While I agree again, that resources must be part of a common, oil is not just important (you did say that, again if you think I’m mis-quoting you) it is VITAL. It is not simply a precious metal like gold that one hoards to obtain its associated riches.

So, the weakness of your argument, and I will say it again, is not that we disagree on most of the points here, but that others here, the very argument of this whole post, is to down play its importance, to think that ideology is the cause of the US invasion into Iraq. I’m not clear on whether or not you think that or not, but you, again, make it sound that way from your posts.

If you like chocolate and are greedy to have more than me…I may not care because I don’t care about chocolate…you can have all the chocolate you can consume…but if you say, I’m taking all the oxygen and you’ll have to fight me for any of it…then we have a very different story. Oil is like oxygen, not chocolate.

Actually, one cld go further than that and affirm that if morality and legality wld be respected, every resource, and not just oil, wld belong not only to each land but to each person.
This wld obviate most wars!
Today, of course, there is no nationality in US nor does US respect any moral tenet or law that does not aid US in robbery.
So, to evaluate any event, but leave this fact out, is a lost labor.

Max, i have to bring u up: it’s one of the oldest tricks to use own [re]label to stand for what it had been said and then use the new label as proof that what was said was wrong or as u say “weak argument”.
I did not say that! Why wld one call positing known and postulated causes for cancer or war, be called even an argument let alone weak argument, when one can simply say that one does not think any of the causes posited are true and then go on and posit own.

sorry to say, but so many commenters use such subterfuges! Lesson number one: one must endeavor to learn how to talk! tnx

“24/08/09 +0200, Nasir Khan wrote:
[see [Marxism] The US War against Iraq: The Destruction of a Civilization]
[full text: http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/08/the-us-war-against-iraq/

by James Petras, Dissident Voice, August 21, 2009

The US seven-year war and occupation of Iraq is driven by several
major political forces ....

[including] the following (in order of importance).

Unfortunately the quote ends there so you do not get Petras’ “list” of
political forces behind the Iraq war unless you go to the full article as I
did. What you will find is exactly TWO items on his list (of why the US
went to war in Iraq), which are, “in order of importance”:

1) What he calls “The Zionist Power Configuration (ZPC),” essentially
referring to JEWS in the US government whose “top priority was to advance
Israel’s agenda.”

and (of less importance):
2) “Civilian militarists (like Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Cheney)”
who are NOT JEWISH.

I’m sorry to boil it down to this, but that is just about what he says; I
don’t think that I misread it! My revulsion isn’t just that his “analysis”
is wrong, as most people reading this will recognize (but I’m not putting
it beyond debate). I’m worried about the EFFECT of framing the issue in
such terms which go beyond analysis and into ethnic identification of the
enemy. That has a miseducational effect on the left (the majority of those
who would be reading this) and misrepresents the legitimate positions of
the left which oppose western imperialism without requiring (in the first
instance) a distinction between the interests of the US and the Israeli
ruling classes, let alone identifying the ethnicity of US government leaders.

I don’t want to be dogmatic and certainly an in-depth analysis of
individuals/ideologues involved in government decisions can discuss all
aspects of their background. But it is clearly troubling when one’s
analysis of a imperialist nation going to war requires an ethnic
identification of the leaders who are considered responsible, especially
when it is further stated that they are acting in the “interests of a
foreign power.” Petras essentially says that, but being a leftist doesn’t
go so far as to call them “disloyal” or acting against the interests of the
US as is openly charged by right-wing “antiwar” forces such as Paul Craig
Roberts and Jeff Gates, whose columns have also been forwarded to this list
by Nasir Khan, with equal disregard.

