm not sure which woman he was afraid of, the one in the red dress or the secretary of state, he said. In the two-day conference here, the Bush administration has been seeking the help of Iraq's neighbors, and countries around the world, to quell the violence there and relieve Iraq's enormous debt. Jon Elsen reported from New York. Michael Slackman contributed reporting from Sharm el Sheik. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Iraq, Iran, USA, and Arab States
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/03/world/middleeast/03diplo.html The New York Times May 3, 2007 Concern Is High and Unity Hopes Are Nil at Talks on Iraq By MICHAEL SLACKMAN and HELENE COOPER SHARM EL SHEIK, Egypt, May 2 — Four years ago at this Red Sea resort, leaders of Saudi Arabia and Egypt were photographed as passengers in a golf cart driven by President Bush. The symbolism led to taunting headlines in the region's newspapers. But the United States will not be the sole driver at a two-day international conference seeking to bring stability to Iraq that starts here on Thursday. The Bush administration has lost the confidence of Arab allies frustrated with its failure to stop the bloodshed. While about 60 countries are expected to attend — evidence of global concern over Iraq — the competing agendas here suggest that cobbling together an effective, widely accepted strategy will be hard. Officials from participating nations have haggled for days in Cairo over the elements of a communiqué that the conference plans to deliver. The contradictory agendas are numerous, analysts say. Washington wants to help the Shiite Muslim-led government of Iraq, but the Sunni governments of Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, while eager for stability, do not trust the Shiites with their Iranian links. Egypt wants to increase its role in the process, feeling competitive with the Saudis' growing role. Syria wants a timeline for an American withdrawal; the Iraqis, the Americans and other Arab governments do not. Saudi Arabia has shied away from making the formal overtures toward Iraq that the United States would like to see. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia last week refused to meet with Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq while Mr. Maliki was touring the Persian Gulf states. Saudi officials said that they had been unhappy with the pace of Mr. Maliki's promised reforms, and that in particular they had been frustrated with Mr. Maliki's failure to deal with Sunni concerns. The Arabs are in sort of a dilemma, sort of a no-win situation, said Abdel Raouf el-Reedy, a former Egyptian ambassador to the United States who served during the Persian Gulf war in 1991. They realized that the longer the United States stays in Iraq, the deeper and the more complicated Iraq would become as a problem. On the other hand, if the United States leaves Iraq, there will be a vacuum, and who could fill that vacuum? Iran is the most eligible force to fill that vacuum. The conference offers rare high-level contact between the United States and two governments it has tried to isolate, Iran and Syria, but how extensive their discussions will be is far from clear. The United States has set modest goals for the gathering, hoping to get lenders to forgive 80 percent of Baghdad's $56 billion in foreign debt and declaring the very act of holding the conference a sign of progress. But even those modest goals may run into opposition from some Arab leaders who see any agreement to help the current Iraqi government as a step toward empowering Iran. The political significance of having 60 countries there, in what I think will be the first international agreement between Iraq and the world community in decades — our research certainly hasn't found one since the 1950s — I think itself is a moment of political significance quite apart from whatever economic/financial result it might entail, Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert M. Kimmitt told reporters on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's plane en route to Egypt. The main players in Sharm el Sheik this week are a guide to the power struggles in the region: the Americans, desperately in need of regional partners; the Iranians, trying to leverage their increased strength; the Iraqis, looking for help from their Arab neighbors while appearing defiant about actually getting it; and an anxious Arab leadership that wants to pull Iraq back out of Iran's orbit. We have a problem with the Arab countries, said Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, in an interview in his Baghdad office on the aims of the meeting. Their image, their perception of us is not good. If we give them this conference in Egypt it will go down very well. Iraq has become a proxy battlefield for influence in the region between the Shiite Muslim government of Iran and the Sunni-led capitals of the Arab world. While the United States would like to help buttress Iraq's Shiite-led central government, some Arab capitals have been reluctant to offer their support out of concern that they would, in turn, be helping to empower Iran. Arab leaders believe that the presence of American troops in Iraq are destabilizing the region, inciting people to adopt the most radical Islamic ideologies. But they fear that a precipitous withdrawal would lead to civil war and give Iran a stronger hand in Iraq than it already has, analysts and former officials said. The analysts, and even American diplomats, acknowledge that Iran comes to the negotiations in a
[PEN-L] Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Russia Fail to Offer Immediate Debt Relief to Iraq at Conference
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/05/04/africa/ME-GEN-Iraq-Conference.php Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Russia fail to offer immediate debt relief to Iraq at conference The Associated Press Thursday, May 3, 2007 SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt: Saudi Arabia said it is still negotiating with Iraq over writing off billions of dollars owed it by the war-torn country, and major creditors Kuwait and Russia failed to offer immediate debt relief — a key goal of an ambitious blueprint launched to stabilize Iraq. -- Yoshie
[PEN-L] Iranian President Accused of Indecency
Only in Iran! Thoroughly delightful. -- Yoshie http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article1735969.ece May 2, 2007 Iranian President accused of indecency http://www.timesonline.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00162/Ahmadinejad_162886a.jpg This salute on the gloved hand of an elderly school teacher by the Iranian President prompted accusations of indecency (AFP/Getty) Jenny Booth and agencies The President of Iran has been accused of indecency after he publicly kissed an elderly woman who used to be his school teacher. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was photographed and filmed by state media stooping to kiss the woman's hand and then clasping her arms in an embrace, at a ceremony yesterday in honour of Iranian teachers' day. According to sharia law, it is forbidden for a man to have any physical contact with a woman to whom he is not related. The Muslim Iranian people have no recollection of such acts contrary to sharia law during Islamic rule, seethed the ultra-conservative Hezbollah newspaper, on its front page. This type of indecency progressively has grave consequences, like violating religious and sacred values. The newspaper has no link to the Lebanese militant group of the same name. The elderly woman, who was not named, wore thick gloves along with a headscarf and long black coat, meaning that Mr Ahmadinejad avoided any skin contact. While the Iranian president is considered an ultra-conservative in the West, this is not the first time that he and his government have been attacked by hardline elements even further to the right along the political spectrum. He courted controversy when he unsuccessfully proposed that women should be allowed to attend football matches. One of his vice presidents came under huge pressure last year after allegedly watching a woman dance at a ceremony in Turkey. This astonishing act by the president comes as the faithful have yet to forget his decision to allow women to watch football, noted the Hezbollah newspaper. However, other hardline publications published the images without further comment. A kiss on the hand for the teacher, was the headline in Iran, the government daily. Ahmadinejad's action appeared a public gesture of humility before Iranian teachers, who have publicly protested against low salaries and accused the government of not doing enough to improve their work conditions. -- Yoshie
Re: [PEN-L] Kerem Kaya and Sinan Ikinci on Turkey
On 5/1/07, raghu [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 4/30/07, Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Surprisingly sensible for WSWS (if you can ignore typical WSWS formulae at the end). -- Yoshie Just curious: what do you have against the WSWS? WSWS can't resist inserting into every single article cliches like the betrayal of Stalinism and collapse of bourgeois nationalism that really explain nothing. And the conclusion of every single article is in effect abstention, though it sometimes comes wrapped up in an exhortation for workers to build a working-class socialist party independent of the ruling class. It's true that sometimes abstention is all you can manage, but if that's all there is to it, what's the point of politics? -- Yoshie
