Faster, Higher, Stronger in Kamila Valieva’s home city of Kazan

Declan Hayes

More eyes would turn to the Russian and Chinese companies that act as technological anchors for Kazan and less profits will be available for AirBnB, CocaCola, Procter & Gamble, Toyota, Panasonic, Samsung and Visa and the other suckers underwriting Paris 2024.

This year’s BRICS Games are scheduled to be held from 11-24 June in Kamila Valieva’s home town of Kazan. And, though Valieva is the brightest jewel in Kazan’s sporting throne, she is far from the only one. Retired skater and winner of umpteen Olympic medals Evgenia Tarasova also hails from Kazan, as does artistic gymnast Aliya Mustafina and a bunch of other top Russian athletes we need not concern ourselves with here. Let’s hope the organisers give them and all of Kazan’s other jewels their well-deserved day in the sun, even if Valieva’s chosen art form is not currently in their schedule, which is of interest in its own right for a number of important reasons.

First off, though the range of sports seems relatively limited when compared with the summer Olympics, many more sports are on offer than was the case when these games were last held in China, which was then operating under very restrictive Covid lockdown conditions. Further, as these games were only established as recently in 2016, the future is theirs, if they can only establish their particular market niche. Kazan offers the BRICS countries an opportunity to make their mark in a variety of important ways.

Though showcasing Valieva but also Mustafina and Tarasova would send a message to the world’s sporting bodies that Russia’s finest will continue to exude greatness, it will also send a message of hope and inspiration to all the young Russian, Chinese and other gymnasts and skaters who are lucky enough to either visit Kazan in person or to simply watch them on MatchTV, which has secured the franchise to broadcast the Games.

And not just gymnasts and skaters. As the Kazan Games also include such traditional sports as Greco-Roman wrestling, boxing and weight lifting, Kazan offers the BRICS countries a chance to re-invigorate those traditional games, which are struggling for sponsors in the West because they are not profitable enough for the gangsters who run NATO’s sporting bodies.

Although acrobatic rock n roll, beach volleyball and breakdancing are included in the schedule, that is to miss the point that these games, with folk like Valieva at the helm, offer the greatest of opportunities to connect back to the grassroots, to those Mongolian kids who practice wrestling in their down time as well as Chinese, North Korean and Iranian weightlifters, whose sport can be also traced all the way back to the original Olympics of ancient Greece.

Though Russian Sports Minister Oleg Matytsin has made the point that “the capital of Tatarstan has extensive experience in holding sporting events at the international and all-Russian level, as most recently Kazan successfully hosted the first-ever ‘Games of the Future’ competition,” he missed the point when he declared that the BRICS Games are not meant to rival any other competitions and will not interfere with the international sports calendar as well as with the IOC-approved calendar of events.

Although that might be the objective reality, it is not one that is shared by NATO, which wants to break the spirit of Valieva, as well as all other Tatars and Russians who, NATO’s spoilsports insist, must be deplatformed along with their international friends and allies. If Mongolians want to wrestle each other in their school yards or if Valieva wants to skate on a frozen lake in the middle of nowhere, that is ok with NATO, as long as it does not interfere with their business models, much of which factors around making the Olympics and similar circuses commercial successes.

Let us first of all recall that the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, where the Soviet Union did not compete, was an unprecedented commercial success and that Los Angeles will again be hosting the Olympics in 2028 where the objective of making coin will remain the organisers’ overriding concern.

Given that Association of Summer Olympic International Federations (and second rate tennis player) President Francesco Ricci Bitti has warned Russia against any “very contentious” plans to stage rebel events outside of the Olympic Movement, we must note what is at stake not only for Bitti’s crew but also for the technological companies they depend on.

The modern Olympics cannot work without world class technological companies ensuring there are no technical glitches with time keeping, simultaneous broadcasts and very much more. It was, for example, a major feather in Japan’s cap that the 1964 Olympics were such a technological success. Though this is more of a problem in the sub zero conditions of the winter Olympics that Valieva excels at, imagine if the BRICS Games go without a hitch and Paris turns out to be the rat infested technological nightmare it is shaping up to be.

More eyes would turn to the Russian and Chinese companies that act as technological anchors for Kazan and less profits will be available for AirBnB, CocaCola, Procter & Gamble, Toyota, Panasonic, Samsung and Visa and the other suckers underwriting Paris 2024.

And, although Paris 2024’s website has some babes dressed as Athenian chics of 2000 and more years ago, NATO’s sporting model is more akin to that of the Emperor Nero than the one the Spartans, the Peloponnesians and the rest of them competed in. Nero, the historians tell us, won an impressive seven gold medals at a variety of events, some traditional and some not so traditional, because the organisers did not want to be fed to the lions at circus time if they did not humour the Uncle Sam of their era. Nero, in that respect at least, was ahead of his time because the United States would like for its competitors to win any and all medals going so that its companies and those affiliated with them might reap the fruits of those garlands. That, at heart, is their driving force.

Sad to say, however, that just with the ancient Olympics which, with the Pythian, Nemean, and Isthmian Games, made up the Panhellenic Games, other models, the most famous of which are the Maccabiah Games aka the Jewish Olympics, are out there in the long grass. The relevance of the Maccabiah Games, in the context of the BRICS Games, is that legendary stars like Mark Spitz and Jason Lezak have found themselves pitted against others who were not quite in the same class. And, though nobody is in the same exalted class as Kamila Valieva, every single kid who aspires to skating greatness has a right to see her, and will hopefully see her and many more like her who aspire to be faster, higher, stronger in Kazan in June, as well as in the BRICS Games that follow. NATO and other spoilsports will just have to suck it up.