BTW my objections here are not directed to Nasir Khan, the poster, who
apparently doesn’t read what’s posted to the list (or if he does, he has
essentially never reacted to what someone else has written). I assume he
isn’t reading this (but if you are, please prove me wrong!). I am worried
about this form of discourse infecting the left, or even being seen as
acceptable. There does exist, especially in the US, a right-wing antiwar
movement (antiwar.com, Pat Buchanan, etc.) and they never fail to direct
their anger against Israel. Indeed most of what they say about either the
US government or Israel and their filthy wars is not unlike our own
propaganda. But you can look a little deeper and they generally betray
their identification of Zionism with “Jews” and an international link which
is tantamount to the “International Jewish Conspiracy” theories of yesteryear. . . . ”
—————————————————-
My reply to Jeff Meisner on August 27, 2009, Marxism Digest, Vol. 70, Issue 67.

I welcome Jeff’s comments in response to Petras’ article I had posted. I assure him that I do read some of the articles or comments on the list, but due to a busy time schedule I don’t find time to read all the enlightening stuff on the list. However, this is my explanation, not a justification! But I have read what he has written and also Petras’ article.

Those who have cared to read the full article must have seen that Petras’ main focus was on the destruction of Iraq wrought by American invaders and their allies. This he did by describing the military strategy of the Washington rulers. The US neocolonial policies, war in Iraq, wider strategic goals of American power in the Middle East and South Asia, a systematic destruction and assassinations of Iraqi intellectuals, academics and scientists are clearly put forth by Petras. How the American rulers destroyed a modern country in the Middle East and physically annihilated its intellectuals and killed 1.3 million Iraqis is a living testimony to what American imperialism stands for.

One would have hoped that the Left in general would show solidarity with the oppressed people of Iraq (and Afghanistan and Pakistan where Obama recently has escalated and extended the war and the killing of the people) who have been under the heels of American brutal military power. In this struggle the work of all those who oppose American wars of aggression and annihilation of nations needs support for the broader objective of combating American imperialism and its allies. Seen against this background, the work of people from different socio-political background and disparate cultural identities is instrumental in waging such a struggle. Despite some ideological differences some may have against some of the leading opponents of American wars and policies, I admire the work and the moral courage of people like Petras, Paul Craig Roberts and Jeff Gates. I am fully aware that some on the Left do not like their work.

Jeff has concentrated only on the political force of the Zionist Power and the American neocon militarists that Petras mentioned in the beginning of his article. If Petras has touched some raw nerve of any by his critique of Zionist Power then I can understand the reaction he has met. However, it is also possible that he could have formulated his views in a more pliant way that could have gone down well with those who find any such critique unsavoury that bluntly questions the role of the Zionist Power in American politics at home and on US foreign policy and imperial wars in the Middle Eastern region. How Petras could have said or not said on this specific issue that Jeff is concerned with is something that can be a topic of a lengthy discussion.

However, the danger of ‘miseducational effect’ that Jeff refers to in Petras’ analysis is the ethnic identification of the American high officials in the Bush administration. I think here again Jeff in his otherwise nicely-worded comments could have at least admitted the role of religious Right, the New Crusaders, plays in fighting Islam (and Muslims), the Old Enemy. But he seems to have had some other concerns which his comments show.

We all know that a Christian fundamentalist president, George W. Bush, had a ‘divine mission’ to accomplish and he had many well-wishers around his heavenly-mandated mission to kill Muslims. This he did in the most effective way, no doubt. That does not mean that his starting the war on Iraq was solely due to this factor alone. Of course, there were other factors, such as, Iraqi oil, US hegemony over the whole Middle East and furthering the goals of Zionist Israel (Petras: ‘the interests of a foreign power’!). Secondly, Petras’ naming of some top Zionists policymakers and influential officials in the Bush administration who stood for blind support for Israel no matter what Israel did cannot be regarded as identifying such officials with any particular ethnicity. Zionists are not an ethnic group; they belong to diverse colours and creeds and faiths. But their defining characteristic is their adherence to the semi-religious but political ideology of Zionism and their uninhibited support for the policies of Israel. Those who identify Zionism with Jews, as Jeff rightly points out, are obviously mistaken. But the power of the Zionists over the Jewish populations in America, Europe and the rest of the world is a political fact.

