Bulletin N° 627
Subject: ON THE PRECONDITIONS FOR IMPERIALIST WARS AND
NATIONALIST IDEOLOGIES, ACCORDING TO THE RADICAL ANALYSIS OF DR. WILHELM REICH.
27 September 2014
Grenoble, France
Dear Colleagues and Friends of
CEIMSA,
The bankruptcy of self-appointed
political elites (and is there any other kind of political elite...?) is more
apparent today than ever before. This transparency is a positive sign, if we
are to believe Wilhelm Reich. In his
book, Listen Little Man! (1945), Reich describes
the social psychology of populations who are hungry for leadership. Sexually
repressed and alienated, unable to communicate among themselves, disoriented by
the swirl of events around them and confused about their own human needs, they
desperately seek a strong leader who will tell them what to think and how to
feel.
Last March, in our CEIMSA Bulletin N° 603, we looked at the sources and the instruments of power, according to a study by the late Harvard
economist John Kenneth Galbraith, in
his book, The Anatomy of Power (1983). Wilhelm
Reich approached the study of power from the opposite end: it is not the so-called
“political elite”, but rather the followers who determine the form and the
direction of political power. The “emotional plague”, which is of epidemic
proportions in the modern world, sets up leadership in a programmed fashion,
and the “elite” can behave in no other way. The responsibility for this
leadership is laid at the feet of this sick population, the masses who
passively await solutions to their problems. This mentally inactive public has
long ago suppressed their deepest feelings, and as a result their thoughts are distorted
by sadistic urges, self-pity and a general fear of the unknown. This
self-inflicted emotional repression makes them predictable and manageable and
easily seduced; they have little energy left over to take an active interest in
life around them and even less interest in their own lives. Thus, bereft of any
feeling of responsibility for his/her actions and inactions, the Little Man
(and woman) is reduced to the status of a spectator
in the passage of his/her own life, periodically cheering the superstars down
on the playing field onward, upward toward some imaginary crescendo, which they
hope one day to feel.
The slippage of revolutionary
thought from civil society to State, from social class to political party, from
political party to leadership represents a hollowing out of life forces in the
population; in Reich’s terms, it is the result of the individual’s blocking
ready access to bio-energy. The Little Man is
defensive ("up-tight") and has developed body armor sufficient to protect him/herself from most deep
feelings; and this affects the quality of his thoughts. [For a discussion of
the relationship between emotions, feelings and ideas, see the 7 April 2013 CEIMSA Bulletin N°565.]
Toward the end of his book on The Mass
Psychology of Fascism (1942),
Reich quotes from an article by James Aldridge, published in the New York Times
of June 24, 1942, entitled: “British in Africa Lack Killer Urge.”
The German Afrika Corps defeated the Eighth
Army because it had speed, anger, virility and toughness. As soldiers in the
traditional sense, the Germans are punk, absolutely punk. But Marshal Erwin
Rommel and his gang are angry men, they are tough to
the point of stupidity. They are virile and fast, they are thugs with little or
no imagination. They are practical men, taken from a most practical and hard
life to fight practically: Nazis trained to kill. The German commanders are
scientists, who are continually experimenting with and improving the hard,
mathematical formula of killing. They are trained as mathematicians, engineers
and chemists facing complicated problems. There is no art in it, there is no
imagination. War is pure physics to them. The German soldier is trained with a
psychology of the daredevil track rider. He is a professional killer, with no
distractions. He believes he is the toughest man on earth. Actually, he cracks
very easily and is not so tough, and can be beaten soundly and quickly by a foe
using the same ruthless speedy methods he uses . . . . The British soldier is
the most heroic on earth, but do not confuse that with military toughness. He
has the toughness of determination but he has not the toughness which makes him
scientifically kill his enemy. (cited by Reich, on
p.332)
Reich comments on this American
expression of mechanical militarism:
It discloses at one blow the complete identity of mechanistic natural
science, mechanical human structure, and sadistic murder. This identity
found its highest and most consummate expression in the totalitarian
dictatorship-ideology of German imperialism. This mechanical trinity is set in
relief against the view of life that regards man not as a machine, the machine
not as the master of man, and militarism not as this greatest asset. This
living functional view has found its last refuge in the Western democracies. It
remains to be seen whether it will survive the chaos.