Faster, Higher, Stronger in Kamila Valieva’s home city of Kazan

It is time for a democratic world order

By Muhannad Ayyash*

US threats to states that take action on Gaza must compel them to form a coalition and collectively resist US imperialism.

There has been much discussion about South Africa’s landmark case against Israel at the International Court of Justice, accusing it of committing the crime of genocide. When it comes to tangible action, this case has been one of the few bright spots in an otherwise lackluster response from states around the world to the Israeli slaughter of the Palestinian people.

One of the lesser known parts of this story in Western public discourse generally, but more pertinently within activist spaces, is that the US empire is threatening to punish South Africa for bringing this much needed case against Israel.

Republican Representative John James and Democratic Representative Jared Moskowitz introduced in early February the US-South Africa Bilateral Relations Review Act in the United States House of Representatives. This legislation would require a full review of the relationship between the US and South Africa on the baseless and spurious grounds that South Africa is supporting “terrorism”.

South African International Relations and Cooperation Minister Naledi Pandor recently said on a visit to Turkey: “In terms of responses, unfortunately, there are some legislators in the United States of America that have taken a very negative position against my country.”

Although this story has received little attention and many pro-Palestinian activists in the US, Canada, the United Kingdom and elsewhere have not even heard about it, it is part of the discourse in activist and scholarly circles in South Africa. Among other things, people are concerned about what these threats will mean to their economic wellbeing; funding for the arts; scholarly, community, social and cultural projects and initiatives; and the sustainability of funding models for nongovernmental organisations since many of these are economically dependent on various US institutions.

It is incumbent on activists across the world, but especially in the US, to speak up against the US threat to punish South Africa and demand that their government does not pursue such a path. This should become a protest demand along with the other demands that activists are currently making. South Africa has put its neck on the line for the Palestinian cause, and the least Palestinian supporters can do is to support South Africa against the threats of US imperialism in this moment.

It is also incumbent on middle powers across the world to begin forming a coalition to protect not just South Africa today but also themselves from US imperial power.

It is clear to any honest observer that without direct action from states to isolate the Israeli state economically and politically and place pressure on it legally, it will not depart from the path of genocide – not now, not in the future.

When pressed on the necessity of taking this course of action, one of the common off-the-record responses activists, policy analysts and scholars receive from government officials around the world, including South Africa, is: “We want to pursue more meaningful direct action to help the Palestinian people, but we cannot withstand a punishing reaction from the US.”

I do not see this response as a form of diversion, nor do I consider it cowardly. Government officials cannot so easily dismiss the economic hardships their country would face from a harsh US reaction.

But it is not good enough to end the conversation with this response. Since the US empire is a major obstacle to Palestinian rights, freedom, liberation and sovereignty as well as the sovereignty of middle powers, then middle power states have both a duty and a self-interest to plan and follow a path of action that deals with this problem.

Obviously, the best path forward is for countries around the world to become less dependent on US and Western imperial economic power. Although there are efforts to accomplish this goal, such as BRICS, it remains a long way from changing global economic structures. The Palestinian people cannot afford to wait this long.

Another more immediate path is to make it difficult for the US to respond harshly to states that cut off all diplomatic and economic ties to the Israeli state. The principle of this more immediate path is simple: There is strength and safety in numbers.

If a coalition of middle powers forms and together announces their severing of ties with Israel, then it will be more difficult for the US to punish them all because it would become too costly for the US itself to do so.

What might such a coalition look like? It can start with countries like South Africa, Turkey, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Egypt, Morocco, Spain, Norway, Ireland and others. Countries that already don’t claim any diplomatic and economic relations with Israel – such as Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan and others – would also join the coalition to offer support and protection from the US. Lesser powers can also join when this momentum builds, adding pressure and making it virtually impossible for the US to target all of them.

Momentum can build, and countries such as Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium and others that understand that this is the right course of action but are either too cowardly or too unwilling to pursue it for reasons of economic self-interest and their role in the US imperial alliance might be pressured to join, even if partially, by imposing a full two-way arms embargo on Israel.

None of this will be easy. But it is necessary, and it can work. And here I think that activists should begin to speak to their government’s self-interest to pressure them towards forming such a coalition. Governments will only move so much on the basis of a “name and shame” strategy and electoral politics calculations. State self-interest has to also be addressed; activists, policy analysts and scholars can convince their governments that it is in their best interest to follow this policy path.

Challenging the US empire on the question of Palestine will have tremendous consequences for building a more democratic world order. Although some of the states listed above believe that by simply ignoring the plight of the Palestinian people, they can avoid clashing with the US, this is short-term thinking for two reasons.

First, just because they can avoid the wrath of the US on the question of Palestine does not mean that they will not face it on another issue in the future. It is never in the self-interest of middle powers to live under the subordination of a great superpower. Even if temporarily beneficial, at some point, there will be a price to pay for this subordination. So why challenge it now if they do not have to at this moment?

This is where the second reason comes in. There is currently grassroots momentum around the world to challenge US imperialism. Now is the time to seize the opportunity, draw on this energy and direct it towards a democratic world order that in fact stands up for human rights and freedoms for all.

