Letter 107: Walk down a stormy lane of memory

Security Cooperation: a ‘Plan Colombia’ for Iraq?                      

Introduction: current situation.  The current rush-to-consensus on applying Plan Colombia may prove over time to be pre-mature and a product of group-think.1 In working with the Iraqi government (GOI) to create a “sovereign, stable, and self-reliant” nation, the U.S. government (USG) must assist and support the GOI in avoiding three national catastrophes:

1. a regional war between Arabs and Persians fought on Iraqi soil;
2. a civil war between the Arabs and Kurds; and,
3. a continuing relapse into civil conflict creating a culture of chronic conflict.2

The danger of the third point is clear: half of the failed states that emerge from civil war relapse into (often-times bloodier) conflict within ten years.  Iraq may be starting to relapse.  Why?  

1. Iraq’s contentious factions remain trapped in a "security dilemma", complicating the prospects of long-term conciliation.  A security dilemma exists when paramilitary and other armed groups outside the law tend not to surrender weapons during programs of disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (“DDR”).3 The dilemma lies in a militia being defenseless in the face of a rival that has retained its firepower through DDR.
2. Specifically, in Iraq, we do not know what the Ministry of Interior really did to weed out the death squads brought in during Bayan Jabr's tenure of 2005 and 2006 or thought to be lingering in the Ministry of Defence.4  
3. The Norwegian government and the Iraqi Ministry of Planning have documented an absolute surfeit of weaponry dispersed throughout the extra-legal fighting elements.  Any actual surrender of arms is likely to be nominal.  The presence of pervasive poverty sharpens the temptation to resort to violence as a means of dispute resolution.
4. The Maliki government has squandered the reconciliation started by the U.S. program of funding the Sunni ‘Awareness Movement’ with concerned local citizens (a/k/a CLCs).  This surge-related program protected the Sunni population from possible sectarian genocide and, more importantly, began bringing disaffected elements into the political mainstream while establishing the fundaments of community policing.

Community policing re-frames the current insurgency into a crime wave -- not an insurgency -- effectively to cut these murderers off at the source.  Whether the rationale is ethno-sectarian or economic, people who kill people are still criminals.  Neighborhood residents are the best eyes-and-ears for the police, as proven by the Kurdish cities.

Review of Plan Colombia as a Template.  Colombia and Iraq share evident similarities -- high numbers of internally displaced people; drug (or illegal oil) trafficking as a source of funding for militias; widespread corruption; human rights abuses; vulnerable oil infrastructure in need of protection; and, widespread homicide.  A few crucial differences, however, trump these circumstantial parallels.  Additionally, aside from recent tactical gains against revolutionary groups, the ultimate success of Plan Colombia remains contested.5

 

Plan Colombia was basically a de-novo militarization by the USG of the counter-insurgency in Colombia.  Over six years, the United States invested $5-6 billion in military aid, a significant portion of which funded the fumigation of millions of acres of arable lands producing illicit cash crops; not so in Iraq.  Over a six year period, the USG allocated $18 billion to the Iraq Security Forces Fund.  Thus, Iraq’s equivalent to Plan Colombia has likely taken place already.

 

With the funding and equipping to date of the Ministries of Interior and Defence (MOI and MOD) as well as the 100,000 CLCs exceeding $18 billion, $3 billion (or Iraq’s population-based equivalent to the aid under Plan Colombia’s) of funding over six years should prove to be superfluous.  Such a situation would be like Noah, on the thirty-ninth day of rains, walking topside with a pitcher of water to tend to some plants on deck.  Instead, such a USG posture would more likely spoil the prospects for long-term stability as U.S. policies would be perceived – as they already are by many – as taking sides in a civil conflict.

 

Training more men to kill other men, as suggested by applying Plan Colombia, will not enhance the rule of law in Iraq.  The current police force exceeds sustainable levels; the police stations and other infrastructure in place can not handle the levels of forces using them.  One of every 25-30 Iraqis is in the security forces (i.e., the military and police; or, ISF), meaning more police per population than any of the world's five most dangerous countries.  At the height of Plan Colombia, there were -- at least -- one hundred people for every member of the security forces.

 

Iraq lacks the extra-governmental institutions reaching all levels of its society.  Colombia has the Catholic Church and many mature peace-oriented non-governmental organizations (NGOs), allied with wealthier benefactors in the U.S. and Europe, to build a climate of reconciliation that can supplant a culture of conflict.6 Iraq’s NGOs are nascent and under-funded.  Lastly, U.S. interests (i.e., the war on drugs and “nar-corruption” sweeping Northward from Colombia) remain more immediate and vital with respect to Colombia than they do with Iraq.7

 

A (Not-So) New Way for a New Day.  The ideal end-state toward which U.S. can point Iraq includes the following elements:

1. police primacy through democratic, communally-based law enforcement;
2. an end to ISF-sponsored violence against prisoners and detainees including torture, false arrest and neglect during custody;
3. widespread enforcement for the protection of fundamental human rights; and,
4. ethno-sectarian tolerance strengthened through mutual support.

These elements define President Obama's ideal of “an Iraq that is sovereign, stable, and selfreliant”.  It may be prudent not to assume an eventual stay-behind U.S. force.  Such a residual force would be unwelcome and, given its small number and attenuated lines of communication (LOC), far more vulnerable.  A possible exception might be small U.S. Army training contingents in Kirkuk, Baghdad and Basra.  These units would gather intelligence while preventing potential regional peace-keepers -- about 20,000 in all (if requested) -- from indulging in a land-grab of Iraq.  Such an oversight force would tap into the peace-keepers’ LOC.

 

This alternative approach minimizes the constraints mentioned earlier by establishing a postkinetic partnership between Iraq and the U.S. starting in 2012. This alliance will aim for peaceful co-existence within Iraqi society to relieve the poverty and essential service shortages that now detract from the GOI's legitimacy and rule of law.  The Office of Security Cooperation (OSC) would ideally consist of a security assistance component (8-13 people) supplemented by liaisons with civilian agencies (27-32 people) harnessing USG and NGO-sponsored resources.  