Lastly, despite oft-repeated myths and claims, Jews are not an ethnic group or a race. They belong to different races and have all possible colours ranging from the Nordic blonds to the dark skin Africans. Any common identity they have is to a religion and to some of their cultural traditions. But in the present political situation some prominent anti-Zionist Jews have adamantly upheld the banner of freedom and stood against the policies of US imperialism and Zionism. For me, they are the true friends of the oppressed people of Iraq, Afghanistan and the occupied people of Palestine.

.

Agree that there are many fathers of this invasion, but invading a nation is not a whim, and it is done because it strikes at the heart of the invader (whether this is considered rational or irrational – one could say all wars are irrational).

Greed only exists if one is “greedy” FOR something. Greed does not exist in a vacuum. So, a simple deduction is why would the US be greedy? Greedy for what? And why?

It’s easy to dismiss or make like of oil if you forget that almost everything that exists in the so-called “civilized world” today is based on it. There is no replacement for what oil does. It is not some nice thing to have; it is the life blood of much of what exists, that is not natural.

Here, Bozh, I find a particularly weak argument from you. Imagine the world’s oil is significantly diminished, and then depleted. What do you think would happen? Millions upon millions would perish. People could not live much further north than the Mason/Dixon line in the US. We’d have no transportation but horse and bugey…no electricity; only wood and some coal would serve as heating fuel.

Our food system – 98% or better totally dependent on oil. How can you be so flippant as to dismiss the critical importance of oil. There is simply no replacement for what oil has afforded: NONE. When discovered and used in the mid-19th Century…it was like a lottery ticket that bought the notion endless consumption. It is the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. Without it the world’s population would shrink not by the millions but by the billions.

Again, what is greed if not the greed to keep this existence going and going with the only means known to humans – OIL.

Or, we may be on the road to becoming better humans than we were up to now. But nature cld speed up with our improvement!?. We, too, are part of nature. Nature is infinitely valued and so are we.
some of us are more human than others. Such people don’t get involved, it seems to me, in governing.
It appears that the worst scoundrels take over. In short, gangsters rule. Mafia has simply espied this and behaved thus. We [90% of us] also shld form a mafioso orgt. tnx

Labels are extemely limiting and disregard anything but a kind of ideosyncratic dogma.

Sadly we are hindered from honest problem solving because sides must be artifically chosen. For example: Nuclear energy brings with it enormous problems, while focused on a single problem: alternative to fossil. But, if Iran is interested in expanding the world’s nuclear energy program we become trapped in a pseudo argument about a weapons program. The latter is laced with all kinds of geopolitics that has nothing to do with the sanity or insanity of a NUCLEAR ENERGY program.

Get my drift?

If Israel represents a military state and quasi theocracy that we justifiably condemn, then why is it ok for various Arab oligarchies to go on with their gun running and dogmatic theorcratic states?

I would argue that state-hood is extremely problematic whether it be the creation of Israel or Palestine. What’s this about a “homeland”. Of course people should have a place they call home, a geograpical location; but why a “state”. What is the purpose of a state other than to create pathological disasters like the USA, China, Saudi Arabia, Israel…yes there are the quiet Northern European states, but they are so tiny that they are best thought of as city-states with a surrounding region. As I’ve said, scale is perhaps the most important determiner of sustainability.

Take the two-state solution that Chomsky espouses. What’s the point in creating a state for Jews and a state for Palestinians? Why? Will it bring peace to separate, say, Arab Jews from Arab Muslims? Or is the point to accommodate, European Zionists who do not really want two-states?

Then there is the pseudo-issue of whether “big oil” or Zionists launched US into the Iraq invasion and occupaton?