It is critical to seize this moment and send a message to the US empire that business as usual, where US dominance determines international economic, political and cultural directions, is neither wanted nor tolerated. The US empire will either have to come around or itself become isolated. When we reach that stage, we will reach the end of Israeli settler colonialism. We will reach the end of apartheid and genocide, the two most lethal weapons in the Israeli settler colonial arsenal.

Once Israel is globally isolated, it will be forced to change its behaviour. Israelis will have no choice but to cease their settler colonial project. Palestinians and Israelis can then begin negotiating for true decolonial peace and justice under the banner of a one-state solution, under which all have equal rights and freedoms and the land and sovereignty can be shared between Palestinians and Israelis.

Such an outcome will not only be beneficial for Palestinians and Israelis, but it will also be a real signal that the US empire is no longer the empire that it once was and people from around the world, Americans included, can begin to build a real democratic world order that is no longer under the thumb of one superpower.

A democratic world order will decrease the chances of great wars, imperial wars and settler colonial conquests and help avoid the tremendous human suffering that the Palestinians today are experiencing.

The horrors that the Palestinian people have been facing for more than 100 years did not start with the Palestinians and will not end there. It is in everyone’s self-interest to avoid such suffering, and one way to do that is to build a more democratic world.

The great Nelson Mandela once said: “We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.” It is well past time that the rest of the world came to truly understand what this quote means and take tangible action to advance freedom from empire and colonialism.

*Muhannad Ayyash is the author of A Hermeneutics of Violence (UTP, 2019), and a policy analyst at Al-Shabaka, the Palestinian Policy Network. He was born and raised in Silwan, Al-Quds, before immigrating to Canada where he is now a Professor of Sociology at Mount Royal University. He is currently writing a book on settler colonial sovereignty.

Source: https://informationclearinghouse.blog/2024/04/17/it-is-time-for-a-democratic-world-order/14/

It is time for a democratic world order

The Immense Hunger

By Edward Curtin

EdwardCurtin.com

Like all living creatures, people need to eat to live. Some people, eaten from within by a demonic force, try to deny others this basic sustenance. All across the world people are starving because the powerful and wealthy create economic and political conditions that allow their wealth to be built on the backs of the world’s poor. It is an old story, constantly updated. It is one form of official terrorism.

From the Irish famine with its terrible aftermath created by the imperialist British government in the nineteenth century that caused the death of between one and two million Irish and the forced emigration of more than a million more between 1846 and 1851 alone, to today’s savage Israeli genocide and forced starvation of Palestinians in Gaza, the stories of politically motivated famine are legion.

In their wake, as the historian Woodham-Smith wrote in 1962 of the Irish famine, it “left hatred behind. Between Ireland and England the memory of what was done and endured has lain like a sword.” This Irish bitterness toward the English was strong even in my own Irish-American childhood in the northern Bronx more than a century later. Ethnic cleansing has a way of leaving a livid legacy of rage toward the perpetrators, especially in the Irish case when talk of of one’s ancestors’ perilous forced emigration on the Coffin Ships was ever broached.The Denial of DeathErnest BeckerBest Price: $7.03Buy New $13.04(as of 07:25 UTC — Details)

Today’s Israeli government leaders must be historically ignorant or suicidal, for the Irish rage at the British led to the Easter Rebellion of 1916 and the eventual establishment of the Republic of Ireland, where today in Dublin, its capital, huge throngs march in support of the Palestinian people and their fight against Israel. Do the Israeli leaders think that they can evade the lessons of history, lessons that oppressed people everywhere learned from the irrepressible Irish rebels? Like their arrogant British imperialist counterparts, they have self-anointed themselves a chosen people so they can inflict death and suffering on the unchosen ones, the animal people, those disgusting creatures not deserving of life, land, or liberty.

But starve, torture, and slaughter people enough and the flaming sword of revenge will exact a heavy price. Dark furies will descend.

Dehumanize people enough, take their land, and the day always comes when the wretched of the earth rise up against their racist colonialist settlers.

Deny the bread of life to people long enough so that they watch their emaciated children die in their arms or search for their body parts beneath the bombed rubble and you will find that the terrified have become terrifying.

Frantz Fanon wrote accurately about the link between bread and land: “For a colonized people the most essential value, because the most concrete, is first and foremost the land: the land which will bring them bread and, above all, dignity.”

Without bread to eat, as Marx and Victor Hugo told us in their different ways, the desperate become desperadoes.

The poet Patrick Kavanaugh, in his haunting long poem, “The Great Hunger,” concluded it thus: “The hungry fiend/Screams the apocalypse of clay/In every corner of this land.” Lines that with a slight difference pertain to every land where famine is used as a weapon of war.

But why is this so? What is this demonic force that drives some human animals to oppress others?

I think we can agree that humans have animal needs of hunger, thirst, sex, etc. that need to be satisfied, but that we also are symbolic creatures – angels with anuses as Ernest Becker has said so pungently in his classic book, The Denial of Death. We live in a world of symbols, not merely matter. Unlike other animal species, we have made death conscious and must deal with that consciousness one way or another. We have beliefs, ideas, symbol systems and get our sense of self-worth symbolically. Of course, the anuses are the problem because they remind us that despite all our highfalutin fantasies of omnipotence of the symbolic sort, what goes in one hole comes out the other and like those backdoor hole deposits we too are destined for underground holes in the earth.