As strange as it may sound to the ears of a general, I maintain that the
defeats of the democracies, as tragic and dangerous as they were, were imbued
with a deep humanity, which is diametrically opposed to mechanical automatism: the
appreciation of human life. Aldridge is wrong in reproaching the democratic
commanders-in-chief for attempting to spare human life, instead of imitating
the human robots. He is wrong in demanding that the anti-fascist fighters learn
to kill even more mechanically, more automatically, more scientifically, than
the Prussian automatons. Those who attempt to beat the mechanical automatons
with their own methods will only jump out of the frying pan and into the fire,
i.e., in their efforts to become more efficient scientific killers, they will
transform themselves into mechanical automatons and perpetuate the
process their opponents have set in motion. In such a case the last vestiges of
all living hope for a different kind of human society, a permanently peaceful one, will vanish altogether.
Our conception of the anti-fascist fight is different. It is a
clear, relentless recognition of the historical and biological causes that lead
to such murders. The deracination of the fascist plague will come about solely
from such a recognition, and not from imitating it.
One cannot vanquish fascism by imitating and subduing it with its own methods,
without becoming a fascist oneself. The way of fascism is the way of the
automaton, death, rigidity, hopelessness. The way of the living is
fundament5laly different; it is more difficult, more dangerous, more honest, more hopeful.
Let us strip the matter of all current political interests and
concentrate on the one question: HOW DOES SUCH A COMPLETE FUNCTIONAL
IDENTITY OF MACHINE, MAN, AND SCIENTIFIC MURDER COME ABOUT? This question may
not bear any relevance to such questions as whether ship-building is keeping
pace with ship-sinking or whether the mechanical monstrosity will reach the oil
wells of Baku or not. We do not fail to appreciate the importance of these
current questions. If my house should suddenly catch fire, naturally I would
first try to extinguish the fire and to save what could still be saved of
important manuscripts, books, and apparatus. But sooner or later I shall have
to build a new house, and I shall give considerable thought to what it was that
caused the fire in the old house, so that I can prevent a repetition of the
misfortune.
Man is fundamentally an animal. In contrast to man, animals are not
mechanical or sadistic, and their societies (within the same species) are
incomparably more peaceful than man’s societies. The basic question runs: WHAT
CAUSED THE HUMAN ANIMAL TO DETERIORATE AND BECOME ROBOTLIKE?(pp.332-334)
In the 9 items below CEIMSA
readers are encouraged to look for contemporary answers to Reich’s radical
questions, which he formulated at the time of the Second World War.
Item A., from The
Daily Kos, is a US economic chart on the “Distribution of
Average Income Growth” between 1949 and 2012.
Item B., from Information Clearing House, is an
article by former Wall Street Journal reporter, Paul Craig Roberts on the imminent collapse of the US economy and
its positive effect on international relations.
Item C., from Truth
Out, is an article by Marxist economist Richard Wolff, discussing the 4-day work week, the winners and the
losers.
Item D., from Forbes
Magazine, is an article by Melanie
Haiken on the increasing rate of suicides among
US war veterans.
Item
E.,
from National Security Archives, is a report on
the secret Cuban-US meetings over the past 50 years, which have led to nothing
. . . .
Item F., from Information Clearing House, is a video
of George Galloway's statement
in the UK Parliament on Isis airstrikes.
Item G., from Financial
Times, is an interview with futurologist Douglas Coupland discussing his
“pre-internet brain”.
Item H., from Truth
Out, is an article by Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo and Kevin Berends on Black genocide in progress.
Item I. from Electric
Politics, is a brief expose of “the politics of hate” coming out
of Ukraine.
And finally, we invite CEIMSA
readers to watch David Harvey and Gar Alperovitz
discuss the future of capitalism and the origins of what comes next….
http://grittv.org/?video=david-harvey-and-gar-alperovitz-on-capitalism-and-cooperation
September
9th, 2014
David Harvey and Gar Alperovitz have been thinking, writing and speaking about
capitalism for decades. David Harvey is a widely cited author of, among other
things, Seventeen Contradictions and the End of
Capitalism, Gar Alperovitz is
co-founder of The Democracy Collaborative, and a member of the board of
directors for the New Economics Coalition. He’s also an author, most recently
of What Then Must We Do, in which
he lays out proposals for democratizing wealth and building an alternative
economy.