 

Toward an Alternate Legacy.  A legacy of goodwill counts in the long-run.  One U.S. approach could leverage each uniformed military trainer deployed from the U.S., U.N. or NATO (about 3,000 in all) with at least five field-workers drawn from the Peace Corps, USAID, DFID, diverse NGOs and the Iraqi population.  These volunteers and the uniformed military would cross-train each other in grass-roots economic development and civil-military operations.  
 

Iraqis could then re-build their villages and their lives in practical ways. In the Iraqi mind, these basic benefits would gradually begin to associate the United States or the West with reconciliation and prosperity.8 The USG would strive, through this radically different OSC concept sponsored by the U.S. Embassy, to impart a legacy of democratic policing, law-&-order, human rights and communal self-improvement.9  The annual cost of this legacy-building would total less than 10% of the average yearly ISFF burden.

 

REFERENCES

1. Irving Janis; Yale & Berkeley; 1972: who did extensive work on the subject, defined it as:  A mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members' strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupthink) 

 

2. Paul Collier; Oxford University 2004: “Around half of all civil wars are due to post-conflict relapses…The risks of conflict relapse are very high during the first post-conflict decade – typically around 50%.”  (http://www.un.org/esa/documents/Development.and.Conflict2.pdf) 

 

3. Matthew Kirwin; Michigan State, 2006 “There are several factors that have led to the conflagration of a security dilemma in Cote d’Ivoire. First, a weak state and economic crisis compelled certain groups to revert to a primordial attachment to ethnic and religious background, which supersedes national identity and creates intense power struggles. This reversion to ethnic identity caused the parties to identify each other as offensive threats. Due to the dire economic situation in states such as Cote d’Ivoire, the struggle for the control of resources has become intense. “Any economic improvement by one ethnic group is frequently perceived as an example by the center: the ethnic security dilemma has an economic component, as all sorts of motives and fears are read into any change in the economic status of each ethnic group (Saideman 1998: 135).” Therefore the distribution of resources to one ethnic group and not another decreases the security of latter and increases the security of the former. Control and distribution of resources is primarily the responsibility of the government. Political appointments therefore confer power to the appointee and his entourage, which in turn can be interpreted as a security threat to certain groups. At one point other ethnic groups assumed that the government of Gbagbo and his ethnic group had a stranglehold on the means of entry into the police and gendarmerie.” (http://www.njas.helsinki.fi/pdf-files/vol15num1/kirwin.pdf) 

 

4. James C. Jones; U.S. Institute of Peace 2009; Colombia: Building Peace in a Time of War (page-365) “Indeed doubts exist about the degree of real paramilitary [i.e., ‘government coddled militias’] demobilization.  Recent reports of the emergence of new groups, or reemergence of old ones, throughout the country.  Moreover, investigations as well as informed testimony under the controversial Justice and Peace Law have revealed disturbing links between lawmakers – most of them [President] Uribe supporters [in favor of Plan Colombia’s militarized program] – and paramilitaries.  And there is strong evidence of widespread paramilitary penetration of governmental institutions.” Please note that the writing of Dr Jones is likely to be biased against the government of Colombia (GOC); he was under investigation by the GOC for possible ties with leftist guerillas opposing the rightist paramilitaries.  The Department of State gives the GOC higher marks but states in its 2009 narcotics report: “The GOC does not, as a matter of government policy, encourage or facilitate the illicit production or distribution of narcotic or psychotropic drugs or other controlled substances, or the laundering of proceeds from illegal drug transactions. While criminal organizations are greatly weakened, concerns remain over their corrupting influences. In September 2008, two CNP [i.e., Colombian National Police] generals, Antonio Gomez Mendez and Marco Pedreros, were fired as a result of alleged ties to narco-paramilitary leader, Daniel “El Loco” Barrera. Separately, several members of the GOC were found to have supported right-wing paramilitary groups. Seventy members of the 2006-2010 Congress and 15 current and former governors have been investigated in the “para-political” scandal, with 34 congressmen and eight governors jailed as a result of the aggressive investigations.” (http://www.state.gov/p/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2009/vol1/116520.htm)

Deborah Haynes; The Times of London, 2009: “….in January the human rights office of the Defence Ministry found more than 1,000 detainees at three centres in Ninevah, northern Iraq, including about 550 who had orders issued for their release…Many prisoners were held in cramped and unhygienic conditions. More than 700 were eventually freed.” (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article6737870.ece)  

 

5. Associated Content News; “Top 5 Nations Where Safety is Last” 2007: “Colombia. Infamous for its guerillas, illegal cocaine "industry", and corrupt government, no wonder Colombia ranks as ‘The Most Dangerous Country in the World’. Bombings targeting civilians are common and terrorism is a way of life for most citizens who have grown accustomed to the chaos. It has a high rating for kidnappings with ransoms, with businesspeople, tourists, journalists, and scientists being frequent targets, though no one is actually excluded from kidnappings. Hot spots include ATMs, taxis, restaurants, and simply walking down the street. Those who try to resist robberies usually get shot and killed. Bogota, Baranquilla, Cartagena, and Medellin are statistically categorized as the most dangerous cities, with Medellin holding the title of the Drug Capital and ‘Most Dangerous City in the World’. With 11 murders a day in a city of merely 2 million, its murder rates is quintupled that of New York City. In recent years, murder rates in Colombia have dropped, but not enough to pass the title to South Africa. Though what was previously mentioned [falling homicide rates] may be misinformation, as critics have accused President Uribe of manipulating the crime [rate], making Colombia seem safer than it really is. What is behind all the heinous crimes? An expanding drug market and a plethora of terrorist groups, and a government that does nothing about it. Colombia averages 47 murders a day in a nation of 45 million, giving it the crown of ‘Most Dangerous’.”  
(http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/159175/top_5_most_dangerous_countries_in_the.html?cat=9) 

U.S. Office on Colombia; 2009 “The…Working Group on Extrajudicial Executions has identified new modalities of extrajudicial executions where killings are no longer publicly reported, as happened in the case of false positives, but rather hidden, with measures taken to conceal the identity of those responsible. One example is the increase in cases of forced disappearances of human rights defenders and social leaders, with the person being subsequently killed and put into unidentified graves in the majority of these cases. In many of these cases members of the armed forces are alleged to have been involved either directly, through cooperation, or at the least through acquiescence with paramilitaries.  According to a recent report by the National Commission for the Search for Disappeared People, between January 1, 2007 and October 21, 2008 alone, there was a total of 1,686 people forcefully disappeared.” (http://www.usofficeoncolombia.com/uploads/application-pdf/2009-%20June%20EJE%20memo.pdf) 

 

6. Arturo Carrillo; U.S. Institute of Peace 2009; Colombia: Building Peace in a Time of War (pages 148-149) “As a result, by 2000, the Colombian non-governmental human rights movement was a critical player…Colombian NGOs had powerful allies in the Colombian Congress as well as among foreign governments, intergovernmental organizations…[e.g., U.N.]…and, of course, international NGOs….” 