What matters is what doesn’t matter to most who go round and round on these circular arguments: the people, the children, infants, women, men, young and old who are slaughtered, whose lives are ruined for generations, whose homes are devasted. And what creates this tragedy. The farmer, the fisherman, the lawyer, the doctor, the peasant, the teacher…? No, it is the STATE and its arsenal of war and propaganda.

yes, we need to focus on descriptions, on vivid language rather than exhausted labels and meaningless jargon.

large problem today is with language and meaning. airwaves are designed to replace meaningful dialogue with empty cliches… situations are recreated over and over through this trap of language… it actually creates a landscape that we operate in.

so if we want to recreate failures of “communists” in north america we should continue to use old jargon and we can expect same “pinko” jargon coming back our way. we can recreate scenes over and over. elites won’t mind one bit.

I WOKE UP TO THE TRUTH OF THE ULTRA-RIGHT WING, LIBERTARIAN CONSPIRACY-THEORY GATEKEEPERS WEBSITES.

.

Altho i espy that chomsky does not respect the right of return or push for one state solution, he had long ago condemned jewish orgs for their intolerance of anyone’s facts that proved israel was a terrorist state.

In petras` piece there may not be even one descriptive statement. We cannot get an elucidation of what is going on in US unless we are told what is going on.
“Abdicating their responsibilty“ appears as a generalized statement; in this case an accusation. What is missing is what kind of responsibilities?
To whom? To the ruling class and thus thieves and murderers?
Or to vast number of nonruling americans?

In addition, time factor is missing. Since when had this been happening? Also, why? Who is abdicating hisher responsibility?
tnx

I have not mis-represented anyone’s case. B99 does not respond to specifics and lapses into one red herring discussion after another.

Where have I mis-represented what you have stated? Your mo is consistent. You rant on about Zionism and Chomsky, merging one with the other. If Chomsky argues that the US is an empire…than he must be hiding the real motive – Zionism. If Chomsky states oil and other precious natural resources drive US foreign policy, particularly in the M.E., then again he’s just shielding Zionist Israel. If he uses the word US hegomony in the region, then, again this is a Zionist ploy. And so, whenever I or others use these terms or views of American empire (something well founded before Chomsky could even write his name) you refer to them as Chomskyite zionists.

Is suspect you’ll deny the above and say “I’m mis-representing” what you’ve “said”. But we both know I’m right. (You may even concede the use of the term “empire” because Petras does…such is your mo).

It makes for some fun bantering, from my perspective, but it’s a rather dull and vacuous means of describing complexity.

Power and the limits of Power would lead you far and wide. Instead you choose to just repeat and repeat. I’ll give you a A for unbending consistency…regardless of facts.

But for you we need to go through Petras’s archive files to see where he mentions Chomsky. I have no interest in Chomsky/Petras one-sided “fight”. Does Chomsky ever reply to Petras? Does he even acknowledge their “differences”? And beside a few uninfluential souls, who cares?

I think, as has been mentioned that Petras has done some good scholarly work on Latin America; and I tend to agree, for what it’s worth on his general thoughts about the latest Iranian election. But he has a blind spot of proportionality. While he unlike you (because you Zionist-world-view limits you, tho no doubt, you’ll say differently in response just to prove me “wrong” (: ) does see the US as a mammoth empire; but his sense of Zionist influence and power, as strong as it is, is way out of proportion. And he’s using big oil as a way to make his case…and it’s a bogus argument. If Chomsky has said big oil is the reason for US intervention and occupation, than I strongly disagree. It is oil, but not necessarily the oil companies that are called the shots.

By the way, and for the record, I do think that Chomsky has a proportionality problem as well in his underestimation of the power of AIPAC.

Like I stated, I not taking side in your debate with B99 only pointing out how you have a habit of DISTORTING your counterparty’s position. You misstated the Petras position which is critical of the Left’s active engagement of obfuscating and deflecting any attention of the growing influence of Zionism on U.S. policy making if not the actual culture.

Chomsky influence on Leftist activism has AIDED the growth of this dreadfully racist ideology in the United States because he has help to STUNT any awareness so that it can be confronted head on. Why is this important because in order to confront Capitalism, racism MUST also be confronted especially since the support of people of color is VITAL in order to build solidarity in order to challenge the “empire”.