Sincerely,
Francis Feeley
Professor of American Studies
University of Grenoble-3
Director of Research
University of Paris-Nanterre
Center for the Advanced Study of
American Institutions and Social Movements
The University of California-San
Diego
http://dimension.ucsd.edu/CEIMSA-IN-EXILE/
_______________
A.
From The Daily Kos :
Date: 26
September 2014
Subject
: “The most important chart about the American economy you'll see
this year”
http://www.dailykos.com/user/bobswern
“The Most
Important Chart About the American Economy You'll See
This Year”
I was doing
my usual perusal of news and commentary throughout the blogosphere, earlier on
Thursday, and I came across this quite stunning chart (see below) from Bard
College and Levy Institute economist Pavlina Tcherneva.
She’ll be discussing her graphics (republished throughout the blogosphere over
the past 36+ hours, along with commentary by folks such as Ryan Cooper, Matt Yglesias, Kevin Drum, Justin Wolfers,
and a slew of other well-known economists, bloggers and journalists) in a
presentation at the 12th International Post-Keynesian
Conference at the University of Missouri at Kansas City (UMKC),
Saturday. However, Tcherneva’s work is already
trending on Twitter, as you read this.
Here’s Matt Yglesias with his take on the most widely-mentioned of Tcherneva’s graphics--which are based upon statistics from
French economist Thomas Piketty’s bestseller, “Capital
In The 21st Century”--headlined, “The most important chart about the
American economy you'll see this year,” over at Vox.com…
Pavlina Tcherneva's chart showing the
distribution of income gains during periods of economic expansion is burning up
the economics internet over the past 24 hours and for good reason. The trend it
depicts is shocking:
Yglesias continues…
For a long
time, most of the gains from economic growth went to the bottom 90 percent of
the income distribution. And, after all, the bottom 90 percent includes the
vast majority of people. Since 1980, that hasn't been the case. And for the
first several years of the current expansion, the bottom 90 percent saw
inflation-adjusted incomes continue to fall.
The data
series ends in 2012 and we don't know how long the expansion will last, so that
negative income trend may evaporate before all is said and done. But unless
there's a massive break with the previous three expansions we will continue to
have an economy where the typical family's living standards grow much more
slowly than GDP growth per se would allow.
_______________
B.
From Information Clearing House :
Date: 5
February 2013
Subject : The
Future of a Delusion.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
Will Russia and China Hold
Their Fire Until War Is the Only Alternative?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39786.htm
by Paul Craig Roberts
_______________
C.
From Truth Out :
Date: 5
February 2013
Subject : Plus ça change, plus c’est la męme chose.
Changes in the capitalist system's operating
procedures, rules and regulations are always presented as if they were in
everyone's interest, a kind of "everybody wins" social progress. The
changes usually turn out to be mostly or entirely in capitalists' interests since
they run their system that way. Are we surprised and shocked? To take one
example, changes in production methods (new machines, new techniques) arrive
with much fanfare
Four-Day Workweeks: Change for the Better?
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/26437-four-day-workweeks-change-for-the-better
D.
From Forbes Magazine :
Date: 5
February 2013
Subject : Suicide Rates in the US Among War Veterans.
For a 2014 update on Veteran suicides in
the USA, please see: http://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/21owgr/1892_us_veterans_have_committed_suicide_since/
Suicide Rate Among Vets and Active Duty Military Jumps - Now 22
A Day
by Melanie Haiken
A veteran
protests the veteran suicide rate, which just jumped from 18 to 22 a day
Almost once
an hour – every 65 minutes to be precise – a military veteran commits suicide,
says a new investigation by the Department of Veterans Affairs. By far the
most extensive study of veteran suicides ever conducted, the
report, issued Friday, examined suicide data from 1999
to 2010.
The data was
then compared with a previous investigation – primarily an estimation – that
had been conducted over the same time period, and had found a suicide rate of
18 per day.