 

7. Bruce Bagley University of Miami; 2001: “During most of the 1980s the Medellin cartel dominated the Colombian drug trade and its principal trafficking routes passed through (or over) the Caribbean into the United States via south Florida and elsewhere along the U.S. Atlantic seaboard. As these "traditional" smuggling routes came under increasing pressure from U.S. drug enforcement over the second half of the decade, a gradual shift away from the Caribbean routes to new ones passing through Central America and Mexico and across the U.S. southwest border took place. By the early 1990s 70 to 80 percent of the cocaine smuggled out of Colombia entered the United States from Mexico while only 20 to 30 percent continued to come in via the Caribbean.” (http://clas.berkeley.edu/Events/conferences/Colombia/workingpapers/working_paper_bagley.html) 

 

8. Eugene Burdick and William Lederer; The Ugly American; 1958   “But despite the dual meaning, the ‘ugly American’ of the book title fundamentally does refer to the plain-looking engineer Atkins, who lives with the local people, comes to understand their needs, and offers genuinely useful assistance with small-scale projects such as the development of a simple bicycle-powered water pump. It is argued in the book that the Communists are successful because they practice tactics similar to Atkins'.  According to an article published in Newsweek in May 1959, the ‘real’ Ugly American was identified as an ICA technician named Otto Hunerwadel, who served in Burma from 1949 until his death in 1952.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ugly_American) 

 

9. Bonnie Bucqueroux; Michigan State, 2004 “By embracing strategies that decentralize and personalize police service, police departments that have adopted the community policing philosophy have been able to engage communities in comprehensive, collaborative, community-based problem-solving aimed at crime, fear of crime, and disorder. Many efforts involve assigning individual officers or teams to specific beat areas, to foster a sense of ownership and responsibility. The marriage of police and community brings together the power of the formal criminal justice system with the informal social control that communities can exert. Police departments have also been a catalyst in forging new partnerships with other professional and civic institutions (municipal agencies, non-profit groups, the business community, schools, and the faith community).“
(http://www.policing.com/articles/rcj.html)

 

Ned McDonnell; 'Letter to President George W. Bush, 2006': “The three themes of this rationale – crime prevention, national sovereignty and economic development – are based on precedents in…New York City…The Ministry of Interior has been infiltrated by militias backed by Iran...Trustworthy policemen, vetted and approved by local inhabitants, will empower Iraqi citizens to turn over the insurgents who are nothing more than people enjoying the blood-sport of – and financial gain from – killing, destruction, kidnapping and mayhem.  This plan will save time, energy and money which can then be better allocated to Afghanistan to complete Operation Enduring Freedom in support of a tenuous democratic government….”

Letter 106 to Friends and Familiares: thoughts on the Charle Hebdo murders

The recent article in the New Yorker about the murders of admittedly distasteful journalists in Paris (http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/blame-for-charlie-hebdo-murders) brings up so much so quickly. To me the defining statement of that short-but-sweat article is, "Islam today includes a substantial minority of believers who countenance, if they don’t actually carry out, a degree of violence in the application of their convictions that is currently unique."  I disagree with the size of this malevolent minority.

My sense is that it is smaller; it does not take many people to wreak havoc and intimidate fellow congregants. The key word is "currently". It is difficult for Westerners to understand the lethal power of religious wars since we are three or four centuries beyond them; indeed, the two great splits in Xianity are five hundred and a thousand years in our past. There are three inflammatory divisions here, two within Islam:

1. At its start, Islam was a reaction to "corrupted Judaism", much as the Calvinist reformation was to corrupted Catholicism.
2. Within Islam has been the schism between the Sunnis and Shi´ites (vaguely analogous to intra-Xian arguments over graven images and trans-substantiation).
3. There has been a pervasive fear since the 1970s that there would someday be a clash, not so much of civilizations, but between poorer regions and wealthier ones (the North-South conflict).

There are two other concerns I have, one specifically with the Holy Qu’ran (a beautiful and majestic work) and the other with the history of Islam as a bedrock of social values.  It is likely that the Holy Qu’ran has no more violence in it than the Tanakh (the Old Testament). The subtle distinction that concerns me is the temporal difference between the two. The violence recounted in the Old Testament was a distant and redacted historical narrative of events occurring centuries before.

As such, descriptions of the violently triumphant arrival and mastery of the Promised Land by the tribes of Jacob were not intended as current “how-to” instructions on getting even while getting mad. We all know of the radical Israeli Jews, often living in settlements, who condone violence against Palestineans for just these historically attenuated reasons. They hold little currency with their fellow faithful; as a small minority of a tiny religious population, they are too few to be taken seriously.

Muhamad, on the other hand, was conveying God’s wishes to a beleaguered group of devout followers who found themselves in danger of being wiped out. Thus, the Prophet advocated resorting to violence in the present to survive. This defensive doctrine evolved into a justification for imposing the religion upon others when his new tribe was on a roll. With that text forever being in the present (not pluperfect) tense, a potentially tragic resonance remains available to violent personalities looking for an excuse.

Second, as corrupt as the Churches of Constantinople and Rome might have become, they represented a core belief around which believers and dissenters oriented themselves and centered their societies, values and debates. When the Mongols smashed Baghdad into a million pieces in the mid-thirteenth century, Islam’s core was ripped out, leaving far-flung communities of the gutted caliphate to mutate into culturally conditioned, at-times virulent, off-shoots.