But this is unacceptable. The thought of it drives many savagely crazy – individuals, groups, and nations. So, as Becker writes, “An animal who gets his feeling of worth symbolically has to minutely compare himself to those around him, to make sure he doesn’t come off second best.” Herein lies the root of competition and the desire to be successful and hoist the symbolic trophies that declare us winners. And if there are winners, there must be losers. If I win and you lose, then I can feel superior to you and “good about myself,” at least in the realm where we compete. Equality is a problem for humans, whom Nietzsche termed “the disease called man.” This sense of competition can be relatively harmless or deadly.Core Exercises for Sen…Lynch, BritneyCheck Amazon for Pricing.

History is replete with the latter type, where the fear of not being immortal leads to the extermination of others, as if to say: “See, we are number one.” You die but we live. This is the case with the present Israeli policy of genocide of the Palestinians through famine, bombs, and guns. The chosen enemy is always considered dirt, pigs, reduced to animal status not worthy to exist, and in a transference of existential trepidation emanating from a deep sense of insecurity masked as triumphalism, must be eliminated because their very existence threatens the oppressors God-like sense of themselves.

There is physical hunger and there is symbolic hunger. Each needs satisfaction. In a just and equitable world, the hunger for bread would be easy to satisfy. It is the symbolic hunger for an answer to death that poses the deeper problem and causes the former. For in a world where people could recognize their fears and deep-seated anxieties and stop transferring them to others, the bread of truth might reign. We might stop slaughtering and starving others to purge ourselves of the self-hate and insecurity that drives us to feel the love of our fellow victimizers but the hate of our victims. No one would be Number One. All would be chosen and feast as equals at the table of the bread of life.

If only the Israeli and U.S. government leaders were wise enough to read, they might read Herman Melville’s Moby Dick and turn from the path of their joint obsession to obliterate the world for a trophy that they will never hoist. Ishmael might reach them with his words: “For there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men.” And they might seek peace, not an expansion of war.

If only. . . . but I dream.

Reprinted with the author’s permission.

The Best of Edward Curtin

The Immense Hunger

The United Nations & the Origins of “The Great Reset”

Since the 1990s, several comprehensive initiatives toward a global system of control have been undertaken by the United Nations with Agenda 2021 and Agenda 2030.

By Madge Waggy
MadgeWaggy.blogspot

“Freedom faces a new enemy. The tyranny comes under the disguise of expert rule and benevolent dictatorship. The new rulers do not justify their right to dominance because of divine providence but now claim the right to rule the people in the name of universal health and safety based on presumed scientific evidence.”

…Under the leadership of Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt, twenty-six nations agreed in January 1942 to the initiative of establishing a United Nations Organization (UNO), which came into existence on October 24, 1945.

Empire of LiesCraig Roberts, PaulBest Price: $17.24Buy New $18.86(as of 09:32 UTC — Details)Since its inception, the United Nations and its branches, such as the World Bank Group and the World Health Organization (WHO), have prepared the countries of the world…[for] a world government…

The next decisive step toward the global economic transformation was taken with the first report of the Club of Rome. In 1968, the Club of Rome was initiated at the Rockefeller estate Bellagio in Italy. Its first report was published in 1972 under the title “The Limits to Growth.”
The president emeritus of the Club of Rome, Alexander King, and the secretary of the club, General Bertrand Schneider, inform in their Report of the Council of the Club of Rome that when the members of the club were in search of identifying a new enemy, they listed pollution, global warming, water shortages, and famines as the most opportune items to be blamed on humanity with the implication that humanity itself must be reduced to keep these threats in check.

Since the 1990s, several comprehensive initiatives toward a global system of control have been undertaken by the United Nations with Agenda 2021 and Agenda 2030.

The 2030 Agenda was adopted by all United Nations member states in 2015. It launched its blueprint for global change with the call to achieve seventeen sustainable development goals (SDGs). The key concept is “sustainable development” that includes population control as a crucial instrument.
Saving the earth has become the slogan of green policy warriors. Since the 1970s, the horror scenario of global warming has been a useful tool in their hands to gain political influence and finally rule over public discourse.

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The United Nations & the Origins of ‘The Great Reset’

The Road Back From Serfdom

Is a road that leads away from state controlled money

By El Gato Malo
Bad Cattitude

mM article the other day about the road to serfdom and the ratchets of inflation and political power providing perverse incentives laid out the problem:

politicians who gain power by wrecking financial and social fabrics and gain revenues by wrecking currencies will run awful playbooks to maximize their perverse incentives and the worse they do, the more they get, which, in turn, makes things worse.

It’s a positive feedback loop and those only end in starvation or explosion.

So what is the solution?The Road to Serfdom: T…F. A. Hayek, Bruce Cal…Best Price: $3.06Buy New $1.99(as of 03:40 UTC — Details)

The solution is to take money, commerce, savings, and investment away from not only state control but from state view. in the end, the truly operative phrase is “you cannot tax what you cannot see.”

It’s quite literally the only way to get a durable fix.

Even outright rebellion and mass movements and “putting new governments in charge with better rules etc” is not a long term solution. best case, you just reset or move back on the tytler cycle. but the cycle will remain as inexorable as the seasons and you’ll be fighting the same wars over and over, probably at higher rates of speed. it’s a lot better than nothing and still a worthwhile undertaking, but i think we can do better. i think we can go our own way.