Many of these
suicides involve older veterans; 69 percent of the suicides recorded were by
veterans age 50 and older. But another way to look at this is that 31 percent
of these suicides were by veterans 49 and younger. In other words,by men in the prime of life.
And then
there are the shockingly common active duty suicides. Just two weeks ago, the
military released data showing that suicides among those on active duty hit a
record high in 2012. There were 349 suicides among
active duty personnel – almost one a day. That means there are now more
suicides among active duty soldiers than there are combat deaths.
I’m not a
statistician, but the information released about how the data were gathered
suggests that these numbers may still be considerably underestimated. Suicides
often go unreported as cause of death due to the stigma. And the data collected
were from just 21 states, because these are the only states in which military
status is listed on the death certificate. They were then extrapolated to apply
to all 50 states.
Veteran
Suicide, An Underreported Epidemic
Companion dog
programs ease depression
Veteran
suicide is not a new issue – the various branches of the military have been
raising awareness and increasing proactive treatment programs for veteran suicide
for the past couple of years. But that’s partly what makes the new reports so
upsetting – they appear to show that veteran suicides remain undeterred by
current efforts.
The
Department of Veterans Affairs has a new crisis
line and website with multiple avenues, including text and
online chat, for those contemplating suicide to reach out. The site also offers
extensive information and resources for families and friends to help them spot
the warning signs of depression and suicidal thinking and take action.
According to this week’s press
release, the crisis line has already resulted in saving 26,000 veterans from
suicide. That’s wonderful news – except that the fact that 26,000 vets are
actively suicidal is deeply disturbing.
President Obama signed an executive
order on August 31st authorizing the VA to hire additional staff and double the
capacity of the crisis line. Let’s hope that helps.
It’s important to note that the
suicide rate overall in the United States has been rising, and veterans
actually make up fewer suicide cases proportionately than they did 25 years
ago. While the suicide rate in the U.S. has risen 31 percent since 1999, the
rate among veterans has risen 22 percent in the same period. So according to
calculations offered in a New
York Times report, the percentage of the nation’s suicides
that involve veterans is now 21 percent, down from 25 percent in 1999.
But yikes –
whether the number is one in five or one in four, it’s still pretty shocking
that veterans make up such a high proportion of suicides in this country.
Veterans affairs experts explain this by saying that veterans fall into
high-risk groups for suicide, which include being male, having access to guns,
and living in a rural area, but those factors don’t seem to come close to
accounting for such a high rate.
I covered
this subject previously as part of a report
about service dogs and how they are helping veterans cope
with depression and mental illness. One statistic that veterans’ groups offered
at the time: for every veteran killed by enemy combattants,
25 veterans kill themselves.
But note:
that comparison was based on the prior suicide data, so today’s comparison
would be even more extreme. Here’s hoping the new campaign of public awareness
and new efforts to investigate veteran suicide will result in greater access to
mental health services for all veterans.
_______________
E.
From National Security Archive :
Date: 26
September 2014
Subject : The Dinosaur in the Living room.
http://nsarchive.wordpress.com/
COVERT DIPLOMACY TO NORMALIZE RELATIONS WITH CUBA: Secret
U.S. Back-Channel History with Fidel and Raul Castro Revealed in New Book
http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20140926/
(A Historic Press Conference at the Pierre Hotel, 2 East 61st, New York
City, 4th floor meeting rooms)
WHAT:
In July 1975, Henry Kissinger sent two of his deputies to meet with
representatives of Fidel Castro at the Pierre Hotel in New York City. It was there—in room 727—that the historic first secret talks
between Washington and Havana to normalize relations were held. But they
would not be the last...
For over fifty years, U.S. and Cuban diplomats, emissaries and intermediaries
have met secretly in airport lounges, dingy cafeterias, fancy French
restaurants, and posh apartments in locations ranging from New York and
Washington to Guadalajara, Paris, London, and Havana, to address the myriad of
issues that divide these two perennial adversaries. The history of these
negotiations, and the lessons they hold, are especially relevant at a time when
both President Obama and President Raul Castro have publicly declared the
urgency of moving beyond the legacy of perpetual hostility.
