Love, Power, Politics, Religion and all that Jazz

Love, Power, Politics, Religion and all that Jazz

In 'Reflections on My Eightieth Birthday' ("Postscript" in his Autobiography), Bertrand Russell wrote: "I have lived in the pursuit of a vision, both personal and social. Personal: to care for what is noble, for what is beautiful, for what is gentle; to allow moments of insight to give wisdom at more mundane times. Social: to see in imagination the society that is to be created, where individuals grow freely, and where hate and greed and envy die because there is nothing to nourish them. These things I believe, and the world, for all its horrors, has left me unshaken." 

Russell's vision resonated with me and recalled my father's oft-repeated saying when he deigned to speak to me at all in my early teenage years: "one should live for ' le vrai, le beau et le bien' (the true, the beautiful, and the good) . He often evinced contempt for my aimless existence and sloth. Little did he know that his verbal reprimands and occasional physical beatings administered to me left an indelible mark on my psyche. (I never told him about the impact. He died shortly after I turned twenty). Neither did he know that I discovered philosophy when I was fifteen. My father's corporeal punishments meted out to me and my later orientation to philosophy as a solace largely made me become who I am today: incorrect, nonconformist, disdainful, irreverent toward authority, and fond of le vrai, le beau, and le bien.  Russell is one of the earliest writers that left an influence on me. I read his eminently readable "A History of Western Philosophy", a collection of essays with the eponymous provocative title 'Why I am not a Christian",  and some fragments of his autobiography in which he disclosed somewhat gleefully that as a teenager he tried to fondle a house servant and she protested, saying he was the son of the aristocrats and she was a commoner and he shouldn't do that! He further revealed as a youngster he was fond of the play on words:

"What's mind?" 
"No matter."
"What's matter?"
"Never mind!"

He was at first the teacher of Wittgenstein, but later publicly said that he found the later Wittgenstein too much of a mystic for him to stomach. Russell impressed me for his political courage and incredible clear English prose. He was a mathematician. His sentences read like mathematical arguments: clear, concise, and articulate. I don't know if his writing style left any mark on mine because I was equally enthralled by Vladimir Nabokov whose prose was the opposite of that of Russell. Nabokov, a Russian aristocrat, was an artist and an authority on butterflies.. He studied English at Cambridge, not really as a non-native speaker of the English language. He was trilingual (Russian, French, and English) thanks to having French and English governesses at a very early age. His English is universally acknowledged as something out of this world. He was considered the world's best prose stylist in English in his times. He wrote in a stylized, captivating, ornate, vocabulary-rich English. Just read the first ten pages or so of his most famous book, "Lolita" and you would be amazed. If you are not, well, words are not your thing and you have missed out something beautiful in this world. 

Nabokov, whose family fortunes suffered a reversal because of politics and was forced to become an emigrant in various countries before settling in the US and found literary fame and comfortable living again, apparently found politics distasteful and refrained from taking part in political activities. But Russell, on the other hand, whose family blood ran deep in politics, was a political activist and jailed for his political beliefs and activities. Russell used his fame to advance his views on politics. He loved women. He was four times married and involved in numerous affairs. He also loved justice and freedom. He hated tyranny, be it in politics or in religion. In fact, he found religion more harmful than useful. It was of no surprise to me that he was an atheist. Most eminent thinkers are atheists and have no use of the notion of a Personal God. God makes sense only for the stupid, the ignorant, the weak, the delusional, and various combinations of the above. That is my crystallized view and you can take it to the bank. 

But I know for the masses, God and religion (instead of philosophy and rational thinking) are part and parcel of their lives. Religion and power and economics are intertwined and inseparable. They're so strong that they even transcend blood ties and ethnicity. That's what happening in the Middle East. What else to explain why the Syrians are killing each other while receiving support from their allies, even from the racially unrelated. There the Sunni Arab majority are in open revolt against the Assad regime which gets the support from the Arab Alawites (branch of Shia Islam) and the Arab Christians. The Iranian Shias and their protégés, the  Arab Hezbollah Shias in Lebanon, are fighting alongside the Syrian Arab Alawites while the Arab Sunnis in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Qatar,  and the Turkish Sunnis are helping the Syrian rebels with arms and money. What we are having is the old-fashioned sectarian bloodletting between the Muslim Sunnis and Shias which has been going on intermittently after the death of the Muhammad of Mecca, with a potential horrific regional war looming if Israel and the US join the fray. 

Iran has publicly warned that it would not stand by idly if the US bombs the Assad regime forces. Assad himself told the French daily Le Figaro that the Middle East would become a powder keg and a regional war would break out if the US goes through with the bombing threat. 

How credible is the American threat? It looks pretty damned credible to me, given Obama put himself in a box when declaring that if Assad used chemical weapons, the red line would be crossed. Now the red line has been crossed, for the sake of his credibility and the credibility of the US, he would have to act, even if the charade of seeking authorization of the heavily Jewish-influenced American Congress isn't fruitful. Given the war-weary American public and the drain on the treasury, the charade is absolutely necessary because the war would not be limited and short-lived as outlined to the public. 

War by its very nature is rarely limited and of short duration, especially if lethal weapons are involved and regional in scope. For Israel and America, the objective is not really to stop Assad from ever using chemical weapons again, but at least to degrade the Assad regime sufficiently enough for the rebels to achieve victory. And if Iran and its proxies are foolish enough to join the war, it is the perfect time for Israel to take out Iranian nuclear installations. Considering that Iran views Syria as its buffer zone, it's difficult to imagine that Iran would not support Syria in full force if Syria is attacked by the US. So for what it is worth, it is my calculus, regardless of what the American Congress decides to do regarding the attack (read: war) authorization, that a regional war in the Middle East will break out shortly. 

It's time to gather cash and take advantage of the swoon of the stock market when the war gets on in earnest. In addition, be prepared for the war repercussions at home. The enemy will not go down without putting up a fight. 

Few wars are absolutely necessary. Most are born out of greed and ambitions and blind surrender to emotions and religious beliefs. Man is driven more by his Heart and his Beliefs than by his Mind and Reason. He cannot help himself. That's how he is made up. While he speaks of peace and order, his heart revels in the drunken intoxication of power and the lures of chaos. Additionally, he has this strange fascination with intangible things called Honor and Respect. He would rather die for them rather than to retreat or surrender in order to live another day. That is the paradox of a being called Man. Few men live for "le vrai, le beau et le bien". I once took an informal survey of a group of players at a poker table. I asked them what they would prefer in life: love or power? All nine of them replied in a decisive manner: "power". I knew then why I always felt I was a loner and why I was different and alienated from my fellow men. Let me tell you something else: all the jackasses I have met in my life who hunger for and lust after power don't really know what power is and how to use it. They are just plain animals who want power so they can do what they want and force others to comply with their stupid commands. Jackasses love to assert and exert power over others. Real humans assert and exert power over themselves. If we want to go to war, let's hunt down jackasses and kill them all. I will be the first one to volunteer into the such a war and I will be glad to be the first one to pull the trigger. And I will not rest until I kill every one of them on this planet.

Wissai
September 3, 2013