Since time immemorial, governments have controlled currencies and done an awful job of it. we still call money printing “debasement” in reference to rulers mixing other metals into the gold or silver when striking coins. it’s just the classical version of “money printer go BRRRR.”

Governments are lousy stewards of currency. always have been. always will be. they debase, devalue, and steal. let them run the banks as well and you are well and truly trapped. this is not some accident of financial evolution, it was done by design: rulers have always sought to control currencies because control of currencies is power and wealth.

You come into gatostan and i make you restrike your gold into “gatitos” the currency of the realm. maybe i mix some lead in when i do. or maybe i just take some of your gold as “seigniorage” and the coins you get back weigh 5% less than the ones you gave me to melt. this basically worked like early sales tax (but at least it only applied to coins once, not every time they were spent). of course “recoinages” were common so this could be repeated.

Governments love banking because banks keep records and are easy to co-opt or bully. you bribe or threaten your way into getting them to:

1. let you see what everyone does
2. let you grab whatever anyone has without having to go rooting through the back yard trying to discern where they buried the silver

That second one is REALLY important so let’s delve a bit deeper.

In the age of metallic/physical money, you as an owner of such faced a choice: you could keep it yourself and hide/protect it or you could deposit it with a trusted counterparty. each has risks and costs and the danger of having (and being known or even suspected to have) large amounts of cash on hand are no joke. it attracts brigands and sneak thieves and this is, for most, unreasonable, impossible, or intolerable. very few people are willing/able to keep their life savings under the floorboards.

So you need a bank-like entity to get this money monkey off your back.

We’ve had a number of private currencies that have worked well from private US bank scrip to birmingham buttons. private issuers, especially if they must compete and clear with other private issuers and grant one another audit rights can and have provided systems for very sound money. it’s a market solution that works to create good, useful currencies.

But it’s not government proof.

No currency however sound is safe if leviathan can see it.The Constitution of Li…F. A. HayekBest Price: $9.95Buy New $13.46(as of 02:00 UTC — Details)

No bank that requires licensure from the state to operate or even whose executives and bookkeepers are known to and subject to arrest or intimidation by state actors can truly be trusted and if the IRS or DEA or FBI says “gimmie dat” the bank locks your accounts and your assets are seized faster than you can say:

Civil asset forfeiture, liens, garnishments, there must be 50 ways to lose your lucre. (apologies to paul simon who did nothing to deserve that)

At least in the case of the US, this reach is increasingly near perfectly global and even the gaps are not terribly useful as you cannot get that money back into any banking system where it would be useful to you and simply being known to hold or trade assets in “forbidden zones” gets you on a list and KYC (know your customer) rules get more draconian every 5 minutes.

So you’re always, in effect, choosing between forms of thieves to which you’ll be vulnerable. the whole thing is a hobson’s choice.

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The Road Back From Serfdom

The Spear in AI’s Back

By Charles Hugh Smith

OfTwoMinds.com

That real harm will result from the use of AI tools is a given.

AI is like the powerful character in an action movie who looks invincible until they turn around, revealing a fatal spear embedded in their back. The spear in AI’s back is the American legal system, which has been issuing free passes to tech companies and platforms for decades on the idea that limiting innovation will hurt economic growth, so we’d best let tech companies run with few restrictions.

The issuance of free passes to Tech monopolies / cartels and platforms may be ending. Letting Big Tech run with few restrictions has led to the smothering of innovation as tech monopolies do what every monopoly excels at, which is buy up potential competitors, suppress competition, pursue regulatory capture via lobbying and spend freely on deceptive PR.

Now anti-trust regulators are finally looking at the uncompetitive wastelands created by Big Tech and recognizing the union-busting tactics of quasi-monopolies like Starbucks and Amazon. The bloom might be off the Big Tech / Monopoly rose.

Enter AI, which offers the thrilling prospect of trillions of dollars in additional profits for purveyors of AI and all those companies which use their AI tools.

The American legal system deals with new technologies much as a reptile digests a meal–slowly. I get email from readers about defending the Constitution, something we all support. I am not an attorney, but my impression of Constitutional law is that it is a tediously complex thicket of case law that must be carefully picked through before we can even begin to understand exactly what we’re defending: every issue anyone might be concerned about has already accumulated an immense load of rulings and arguments.

This is American jurisprudence: advocacy goes to trial and ruling are issued, some as rulings that will pertain to all future cases and some that will not. The law advances in new fields such as AI as positions are argued before judges / juries and then reviewed by higher courts as losers appeal judgments / rulings.

A great many things we might think are novel have long been settled. Isn’t the Selective Service Act a form of involuntary servitude? Nope, that’s been settled long ago. The government’s right to draft you to fight in a war of choice is unquestionably the law of the land.

AI has certain novel features which have yet to be decided by the processes of advocacy, rulings and appeals. In general, corporations selling / giving away AI tools are claiming these tools incur no liability to the issuers of the tools because they’re akin to software that, for example, adds HTML coding to plain text: a tool that performs a process.

This strikes me as incomplete. It seems to me that AI, by its very name and nature, is making implicit claims of utility far beyond mere processing of data or text: AI is called AI because it is adding intellectual value to data or text.