Returning to the historic site of the first of these secret negotiations, the
authors of an explosive new book, Back Channel To
Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations Between Washington and Havana, will
reveal the untold details of this covert diplomacy. They will have recently
declassified top secret documents on hand to present to the press, and will
identify the key secret intermediaries used by Washington and Havana to conduct
this diplomacy. The who’s who of
colorful characters includes a Nobel prize-winning novelist, the chairman of
the board of Coca Cola, a leading American television news journalist, and even
a former U.S. president. And the authors will share the lessons for Obama
as he considers a presidential legacy that includes ending hostilities and
improving relations with the Castro government.
WHO:
Peter Kornbluh, director of the Cuba
Documentation Project at the National Security Archive
William M. LeoGrande, professor of government at
American University.
WHEN/WHERE:
October 1, 11:00am, The Pierre Hotel, 2 East 61st, New York City, 4th floor
meeting rooms.
Check out today's posting at the National Security Archive's website - http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20140926/
Find us on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/NSArchive
Unredacted, the Archive blog - http://nsarchive.wordpress.com/
________________________________________________________
THE NATIONAL SECURITY ARCHIVE is an independent non-governmental research
institute and library located at The George Washington University in
Washington, D.C. The Archive collects and publishes declassified documents
acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A tax-exempt public
charity, the Archive receives no U.S. government funding; its budget is
supported by publication royalties and donations from foundations and
individuals.
_______________
F.
From Information Clearing House :
Date: 27 September 2014
Subject : George Galloway's Statement in UK
Parliament on Isis airstrikes.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
You're getting sleepy. So, so sleepy. When I count to three you will want war, war,
war.
British MPs support UK air
strikes against IS in Iraq: The UK
Parliament has backed British participation in air strikes against Islamic
State extremists in Iraq. After a seven-hour debate, MPs voted for military
action by 524 votes to 43.
How your MP voted on Iraq
strikes: The motion was opposed by six
Conservatives, one Liberal Democrat, and 23 Labour
MPs, with Rushanara Ali abstaining by voting for and
against. She resigned from the opposition front bench in order to abstain.
George Galloway's Statement in UK
Parliament on Isis airstrikes
Video
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39788.htm
George Galloway gave one of the most controversial speeches in today's
parliamentary debate considering the whether the UK should take action against
the Islamic State in Iraq, as MPs tried to shout down the Respect MP.
Galloway told MPs that the terrorist group, popularly known as ISIS or ISIL,
only controlled so much of Iraq as the population allowed them to do so,
angered by previous Western military actions.
"That population is quiescent because of Western policies and Western
invasion," he said, adding that the group "could not survive for five
minutes if the tribes of Western Iraq rose up against them."
_______________
G.
From Financial Times :
Date: 26
September 2014
Subject : Futures, virtual and real.
Author Douglas Coupland
tells FT journalist Robert Shrimsley why he misses his “pre-internet brain.”
http://video.ft.com/3807882765001/Douglas-Coupland-our-brains-rewired/Life-And-Arts
_______________
H.
From Truth Out :
Date: 26
September 2014
Subject : Black Genocide in Progress?
Instead of lynchings, we
now enjoy the spectacle of the fraternal-order-of-police executing blacks and
browns as sport.
Code
Black: Murder, Mass Incarceration, Militarization and Genocide in Progress
by Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo and Kevin Berends
_______________
I.
From Electric Politics :
Date: 25
March 2014
Subject : Ukraine’s past, present, and future.
http://www.electricpolitics.com/
Springtime for Yulia
http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-tymoshenko-tape-language-russians/25308845.html
Another day, another intercept. This story
is not from the shady interwebs but from the U.S.
government's RFE/RL (Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty). In
other words, legit news. Presumably again originating from the Russian
Secret Service, posted on YouTube, this time the intercept is of Yulia Tymoshenko (on Twitter
she's admitted the phone call is real). She's talking with the former deputy
secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council, Nestor Shufrych. In the conversation Yulia
says, "Screw it, we should take up arms and kill the goddamned katsaps" — that would be derogatory Ukrainian slang
for Russians — "along with their leader." Oh, OK... This is a nice
group for the U.S. to back, I don't think . . . .