So, at least in my fettered (¿fetid?) mind, none of these strands in isolation can explain the current wave of the murderous ideology described in the New Yorker. The great majority -- and I mean on the magnitude of 98% -- of the Muslims brush aside these ideas and live for a better life for their children, their kin and their countries. For example, the doctrine of jihad, for these warm-hearted people, is not a call to conquer others but to subdue their self-will. Perhaps I am reading my values into the equation here, but these people are as friendly and peaceable as anybody else I know.

Yet, we live in a post-nihilistic global culture that segments people through the social media and inter-net; the world remains awash with guns. These themes -- and others -- are conflating into a wave of violence as unfamiliar to us as it is uncivilized to almost everybody else. Remember, if 98% of 1.2 billion people live peaceably while the remainder insist on violence, the world has twenty-four million people who embody a credo of homicidal hatred looking for a reason. This sad phenomenon is hardly phenomenal as another article on the murders argues persuasively (http://tabletmag.com/scroll/188143/je-suis-charlie).

Letter 105 to friends and familiares: Yes, I am a Republican; but still unsure enough not to be a bully.

Republican friends believe I have slipped into political apostasy.  They have a point, given my frequent defenses of President Obama, usually with a lame disclaimer of my not liking many of his policies. Truthfully, I believe the President did act within his authority on immigration. Yet, the G.O.P. has a convincing narrative by some Republicans that his action was motivated by not wanting to concede the upper hand to the Republican-led House of Representatives and, soon, the Senate.

 

My conservatism remains intact. There are many policies I dislike of this Administration, while I admire the man at the head of it. Here are six policies – two foreign and four domestic – that I have never really liked, nor ever will. While previous essays cited are often dated in their examples, analogies and details, they are based on certain fundamental beliefs that place me firmly on the right. Yes, my principles differ from those of liberals; no question.

 

President Barack Obama deserves respect from each and every American for having beliefs in the first place. Yes, they often get bogged down in the partisan free-for-all that now seems to pass for the people’s government. After all, in my own case at least, I have to admit that I am far from the smartest person in any room. That may sound silly and presumptive, but it is not. There is always the possibility that those principles so obvious to me may not be so obvious to others; they may even be wrong.

 

Abortion on demand. People know why I am a right-to-life conservative  (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2012/01/letter-52-to-friends-and-familiares.html). Kulturkampf aside, we should maintain a large margin of compassion for the hellish dilemma weighing down on decent, often poorer, women. Nevertheless, the notion of foetal viability is an intellectual hoax and I fear that part of the demoralization of American politics and culture came out of Viêt Nam and Roe v. Wade. Coercing religious institutions with the corrosive abortion-on-demand ideology violates the Constitution and further trivializes the sacred value of the life taken.

 

The second bank bail-out. The first bail-out was not a great idea but President Bush basically had four days to react decisively to prevent a collapse of the financial markets. President Obama had four months. The two situations were qualitatively different. Senator McCain articulated a better approach in 2008 that would have been easier to implement, less costly and far less intrusive. That program, at least as I perceived it at the time, would have held people accountable as well as, cleaned up the mess made by a minority of unethical bankers and a broken system
(http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2013/09/this-is-yet-anotherpolitical-letter-home.html).

 

The Affordable Care Act.  True, there is a case to be made that President Obama brokered a compromise against which the Republicans turned their backs. Nevertheless, the mode of resolving the underlying question of a right to health-care and weaving it into the larger body politic was wrong (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2012/05/letter-56-thoughts-on-health-care.html). Additionally, the deceptions to get the law passed and implemented only under-cut and already fragile and unbalanced consensus.

 

Economic stimulus.  The Stimulus package was a blunderbuss approach to the Great Recession that failed to lay the foundation for manufacturing and its attendant wealth and job creation. Yet the infrastructure crumbles and corruption is detectable. The manner of financing this corrupted measure through quantitative easing has bankrupted the country. Sadly, we will only get it when the baseless dollars -- the specious specie -- flood home from overseas. Lastly, combined with the coercion of the A.C.A., this piping tepid approach has turned the Great Recession into a depression for young people; call the millennials the "tossed generation".

 

The Middle East. The President’s current policy in Iraq has been correct and sober-minded (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2014/06/letter-102-to-friends-and-familiares.html). Yet, the situation ought never have degenerated to this extreme. Inaction in the face of power grabs in Iraq in 2010 plus the unmitigated slaughter of Syrians and the infiltration of refugee camps in and around Syria by ISIS – when inexpensive means were readily available to respond – has pushed a difficult regional transition into becoming a possible flash-point for world war (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2013/08/letter-83-thoughts-on-syria-case-for.html).

Compounding these failed polices has been the use of drones to assassinate unindicted terrorists  in a manner clearly outside the laws of men and war (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2013/02/letter-75-doj-white-paper-for-black.html).

 

Russia and Ukraine. This is a complicated question, since Ukraine’s Eastern borders were drawn as arbitrarily by one colonial power as had the dotted lines across the Levant had been imposed by two others.  There are genuine questions of sovereignty to be resolved. The means employed by President Putin and tacitly condoned by President Obama, however, are wrong for Ukraine, Eastern Europe and, ultimately, Russia herself (http://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2014/03/letters-to-friends-and-family-94.html).  President Obama's mismanagement in this case rivals that of President Clinton in the Balkans.

As Yugoslavia crumbled into chaos, President Clinton's half-hearted measures and sanctions hurt the wrong people and managed only to harden a tin-horn dictator into a slaughter-house operator. In the case of Russian aggression, appeasement and procrastination have only made a bad situation worse and whetted the appetite of an aggressor, as the Baltics and Poland are finding out these days.  One should note that Unkraine, each of the Baltics, Hungary and Poland have been steadfast allies in Iraq and / or Afghanistan. Pulling missile defenses and conceding outcomes too readily to the Putineer by President Obama hardly seems to return their favor.

Toward a creative and inclusive dialectic. Yes, there is little doubt in my way of thinking that these and other policies from the Administration are bad for the country in the long-run. In some cases they chip away at our singular experiment in governance: due-process, the rule of law and the courage to do the right thing when it really counts. What is difficult for my more liberal friends to argue is that President Obama was simply doing what he could in the face of thorny dilemmas with no visible alternatives.