All the disclaimers in the world cannot dissolve this implicit claim of utility that adds value. Since I’m not an attorney, I’m not able to put this in proper legal terms; I am using the terminology of philosophy. But the law is a system based on philosophic principles, and so the language of philosophy plays a key role in broadly applicable legal rulings.

Now let’s consider a real-world example. A patient receives a mid-diagnosis and suffers as a direct result of the mis-diagnosis. In our system of law, somebody or some entity is liable for the consequences of the error, and must pay restitution to those harmed by the error.

As fact-finding proceeds, it turns out an AI tool was used in the initial scanning of the patient’s data. The company that created the AI tool will naturally claim that the tool was intended only to be used under the supervision of a human professional, and there were no claims made as to the accuracy of the AI tool’s output.

This is a specious argument, as the clear intent of the AI tool is to replace human expertise as a means of lowering the costs of diagnosis by accelerating the process and increasing the accuracy of the diagnosis.

Clearly, the tool was designed for exactly this purpose, and therefore deficiencies in its performance that contributed to the mis-diagnosis–for example, the fact that the AI tool rated the diagnostic result with a high probability of accuracy–are the responsibility of the company that issued the AI tool.

Should the court find the AI company 1% liable for the misdiagnosis, the principle of joint and several liability means the monetary settlement falls on whichever parties can pay the settlement. Should the other parties found liable be unable to pay a $10 million settlement, then the AI company might end up paying $9 million of the $10 million settlement, despite their apparently limited liability.

The Spear in AI’s Back

Iran And Saudi Arabia — A Common Future Looking East

Moon of Alabama

In March 2023 Iran and Saudi Arabia restored their diplomatic ties with each other. The deal had been mediated by China.

As I remarked at that time:

This is huge!
…
Reviving relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran will make a lot of new things possible.

That Iran and Saudi Arabia accepted China’s mediation is a recognition of Beijing’s new standing in world policies. That alone is enough reason for the White House to hate the deal.

I later summarized the diplomatic action in the Middle East:

For the last 30 years the U.S. considered the Middle East as its backyard. Twenty years ago it illegally invaded Iraq and caused 100,000nds of death and decades of chaos. Now China, by peaceful means, changed the balance in the Middle East within just one month.
…
Xi and Putin are now running the multilateral global show. Biden and the hapless ‘unilateral’ people around him are left aside.

Amwaj.media, which translates everything into Persian, Arabic and English, has published a piece written by two academics from Iran and Saudi Arabia. Such cooperation is still rare. This can then be seen as a semi-official explanation and/or vision of those countries’ global policies.

The piece confirms the loss of U.S. influence and the rise of China’s role in the Middle East:

How Gaza war is pushing the region eastward

The unwavering US support for Israel’s war on Gaza has left a bitter taste in the region. Anger is mounting not only in the Arab world but also across the Global South, over what is seen as western double standards towards Israel’s continued onslaught. There is a unified demand for a ceasefire and sharp criticism of what it viewed as unchecked Israeli aggression.
…
One main trend of regional dynamics in recent years has been a pivot to the east. Underscoring this shift, Iran and Saudi Arabia in Mar. 2023 struck a deal to resume diplomatic ties in a historic agreement brokered by China. In particular, Beijing’s role in the breakthrough sent a clear message to Washington that it is not the only diplomatic heavyweight in the region.

Both Iran and Saudi Arabia have their own individual reasons for prioritizing better relations with their neighbors. For Tehran, getting closer to Riyadh presents a unique opportunity to break free from its economic isolation—after enduring years of US sanctions—by diversifying economic and political partnerships.
…
For Saudi Arabia, looking east is part and parcel of its ambitious Vision 2030—an extensive reform plan aimed at diversifying its economy. China, India, and Russia are key partners in realizing this vision, given their expansive trading relations with Riyadh. […]

Overall, Riyadh understands that the success of Vision 2030, particularly the touristic aspect of it, partially hinges on a safer neighborhood. The attacks on Saudi oil installations in 2019, which were blamed on Tehran but claimed by Yemen’s Ansarullah movement—better known as the Houthis—marked a turning point.

The Kingdom was shocked by the lack of US action, […]

The U.S. plan to bring the Arab states and Israel together into an anti-Iranian coalition gets rejected, the scholars write, because of lack of U.S. pressure on Israel to pursue a two state solution.

In consequence:

[T]he US is losing its standing among regional countries as a security partner. To many, the full-fledged western support for Israel is incomprehensible—and jeopardizes their own safety. […]

All in all, pivoting towards Asia has become an attractive alternative for regional players seeking to counter US hegemony. Non-western countries are less open to adhering to Washington’s rules for the game, and this inclination will further consolidate intra-regional relationships—especially as key actors find more similarities than differences.

Although the perception of US double standards is not new, the willingness of non-western countries to challenge this amid a changing global order has increased. Previously, regional players tolerated the status quo as the US was seen as the sole superpower. However, with the rise of new global powers in the east, these actors see no reason to stay silent about the suffering in Gaza while passively accepting the moral arguments of the US regarding Russia’s war on Ukraine. If the current trend continues, western influence in a region where it has long been dominant will diminish.

This is quite a slap to the Biden administration which still seems to dream that it can broker some Saudi-Israeli deal and isolate Iran with it.

The times where the U.S. could dictate to the Middle East are definitely over.