Failing this perhaps you’ll have pockets of challenges but no where near the cohesion needed to build a MASS and powerful challenge. The ruling class understand this and essentially failing to challenge Zionism WEAKENS any overall challenge.

All you have to do Max is go back to the 1930′s and understand why the Communists and Socialist took strong anti-racist positions. They knew it was important to defeat racism in order to build working class solidarity. Anyone making excuses for racism BETRAYS solidarity and folks like Chomsky who apologizes for and denies Zionism are reactionaries that in the end retards any effort to truly confront “The Empire”.

You don’t seem to understand that Max and that is why you distort the Petras position. You claim to be serious but in the end your bourgeois adherence to privilege overrun your thought process.

Deadbeat, where in Petras artical does he reference this “Chomskyite leftist” position of “Big Oil”? Unless you think Obama and his tribe represent this “Chomskyite leftist” cabal…do you….really?

You know Max perhaps your MEMORY is short so here a passage from a James Petras article where he calls Chomsky on his B.S It was posted right here on DV 7/17/2008

Here’s the passage from the article…

Noam Chomsky has long been one of the great obfuscators of AIPAC and the existence of Zionist power over US Middle East policy. One of his most blatant examples of cover-up occurred during the AIPAC conference in early June 2008. In answer to a question on what it would take to change US unconditional support for Israel, Chomsky ignored the servility of US Presidential candidates to Israel and the AIPAC at the AIPAC conference; Congressional approval of AIPAC authored sanctions resolutions and their implementation by Treasury Department Under-Secretary Levey; the role of the ZPC in shaping media demonizing of Iran, Palestine, Hezbollah and Syria. Instead Chomsky engages in vacuous circumlocution. With reference to US support for Israel, he claims, “We have to consider the sources of support. The corporate sector in the US, which dominates policy formation, appears to be quite satisfied with the current situation. One indication is the increasing flow of investment to Israel by Intel, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and other leading elements of the high tech economy. Military and intelligence relations remain very strong. Since 1967, US intellectuals have had a virtual love affair with Israel, for reasons that relate more to the US than to Israel, in my opinion. That strongly affects portrayal of events and history in media and journals.”

To continue to masquerade as ‘war critics’ while ignoring the central role of the Zionist Power Configuration makes pundits like Chomsky, [Bill] Moyers and [Thomas] Powers and their acolytes irrelevant to the anti-war struggle. They are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

The point that oil companies may not have wanted an invasion, a destablization of the region, of course makes sense. No corporate or hegemon wants to risk the flow of oil…the most precious of 20/21st century resources to any growing and expanding empire.

But that does not mean that oil is not the ultimate aim. The region has oil…what else does it have of interest to say, the US or China, or Russia, or the EU or Japan? Nothing else.

One has choices, they’re not good, but an empire does what it has to do when forced to stablize what it saw as an ever growing destablized region…call it stupid…call it irrational…call it warmongering…call it internationally criminal…call it imperial aggression…no matter, the Empire needs oil like you and I need oxygen. It’s that simple.

The chess board was in play, Saddam into Kuwait, whose oil is it anyway if the Kuwait decides to drill horizontally and cross the “border” into Iraq, fuck it, Saddam says, and he invaded Kuwait, the bastard…all bets are off…and the US…that’s our fucking oil you’re messing with Saddam…dumbhead…and the torch was lit and off for a decade of cat and mouse…with the Iraqi people, like the Palestinian people, squashed in this deadly game…but who cares? US citizens…Nah…not as Clinton bombed the shit out of Baghdad and as children died needlessly of contaminated water, and lack of medicenes and availability of medical facilities do to on going blockades and US terrorist air raids.

And than George W. Bush came in and 911 happened, and shit just got worse…but all the while it was about setting up bases in this region and making sure that oil…the blood of our life oil was secured before those bastards in Saudi Arabia started blowing up pipelines and sending the West in to a tailspin so severe people would be freezing their balls off in up state NY because there’s no heating oil and the South would fry itself to death because the airconditioned nightmare came to a stretching halt.