Not at all true. With the possible exceptions of health-care and abortion, each of these policies had better alternatives at the time proposed by other mainstream leaders. Within these two issues, the use of the law to enforce an ideology on long-established religiously based and funded hospitals is very, very dangerous.  That said, however, there is a palpable racism in much of the vitriol hurled the President’s way.  While these policies are headed toward popular repudiation, delighting in President Obama’s failure is even worse.

Such an attitude of political vindictiveness makes compromise harder to achieve and fails to recognize that critics have it easy in a policy debate; that is, changelings have the intellectual burden-of-proof when they attack a status quo. It is easier to attack a status-quo than to defend it. Yet the burden-of-proof needs to be pragmatic: one that permits a resolution of a debate even of morally ambiguous situations, like that of Ferguson, Missouri. Because the officer was not indicted does not nullify the contention that the police are open to criticism for often using excessive force, especially against minorities.

 

Critics tend to compare the best case scenarios inside their heads to the often disappointing policies carried out in plain sight. People seem to forget that many of these now-reviled policies emerged earlier as politically poignant and timely best case scenarios in the heads of other bright and well-intentioned thinkers. Thus, the foreign policies of President Obama, ones that I often see as feckless, may very well be avoiding unacceptable levels bloodshed that my best-case scenarios would otherwise impose.

 

Debilitating personal attacks, especially those that are unfounded, help no one, especially Republicans, as we now bear the onus of “manning up” with a new, better and attainable contract with America, one that is far-reaching, flexible and durable. We need a new consensus toward compromise, badly.

Letter 104 to friends and familiares: México's challenge; México's opportunity

El presidente Enrique Peña Nieto announced yesterday that his administration is set to take measures to streamline and reform the Mexican police system. This effort will prove to be a herculean task in view of the massive bureaucracy, the confusing structure, the insinuation of gangsterism into some parts of the force, entrenched interests of unpalatable profitability and the low pay that induces petty corruption among many of the street cops.

Another sobering announcement surfaced this week that, previous to the atrocity against the forty-three students in Ayotzinapa that has sparked a spectacular national revulsion, another thirty-one students had gone missing (likely murdered) in another village in the same awful state of Guerrero; news was slow in coming since the pueblito involved was directly threatened with total massacre.

The President has a lot facing him, as the senior elected official of the “Institutional Revolutiory Party” (the P.R.I.), which ruled México for seventy years as a one-party autocracy that eventually mired the Repúbica deeply in unfettered corruption. That systematic inefficiency stagnated an inventive, hard-working people for many decades. Yet the corruption creating so much turmoil today is not that of money but that of power (far worse).

My gut says loud and clear that el presidente Peña Nieto is a very decent man who has the courage to cut right to the heart of the current corruption of power in México. Nevertheless, the P.R.I. today came out saying it will propose a "complementary alternative" to el presidente Peña Nieto's initiative.

This latter announcement is not necessarily good news as the P.R.I. plan may be a ruse, with all the right words, intended to undermine the proposed reform. Undoubtedly, el presidente Peña Nieto knows how high the stakes really are. Failure could de-rail México’s ascent into economic stardom.  This man has worked earnestly to modernize the economic and political governance of his country.

Sadly, he gets very little credit for that. Sure, it is a no-brainer for me to believe that this man is far better than I; ergo, no judgements of his character, here. What is less evident, however, is that Enrique Peña Nieto may very well be placing his life at risk in service to his country. No, I am neither kidding nor being dramatic. In all of this high-velocity tension, one may find a few reasons for optimism. 

First, el presidente Peña Nieto may be breaking with P.R.I. hierarchy with today's announcement by the P.R.I. of a "complementary alternative". People here have long deemed el presidente Peña Nieto to be a “Gel Boy” (pronounced Hell Boy in Spanish) to be a Frankie Avalon marionette of former President Salinas Gortari, deeply dishonest and deeply disgraced in the eyes the world after wrecking the country’s finances two decades ago. 

Personally, I have never bought that theory; were it ever true, I sense that President Dippity Doo-Dah is cutting the strings that have bound him. To wax historical, el presidente Peña Nieto has issued his private "Unilateral Declaration of Independence", one that is far better than its fifty year old name-sake in Rhodesia.

Much like President George W. Bush, I believe el presidente Peña Nieto is far more intelligent that he seems.  Nonetheless, it is unwise to bite the hand that has fed you, even if a president need not worry about re-election in this República; no, not the mangey mano of Salinas but that of the larger P.R.I. leadership.

Second, el presidente Peña Nieto’s hard-driving reforms may be hitting close to home, creating push-back, leading gangsters inside the various shades of government (or, in this case, the Mme. Nhu of Guerrero) to feel the pressure and start making stupid decisions that reflect desperation that the gravy train may be ending. This particular optimism is, admittedly, a stretch but it does link to the third reason for guarded optimism.

Third, the people of México have had enough. The message may be revolutionary. Yet it is only contingently so. The citizenry is repudiating the gangsters and their enablers. That repudiation comes at great risk to themselves. The President's hoisting their banner comes at great risk to him. It has been a long time in coming, as so many guns (mainly from the U.S.) have overwhelmed México, much like a self-replicating bacterium that debilitates and kills the host organism.

In one sense, Mexicans are already rebelling, not against the state, yet, but against intimidation by gangster régimes pocketed throughout the byzantine federal structure. The element of contingent revolution, literally burned into the country’s psyche over the past ten days, is quite clear: “El Sr. Presidente, tiene una elección: limpiar nuestra sociedad con nosotros o ser eliminado por nosotros.”

(Mr President, either you clean up this savage corruption or we will clean you out.) This is both a sobering and an exciting time for México.  El presidente Peña Nieto’s choice is rather stark: turn both of these atrocities, unspeakable for nations in the developed world, into the “cause célèbre” needed to cut right to the heart of the corruption of power in México and slice away its tissue of death.

Or he can forfeit México’s opportunity to take her properly earned place on the world stage. The popular outrage and repudiation can be harnessed into police reform. While I never enjoyed Frankie Avalon films or made much time for Hell Boy, I remain convinced that el presidente Peña Nieto is a leader of courage and substance who will tap this deep popular resentment to complete the work of his equally gutsy predecessor. 