Reprinted with permission from Moon of Alabama.

Iran And Saudi Arabia – A Common Future Looking East

„Sie sind eine Kriminelle, Frau von der Leyen. Ihr Platz ist in Den Haag!

Video

Während des Verteidigungsgipfels in Brüssel erzählte der Journalist David Cronin der Hexe alles, was viele Menschen denken, aber nicht sagen wollen.
Und achten Sie auf das schiefe und verächtliche Grinsen auf Ursulas Gesicht.
Wie sie sagen – statt tausend Worte.

Ein bisschen Humor am Freitag……

Jetzt ist klar, warum Romeo Gift genommen hat…….

Eskalation in Nahost (II)

BERLIN/TEHERAN/TEL AVIV (Eigener Bericht) – Auch auf deutschen Druck bereiten die EU sowie mehrere G7-Staaten neue Sanktionen gegen Iran vor. Ursache ist Irans Angriff auf Israel vom vergangenen Wochenende – der erste, der direkt gegen israelisches Territorium gerichtet war. Gewaltsame Auseinandersetzungen führen Israel und Iran bereits seit vielen Jahren. Seit 2013, verstärkt seit 2017 greift Israel iranische Stellungen in Syrien an; seit dem 7. Oktober 2023 ermordet es dabei auch gezielt iranische Kommandeure, fast ein Dutzend allein bis Ende März. Mit dem Luftangriff auf ein iranisches Konsulatsgebäude in Damaskus am 1. April, bei dem sieben teilweise hochrangige iranische Kommandeure zu Tode kamen, hat Tel Aviv laut der Einschätzung des Londoner Think-Tanks Chatham House „eine beispiellose Eskalation“ gestartet; diese könne sich noch als „der Funke“ erweisen, „der den Mittleren Osten in Brand setzt. Strafmaßnahmen verhängt der Westen dagegen nicht; auf Irans vorab kommunizierten Gegenschlag reagiert er jedoch mit Repressalien. Die doppelten Standards, die dabei einmal mehr zum Vorschein treten, werden international äußerst scharf kritisiert.

Cyberangriffe, Morde

Die gewaltsamen Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Israel und Iran dauern schon seit vielen Jahren an. So hat Israel immer wieder das iranische Atomprogramm sabotiert und dazu unter anderem teils umfassende Cyberangriffe (Stuxnet) durchgeführt sowie Morde an iranischen Atomwissenschaftlern verübt. Zugenommen haben die israelischen Angriffe auf iranische Ziele vor allem seit dem Jahr 2013. Damals begann Teheran, seine Unterstützung für Syriens Präsidenten Bashar al Assad zu nutzen, um über syrische Routen die libanesische Hizbollah mit Waffen zu beliefern und ihm nahestehende Milizen auch in Syrien selbst zu stärken – beides mit dem Ziel, proiranische Kräfte an Israels Nordgrenze in Stellung zu bringen. Israel hat immer wieder versucht, dies mit Luftangriffen zu verhindern. Dabei nahmen seine Luftangriffe besonders seit 2017 zu, dem Jahr, in dem sich Assads Regierung zu stabilisieren begann. Eine vom Washingtoner Middle East Institute (MEI) präsentierte Analyse zählt von 2013 bis August 2023 226 öffentlich dokumentierte israelische Luftangriffe auf iranische Ziele in Syrien.[1] Andere nennen weitaus höhere Zahlen.

Kommandeure im Visier

Eine neue Eskalationsstufe haben die Auseinandersetzungen nach dem Massaker der Hamas vom 7. Oktober 2023 erreicht. Die Iran nahestehende Hizbollah begann sich erneute Kämpfe mit den israelischen Streitkräften zu liefern; die gleichfalls von Teheran unterstützten jemenitischen Huthi gingen im Roten Meer zu Angriffen auf Schiffe mit Beziehung zu Israel über. Beide verstehen dies als Unterstützungsmaßnahme für die Palästinenser im Gazastreifen und als Mittel, der Forderung nach einem Ende des Kriegs Nachdruck zu verleihen. Tel Aviv ging daraufhin dazu über, gezielt Kommandeure der iranischen Revolutionsgarden bzw. der Quds-Brigade zu ermorden. Allein von Anfang Dezember bis Ende März kamen laut Zählung der US-Fachzeitschrift Foreign Affairs „fast ein Dutzend“ von ihnen durch israelische Angriffe ums Leben.[2] Am 25. Dezember brachte Israel durch einen Luftangriff den damals wohl mächtigsten aller iranischen Kommandeure in Syrien um, Sayyed Razi Mousavi.[3] Teheran musste faktisch zusehen, wie seine militärische Führungsriege in Syrien mit israelischen Luftangriffen systematisch eliminiert wurde.