And what about Zionism in all this mayhem and human tragedy? Well for you Deadbeat it helps you pass your days away thinking if only, if only we could get rid of those fucking Zionists, we could all live in peace and harmony…dream on Deadbeat…and get real…you still don’t understand POWER…how its taken and how its kept.

And you don’t understand how the wealthy get wealthy and the poor get poorer…which is why you keep looking for the Zionists to solve all of our problems…

Yes, and the point has been made, Petras and his followers think “Big Oil” had nothing to do with the invasion of Iraq and that was Jews and Zionists who instigated the invasion and occupation.

Once again Max you are misrepresenting your counterparty’s position. It is the Chomskyite Left that has spent the better part of the last 30 years promoting the idea that “Big Oil” is behind U.S. Middle East policy making. They have deliberately downplayed and deflecting the role and influence of Zionism in U.S. policy making.

In fact Max in your initial appearance on DV your strawman premise was how could “little tiny” Israel run “big bad” U.S. foreign policy when in fact NO ONE was making such a claim. Once again MAX your tactic is to MISSTATE and to DISTORT your counterparty’s position and base your arguments on that DISTORTION.

The Petra’s position is to COUNTER to ACCEPTED and CONVENTION “DRUMBEAT” promoted by Chomsky “Left” and his followers that ignore Zionism’s influence (can you say Project of a New American Century and its drafters who were pervasive throughout the Bush Administration) and their insistence that Big Oil was if the only influencer but the PRIMARY influencer.

The Petra’s position is much more dialectical and fully examines ALL interest parties and places their influence in context. Petras doesn’t try to hide, distort, ignore, deflect and mislead his audience as Chomsky does.

This leads to asking a serious question why does Chomsky and his ilk are so hell-bent on misleading their audience. Why is it important for Mr. Chomsky and his ilk to cover-up and even to defend a racist ideology? It raise serious question about the veracity of their so-called “activism” and their seriousness of any future alignment with such promoters.

What happens is not only are activist being mislead but it essentially retards solidarity because these question indication not only a major contradiction in their stance but a chilling realization they any configuration with such folks leads to betrayal thus retarding any possibility of a long lasting solidarity.

This became self-evident via the collapse of the anti-war movement when serious activists began to raise serious questions about Zionism and the relationship between the U.S. and Israel. It also became evident with Chomsky defense of AIPAC after the Mershiemer and Walt’s revelations.

So Max YOU once again deliberately misstate the issue. The problem is not that Petras and his followers say that there was NO “Big Oil” involvement it is that YOU and the Chomskyites want to DENY the major role that Zionism in shaping U.S foreign policy.

Los Estados Unidos nunca han ganado una guerra de tú a tú. El arma más efectiva de los del Norte no es su poderío aéreo, naval, terrestre y nuclear, es su poderío mediático que hace que nuestra juventud odie lo propio y adore todo lo anglo. Ese poderío mediático es el que ha vendido la especie de un fuerza militar invencible y procuradora de libertad a los oprimidos. ¡nada más falso! porque ni es invencible, ni a llevado libertad a nadie, sino ocupación. Solo basta ver la condición humillante de Europa sesenta y cuatro años después del final de la segunda guerra mundial…

And what ‘jews’ do or have done meanwhile around or directly to the de jure palestinian state is connected much to that state.
Using its waters, drilling tunnels, erecting walls, plowing under orchards, destroying homes, bringing an aliens on pal’n soil matter; i.e., the state may have been changed so as to not function as well as if it existed prior to ’67.
tnx

So, butthole, by ‘site’ I’m not talking about this thread, this discussion, I’m talking about DV – where Zionists post all the time.

If saying PhD means ‘who cares’ – you need a stint in humor camp. But if you ‘don’t care,’ just move on – it’s not like you have anything to contribute to a discussion of Palestine. Maybe you should read about the history of the Green Party – they were, after all, around in the 80s and 90s – before they opened up to dorks.