Perhaps the President’s first step might be to bring back el ex presidente Calderón Hinijosa to head up the arduous, dangerous and critical work of reconfiguring the police into a smaller, better paid force that taps the community consensus to enforce neighborhood (pueblito) policing so that, together, all México can finally choke off the narco-gangsters from the bottom, up.

Letter #103 to Friends and Familiares: opportunities lost afterward

Esta carta se presenta en ambos español e inglés; ya que mis amigos mexicanos hablan inglés mejor que pudo hablar español y a causa de mi no ser capaz de traducir las sutilezas de mi lengua primordial, les sugeriría que se refieren al párrafo inglés, cuando mi frase español no se entienda bien.

Hay razones porqué no debo escribir esta carta. Sin embargo, sigue habiendo una razón primordial porqué tengo que hacerlo. No quiero preocupar a mi familia ni dejar un miedo en sus corazones. Al contrario, dicho catalizador es el sentimiento de ironía, provocada por oportunidades perdidas, en nuestras almas (es decir, la mía).		There are reasons not to write this letter and there remains one which compels me to do so. The reasons why not revolve mainly around my not wanting to engender fear or cause any worry in the hearts of my loved ones. But the reason that will not ease over time is the sense of irony that missed opportunities evoke in one’s (read: my) soul.
El jueves pasado, el siete de agosto, dos mil catorce, un día que no va a vivir en infamia (pero será “barrido en el gran basurero de la historia”), recibí un correo electrónico de dos compañeros de CIDESI, dónde había servido en el Peace Corps en Querétaro, la magnífica ciudad tan lejos en mi memoria como el Bajío está desde Baja California.		Last Thursday, the seventh of August, two thousand and fourteen, a day that will live not in infamy but in the miscellaneous file, I received an e-mail from two colleagues of my Centro in which I served the Peace Corps: CIDESI in the sublime city of Querétaro, now far away in the mountainous midlands of México.
Estaban en Tijuana y dijeron que querrían verme si fuera posible. Ya que tenían un viaje temprano la mañana siguiente a Mexicali (225 kilómetros de TJ), tendría que ir a su hotel a las ocho. Sin pensar mucho, despedí la molestia de ser el único de nosotros sin coche que iría a ellos que tenían un coche.		They were in town and said they would like to see me. Due to scheduling problems (i.e., a trip early next morning to Mexicali, about 135 miles away), I would have to go to their hotel at 8:00. Quickly, I swept aside the slight annoyance at being the one without a car going to see those with a car.
Miré un mapa generado por GOOGLE que indicaba que el hotel estará varios nudillos a través de la pantalla, más o menos 1,8 kilómetros desde mi oficina; veinte minutos a pie. ¡Bien! Además, yo necesitaba el ejercicio de una caminata enérgica. La molestia se convirtió en la felicidad porque estaría pasando tiempo con un buen amigo.		Then I looked at the GOOGLE map and saw that hotel was, by measuring the scale by knuckles, 1.8 kliks away; a bit more than a mile and a quarter; twenty minutes, tops. Since I needed the exercise of a brisk walk, the annoyance quickly dissipated and I was merrily on my way to meet one of my best friends at CIDESI.
El aspecto más emocionante para mí fue el hecho que este caballero había recibido una promoción hasta el  gerente de la transferencia de tecnología. Con discreción, de verdad, había pasado mucho tiempo dentro de CIDESI apoyando esta idea con líderes del Centro. Mientras que mis esfuerzos me hacían sentir bien, sospecho que mi influencia estaba sólo en mi mente.		What was most exciting was that my colleague had been promoted, finally, to the head of tech transfer there. This was great news and ample cause to celebrate. After all, I had spent a lot of time in CIDESI quietly lobbying the senior management of that science center for this to happen. While my efforts made me feel good, they were almost certainly not decisive.
A la hora de mi salida, estaba luchando en completar una propuesta. Les envié a mis compañeros un mensaje de texto para alertarles que sería quince minutos tarde. Privadamente pensaba que sería cinco o diez minutos, pero quise manejar expectativas y evitar ser avergonzado a pagar para la cena. Sin embargo, cosas no parecían en los lugares especificados por el mapa.		At the time to leave, I was struggling to get a proposal out to a possible --no, in this case, quite impossible – client. And I texted ahead that I would be fifteen minutes late, figuring that I would beat that timing and so exceed expectations and not get interrogated into paying for dinner.  Then I noticed that landmarks and intersections were not quite where they were supposed to be.
El Señor Todopoderoso GOOGLE lo había sido muy lejos de la realidad esta vez, ¡unos ocho kilómetros en error! Además, era casi noche ahora y me encontraba en la parte industrial, de las maquiladoras, una parte difícil de la ciudad. Caminando lento, estaba pensando en mis opciones.		This time, GOOGLE´s algorithmic hiccup threw me off by five or six miles. Besides it was almost dark and this part of town was down by the maquiladoras (factories that make cheap televisions), a pretty nitty-gritty place. Walking very slowly, I paused for moment to consider my options.
Entonces, había un empujón desde atrás por un adolescente quien dijo “Ándale” o algo otro para permitirle para pasarme. Pues, él se ralentizaba. Ahora, fui motivado sólo por mi estrés. Era evidente que el gigante GOOGLE no me podría guiar por una sola milla. ¡Qué monopolio! Ahora, yo sería muy tarde. Entonces, fui enojado.		Then a shove from behind by a sixteen year old who said “Ándale,” or some such term and I let him pass. Then he slowed down. By now I was pretty edgy. It was obvious that GOOGLE had screwed up the whole map thing and I was going to be very late. You think a monopoly that wires our brains could at least get the map right.
Ahora, este tonto se está desacelerando, probablemente para empezar hacer el 'texting' mientras de caminar. Sin embargo, él no me parecía el tipo; era delgado y de altura. No tenía la manera de un data-dink, tampoco. Estábamos todavía casi un kilómetro de la esquina donde yo podría tomar un taxi.		Now this idiot was slowing down, probably getting ready to text while he walked. Funny, he did not look the type; he was tall and thin. He really had nothing of the air of circuit-slug or data dink. We were several hundred yards away from the main intersection where it seemed highly likely that I would have to hail a taxi.