„Eine beispiellose Eskalation“

Eine neue Qualität stellte dann der israelische Luftangriff auf das iranische Konsulat in Damaskus dar. Zum einen kamen dabei gleich sieben iranische Kommandeure zu Tode, unter ihnen Mohammad Reza Zahedi, ein Brigadegeneral der für Auslandsoperationen zuständigen Quds-Brigade, sowie sein Stellvertreter. Zum anderen traf der Angriff mit dem Konsulat ein Gebäude, das besonderen diplomatischen Schutz genießt; kriegerische Angriffe auf solche Einrichtungen sind selten und werden als besonders gravierend eingeschätzt. Der Londoner Think-Tank Chatham House konstatierte am 12. April, der israelische Luftangriff stelle „eine beispiellose Eskalation Israels gegen Iran“ dar; er könne, hieß es, „der Funke sein, der den Mittleren Osten in Brand steckt“.[4] Der russische UN-Botschafter Wassili Nebensja erklärte im UN-Sicherheitsrat, „ein Angriff auf eine diplomatische Mission“ könne sogar als „Casus Belli“ gewertet werden.[5] Davon abgesehen müsse Iran schon aus simplen praktischen Erwägungen auf den Angriff reagieren, hieß es in der Chatham House-Stellungnahme; denn wenn iranische Kommandeure nicht einmal in einer diplomatischen Vertretung sicher vor israelischen Bomben seien, seien sie dies nirgendwo.

Zu Gegenschlägen fähig

Die westlichen Staaten haben den israelischen Luftangriff auf das iranische Konsulat in Damaskus mit einem gewissen Stirnrunzeln, faktisch aber tatenlos hingenommen. Ganz im Gegensatz dazu haben sie mit scharfer Ablehnung und konkreten Maßnahmen auf Irans Reaktion in der Nacht von Samstag auf Sonntag reagiert. Iran griff Israel mit wohl deutlich mehr als 300 Drohnen, Marschflugkörpern und ballistischen Raketen an. Dass die meisten davon abgefangen werden konnten und nur eher geringe Schäden an einem israelischen Militärflugplatz entstanden, lag daran, dass Teheran die arabischen Nachbarstaaten wie die USA – Letztere vermittelt über die Türkei – über den Zeitpunkt des Angriffs informiert hatten. Dies ermöglichte es Israel, sich auf die Attacke einzustellen und nicht nur westliche (USA, Großbritannien, Frankreich), sondern auch arabische (Jordanien, Saudi-Arabien) Unterstützung bei der Abwehr des Luftangriffs zu organisieren. Ein entsprechender Bericht des iranischen Außenministers wurde unter anderem von türkischen Insidern bestätigt.[6] Teheran hat damit schwere, wohl einen Krieg auslösende Schäden in Israel vermieden, zugleich aber klargestellt, dass es, sofern seine roten Linien weiterhin überschritten werden, zu umfassenden Gegenschlägen fähig ist.

Neue Sanktionen

Die EU hat darauf reagiert, indem sie am Dienstagabend eine erneute Verschärfung ihrer Iran-Sanktionen angekündigt hat. Wie der EU-Außenbeauftragte Josep Borrell nach einem Treffen mit den EU-Außenministern mitteilte, bereitet Brüssel eine weitere Einschränkung des Handels mit Iran vor.[7] Dafür hatte sich bereits am Montag Bundesaußenministerin Annalena Baerbock stark gemacht.[8] Baerbock sprach sich auch vor dem Treffen der G7-Außenminister auf Capri für neue Strafmaßnahmen gegen Teheran aus. Am gestrigen Donnerstag kündigten die USA und Großbritannien vor dem Hintergrund des G7-Außenministertreffens eine weitere Verschärfung der Sanktionen gegen Iran an.[9] Israels Angriff auf das iranische Konsulat in Damaskus hingegen bleibt ohne Konsequenzen.

Mit zweierlei Maß

An den doppelten Standards, die sich darin äußern, wird scharfe Kritik laut. Russlands UN-Botschafter Nebensja etwa sprach von einer „Parade der Heuchelei“.[10] Auch der türkische Präsident Recep Tayyip Erdoğan konstatierte, der Westen messe da – einmal mehr – mit zweierlei Maß.[11] Während die iranischen Geschosse „in westlichen Hauptstädten moralische Empörung“ ausgelöst hätten, habe es „keine vergleichbare Verdammung des mörderischen Angriffs Israels auf Gaza“ gegeben, hieß es am gestrigen Donnerstag etwa in der pakistanischen Zeitung Dawn: „Diese doppelten Standards sind erschreckend.“[12]

[1] Navvar Şaban: Israel’s Response to Iran in Syria: Choosing Between Escalation and Accomodation. mei.edu 17.11.2023.

[2] Ali Vaez: The Middle East Could Still Explode. foreignaffairs.com 15.04.2024.

[3], [4] Haid Haid: The strike on Iran‘s consulate in Syria could be the spark that ignites the Middle East. chathamhouse.org 12.04.2024.

[5] Russian envoy calls UN Security Council meeting on Iran strike parade of hypocrisy. tass.com 14.04.2024.

[6] Iran told Turkey in advance of its operation against Israel, Turkish source says. reuters.com 14.04.2024.

[7] EU plant neue Iran-Sanktionen. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 17.04.2024.

[8] Baerbock fordert Verschärfung der Sanktionen. deutschlandfunk.de 15.04.2024.

[9] Iran sanctions: US and UK extend measures against Tehran. bbc.co.uk 18.04.2024.

[10] Russian envoy calls UN Security Council meeting on Iran strike parade of hypocrisy. tass.com 14.04.2024.

[11] Erdogan accuses Western nations of double standards, blames Israel for escalation of Mideast crisis. msn.com 17.04.2024.

[12] Never-ending suffering. dawn.com 18.04.2024.

https://www.german-foreign-policy.com/news/detail/9534