Así, decidí emitir un fuerte gruñido, como un oso mexicano, para moverme por delante este joven desaliñado. Luego, me lo sentí. Una mordida aguda, de un grande insecto, entre dos costillas en mi lado derecho. Un gran insecto, por supuesto. Búsqueda rápida, ningunos resultados. Bien. No era un insecto.		So, I decided to emit a Klingon Worff-grunt and edge ahead of the scruffy looking fellow. Then I felt it. A sharp bite from a big bug, on my side. Right there, in between two of the ribs on my right side. Must be a pretty big bug; quick blood-check. Nothing; good. It was not a bug.
Su cuchillo tuvo una hoja curvilínea, tal vez como un machete. La hoja se extendía por diez centímetros, tal vez un poquito más. Esto me enfocó. Un niño de menos de diecisiete años, me dijo, “tu dinero…Your Munnnnnyyyyy” Eso fue todo: la estresa de ser cada vez más tarde para mis amigos me hizo enojado.		His knife was curled, perhaps like a machete. The blade was four inches long, maybe a smidge longer. That focussed my attention. The young man, no more than sixteen, said, “tu dinero…your moneyyyy.” This was the last straw as I was already stressed because I was running later and later.
Este Tijuana telenovela se había vuelto en una molestia sin fin. En fijar mis ojos a los suyos, le miré directamente y, con una voz elevada, le sugerí que haga algo sexual a sí mismo bien imposible para hacer. Sí, mis términos fueron 'un poco' más transparentes, con palabras antiguas sajonas que son bien conocidas en México.		This wild GOOGLE chase was not only frustrating but becoming a downright nuisance. Bringing my eyes over to his, I looked at him directly and, with a raised voice but not yelling, I suggested that he perform some physically impossible act of auto-fornication, albeit in terms a bit more – ¿how shall we say this politely? -- prosaic.
El joven fue tan asombrado por mi respuesta, impulsada por mi frustración de ser tarde para cena, que sólo se quedaba allí, su boca abierta con sorpresa. En la ausencia de otros peatonales, caminé rápido al mediano del tránsito en un carretera llena de coches.		The bewildered chap was so taken aback by my response – charged as it was from the stress of running late and being lost – that he just stood there his mouth gaping open in surprise.  With no other pedestrians around, I quickly strode out to the middle of an adjacent freeway teeming with speeding cars.
Entonces, haberme demostrado ser un ‘loco-yank’, el adolescente se alejó con su cuchillo. En todo eso, me sentí ningún momento de miedo. Había pensado rápido y sabido exactamente lo que hacer. Situaciones como ésta no son pruebas de carácter. Sin embargo, pueden darnos un indicador de quien realmente somos.		Well, that finished things for the ‘old sport’ and off he went. Through it all not one ounce of fear. I thought quickly and knew just what to do. Situations like these that arise in life are not big tests of character – most fail character tests at some time or other – but can indicate something about who we are; how we think.
Sin embargo, la historia no está terminando aquí. Todo ése se trataba de pequeñas cosas. La verdadera historia empieza aquí. Por supuesto, jactaba toda esa noche y, especialmente, con la mujeres bonitas de mi oficina el próximo día.  Después de tomar un taxi y llegar treinta minutos tarde, tuve la excusa perfecta, “fui asaltado pero con mi mente legendaria manejó de evitar ser robado.”		Yet the story does not end here. It begins here.  Sure I spent the rest of the evening bragging to my buds from CIDESI. After finally tracking down a “rip-shaw” (i.e., an overpriced cab) and arriving a half hour late, I had the perfect excuse, in halting Spanish, “My apologies – getting mugged and then un-mugged took up more time than one would otherwise normally expect.”
Por supuesto, capturé la audiencia para describir mis proezas valientes en detalles deliciosos, aunque en términos no tan neutros como aquellos por arriba. Sin embargo, decidí mentir por decir que me había sentido miedo un poco después (que había sido verdad de algunas previas molestias), a menos que yo parezca como un ‘estadostúpidense’.		Of course that gave me the floor to go into details – a bit more floridly stated than my bloodless rendition above – while pompously announcing that I felt no fear during the event. However, I did lie and say I felt fear afterwards (as I sometimes do after other such inconveniences). The last thing I need is to be viewed as some loco-yank.
Sin embargo, la historia verdadera comienza ahora. Es corto y difícil para recontar, a causa de la exposición inevitable de una deficiencia personal (es decir, ick). Después de la elaboración de mis mitos convenientes, un aspecto inquietante de los ojos del atacador frustrado regresaba a mi mente; sus ojos mestizos y tristes, llenos de prematuro cansancio del mundo.		After all, I have a business to run (into the ground at this point). The story really begins now. It is short and it is difficult for me.  After all the bragging, especially to attractive women, the haunting look on that boy’s face came back to me.  His eyes, definitely of that mestizo, faintly Asiatic, slant seemed almost lachrymal in their creaminess; the silent cry of weariness.
La postura de este niño me siguió como una fantasma de culpabilidad, mi culpabilidad, todavía no percibida. Su postura era ésa de un anciano; pero tenía no más de dieciséis años y fue más alto que yo por cinco centímetros al menos. Había otra indicación en la manera con que estaba blandiendo su cuchillo; pude ver el brillo de la hoja.		The boy’s posture – and I am no one to judge – haunted me, too. He was taller than I by at least two inches; yet he was slumped over at sixteen years old. Not deformed but weighed down and worn out. Something showed even in the way he held the knife, the glint of the blade of which I could see twinkling under the light of a distant street lamp.
Una hoja aguda, ésta era. Este adolescente estaba agarrando el cuchillo tan tentativamente; como si quiso minimizar su contacto físico con su arma. En retrospectiva, la señal era clara: este joven, no más de un niño, de veras, no deseó estar allí. Además, no le gustaba amenazar a alguien por su dinero con un cuchillo capaz de matar. No, no: todo esto no era propicio para él.		One sharp blade. That teen was holding the knife so tentatively, as if there were some deadly virus on it and he was trying hard to minimize the contact of his flesh to it.  These cues were clear: this young man, a mere boy, really did not want to be there.  And he really did not want to be there sticking a knife at someone, threatening that person for his money.
Caminaba lejos de mí, sobre una colina cercana, porque no querría perseguirse por un coche si uno de detuviera para mí. (Ninguno detuvo.) Pues, le miré subir esa colina y él me parecía, de veras, un poco desgraciado. En recordar mis años adolescentes, había caminado a menudo de misma manera con los mismos sentimientos.		He walked away, up a nearby hill, for he did not want to be pursued by cars should one stop for me. Anyways, I watched him for a minute or two as he walked up that hill and he seemed, well, kind of sad. Recalling my mid-teens, I had walked and likely felt much the same way.
Aunque no me encontraba feliz muchas veces hace cuarenta años, nunca había pensado en atacar a otros tampoco. Pero me había nacido en una familia afluente en Pittsburgh en los años sesenta y setenta, un ensueño listo para durar siempre. Mis papas nos habían alimentado bien y educado aún mejor. ¡Qué fortuna para mi hermana y mí!		Of course, blue as I often was back then, I had never thought of going after people with knives. Then again, I was born into an affluent, lovely family in the Pittsburgh of the 1960s and early 1970s, a dreamtime ready to go on forever. My parents were not poor. They had fed us well and educated us (i.e., my sister and me) even better.
La sola presión de compañeros que sentí era el dilema, sí o no, de fumar lo que sea. Este joven probablemente nunca había sabido ningunas de estas circunstancias. Era más de probable que tenía un papa abusivo. La violencia familiar entre los pobres – en ambos la ciudad y el campo – sigue siendo lamentablemente generalizada.		The only peer pressure I felt was whether or not to cough over a bong.  This young man probably had never been remotely close to any of these circumstances.  Chances are he had at least one abusive parent. Domestic violence among the rural and urban poor remains lamentably high in México.
Al cabo, es fácil para olvidar que la pobreza es su propia forma de violencia estructural. Además, este joven probablemente enfrentaba a la presión constante de un familiar mayor – un hermano o primo, tal vez – para unirse en una pandilla. Hay una posibilidad fuerte que una tal pandilla sería su sola opción para protegerse en su mundo, al menos fuera de la casa.		After all, it is easy for me and almost anybody I know to forget that poverty truly is structural violence. It is likely that this teen was under a lot of pressure from some older relative of his generation, be that a brother or a cousin, to join a gang. There is a strong possibility that being in a gang was his only way to assure his safety, at least outside the home.
Así, mi contra-atraco no ocurrió gracias a lo que había hecho. Al contrario, mi 'gran escape' reflejaba la personalidad del ladrón prospectivo; al fin, no quiso hacerlo. Su ritual de iniciación en la pandilla, que había estado soportando, no estaba teniendo éxito. Y, en su corazón, ya escondido del mundo, esto estaba sólo bien con él.		So, the unmugging took place, not because I did or said anything particularly brave. (Allow me to assure you that I am a most practiced coward.) The unmugging was about the mugger; he really did not want to do it.  This initiation ritual he was likely enduring was not going well. Nor did he want it to, really.
Dentro de sí mismo, este joven encarnaba mucho más que una vida de un ‘punk’ de las calles. En este momento, perdí mi oportunidad. ¿Qué habría pasado, si yo hubiera tenido un enfoque diferente, basado en algo diferente de la agresividad, y le hubiera mirado en el ojo, sin escupiéndole mi lenguaje ofensivo? ¿Qué habría ocurrido si yo hubiera dicho, “Tu vida no tiene que seguir este camino; eres más grande que esto…”?		This young man had far more inside him than a life as a street punk. At this point, I missed my opportunity.  What if I had had the presence of mind to stop; take a breath; and, look him in the eye, this time not flinging saxon words his way? What if I had simply said, in halting Spanish, “You know, your life does not have go this way…You are bigger than this…”?
¿Habría yo cambiado su vida? Probablemente, no; al menos en el corto plazo. Pero, en algunos años, este hombre de futuro podría haber dicho a sí mismo, “Ese tonto gringo, con su español tan torpes, tenía razón. En verdad, no tengo que seguir a mi hermano, primo, amigo o quienquiera…” Es posible que he revisado ese escenario para alinearlo con mis necesidades pequeñas. Ya que yo me haya conocido desde hace muchos años, un tal robo de contexto es bien posible.		Would I have changed his life? Probably not, at least in the short term. But down the road, this future man may have said to himself, “that idiot gringo with his retarded Spanish was right. I do not have to live like my brother, classmate, cousin, neighbor, whatever…” Or did I re-write the script of that moment to fit my own parochial ends? Knowing me for fifty-plus years now, I have to confess that such a soul-swipe is entirely possible.
Verdaderamente, puedo perderme en este agujero de oscurecimiento sin saber cómo obtener la repuesta; de veras, es un kaón vivo. Sin embargo, una cosa, que sabré siempre, es el hecho que, en esta noche, tenía una oportunidad para alcanzar más allá de mi hostilidad (sólo otra cara de miedo) y comunicar auténticamente con otro ser humano, quizás encontrarse en una encrucijada en su propia vida.		Truthfully, I can go down this darkening trail all I want and will never really have answer. But one thing I do know: that evening, I had the opportunity possibly to make an important difference by reaching out through my hostility (morphed fear, surely) and communicate authentically with another human being, possibly at a cross-roads in his life.
Al fin, no tomé este riesgo esa noche; ni aprovecharme de esta oportunidad; lo esquivé. Sí, elegí el camino más viajado. ¿Por qué? Porque estaba ya preparándome para poner en marcha la fanfarronería para mi compañeros en su hotel y para las bellezas en mi oficina el próximo día. Sospecho que tenga que presentar algunas explicaciones al momento de mi partida eventual.		Yet, I did not take that risk or follow that opportunity; I merely skipped it. So, yes, I took the road more travelled. Why? Because I was already preparing the braggadocio for my colleagues that evening and any number of beauties the next day.  When my time is up, I may have some explaining to do.