Rhinocrisy

On Inauguration Day, the Students Against War (SAW) group at Seattle Central Community College held a walk-out. The walkout, advertised heavily by NION (which, with ANSWER, dominates the meaningless protest scene in Seattle), drew about 400 students. A very small group of students, who had been organizing for weeks prior, were handing out counter-recruitment fliers near the table of a pair of military recruiters, who happened to be on campus that day. As the students gathered in the Atrium, some of them started harassing the recruiters. Within five minutes, the recruiters were surrounded by hundreds of students, shouting at them to leave, tearing up their materials and throwing the pieces at them, and dancing on their table. Campus security escorted the recruiters out of the building for their own safety.

The SCCC administration initially told SAW that they would be disbanded for the quarter if they didn’t apologize to the recruiters, but later backed down. The recruiters for their part, sent this message:

>From: “Dupras, James L CPT USAREC” JAMES.DUPRAS@usarec.army.mil

> Date: Thu, January 27, 2005 12:42 pm

>College Students,

>

>What your college did last week to our Army Recruiters was not only a

>disgrace to our country, but a disappointment to our state and local

>community. Most of you have no idea what it is like to serve your country

>and be proud of a nation that has been free for centuries. Our

>Grandfathers and Fathers paid the ultimate sacrifice in past wars for you

>to enjoy sipping a coke in your college dorm. Millions of veterans

>scattered across this great land of ours are limbless or scared with

>battle wounds so that you can walk freely at your local mall without fear

>of a volley of missiles coming down on you. We are not on your campus to

>fill our Army with bodies to fight a war. We are on your campus to offer

>you and your fellow classmates a chance to serve in the greatest Armed

>Forces this world has ever seen. A chance to be a part of an organization

>that spews pride amongst its ranks. For you and your college schoolmates

>to scream obscenities and throw trash at my fellow soldiers should think

>about the day to day sacrifices our military endures. Whether overseas

>fighting door to door, or sitting in an office ensuring supplies get to

>the right location, our soldiers around the world do not deserve the kind

>of treatment you displayed. We will be at your college another day and we

>will recruit the fine young men and women who are upstanding and patriotic

>and want nothing more than the opportunity to serve our country. We have

>a popular saying in our military about folks like you…Lead, Follow or

>get out of the way.

>

>CPT Jim Dupras

>Executive Officer

>Seattle Recruiting Battalion

The story broke across the national news. Kudos to the great students at SCCC. CPT Jim Dupras has started a dialogue, and I encourage all interested parties to e-mail him directly with your take on his letter, especially if you’re a college student.

So, now that ballots are actually being counted, we can figure out the real “voter turnout” percentage. According to this UPI story, there are 3.3 million ballots counted so far, which is 53% of the total, meaning 6.2 million ballots. Jon Henke at QandO does a pretty good job breaking down what the actual eligible voting populace in Iraq ought to be.* He arrives at a figure of roughly 14 million. However, I think he underestimates the number of expatriates, making it more like 14.5 million eligible voters. This comes out to 42.7% voter turnout, an impressive number, given the circumstances. But I’d be willing to bet that this is highly non-uniform with respect to religious group, district, and so on. We’ll know for sure on Thursday when full results are apparently due to come out.

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*Note that estimates based on the number of oil-for-food ration cards, which is what was actually used for election registration, is considered to be a very unreliable figure, since many ration cards were fakes, obtained fraudulently via bribes.

I had an interesting conversation after my kung fu class this morning where I found myself arguing against the anti-war position. It’s not uncommon for me to swap sides in a debate out of irritation at weaknesses in someone’s arguments (since, after all, knowing how to think is more important than knowing what to think). But this did underscore for me how conflicted I am about the fundamentals of the Bush invasion and occupation of Iraq. If, in spite of the terror of occupation and bombing, in spite of the American’s efforts to manipulate events in Iraq to their benefit, the end product is a stable and relatively democratic regime, how will I feel about it? And I don’t consider this to be a mere flight of fancy - it’s a real enough possibility. Things may turn out okay. And if they do, then what? Does that mean that the ends justify the means? That it is morally acceptably, maybe even correct, to use force to depose dictatorships and replace them with democracies?

The facile answer is a clear “no”, which is the response I’m supposed to give as an anti-imperialist. But the waters seem a bit muddied, to me. Yes, the intent in Iraq was mistaken, and at every step the Bush administration has demonstrated that they do NOT understand what democracy means, that they will push American advantage in disgusting and underhanded ways. But I’ve never seen a convincing refutation of the idea that inaction is morally indefensible, that allowing dictatorships to persist is tantamount to supporting oppression. And if the effective result of George W. Bush’s interventionist policy is not imperialism, but rather the replacement of the bad with the good, on what leg does the anti-war argument stand?

I went for jury duty today, which was rather uneventful (I got to read “Slaughterhouse Five” some), but did lead me to observe that my jury pool was overwhelmingly white. There were about a hundred-odd people in the room, maybe more, and only a handful of them were “of color” - maybe two black people, one asian guy (me) and this or that. Since the Edward J. Sullivan courthouse draws its pool from Cambridge, I imagine it ought to reflect the racial makeup of Cambridge, which is, roughly, 68% white, 12% black and 12% asian*. The fact that it doesn’t suggests something funky. Of course, statistical error is possible, but my hunch was confirmed a little later when they made us answer a questionnaire which had only two questions: “What is your race?” (with the same stupid categorization), and “Do you consider yourself Hispanic or Latino?”

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*I’ll take this moment to complain about racial groups, which are especially silly for Asians, since it puts Gujaratis and Han Chinese into the same “group”. Of course, considering that the African population as a whole has more genetic variation than the rest of the world combined, “Black” as a group is probably even sillier. Even “Afrocentrism” is sort of annoying that way - can you imagine trying to cultivate some agglomerated “Asian” or “European” identity?

I am slowly starting to realize that I am caught in a trap called MIT. Almost all my friends are from MIT. Everyone I’ve dated or been interested in dating went to MIT. Upwards of 90% of my roommates have been MIT alum.

And that’s not all - everyone ELSE I know is good MIT material - you know, strong intellectual streak, geek-hip, droll sense of humor.

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing - I surround myself with these people because I happen to genuinely like them. But it does present a conundrum: are normal people boring? I have no idea! I’ve never met one.

Proposal: a cultural exchange program. Intellectual blowhards like myself (or, preferably, one of my friends) swap places with someone from an alien subculture (hipster, b-boy, jock, etc.). The two make a genuine attempt to connect and see if there’s any possibility of intermeshing. A proposition fraught with peril, I know, but it might be worthwhile. On the other hand, maybe I should just stick with what I know is good…

Bob Harris links to an amazing document, a Republican guide written for Senators and Representatives on how to sell social security privatization. Now, unfortunately I think this whole social security question is boring as all get-out; if you want the scoop on that, you should visit A Tiny Revolution, where my man Jonathan Schwarz is kicking up a regular Social Security Shit Storm. But the text is fabulous reading for other, anthropological reasons. Check out this paragraph, from a list of recommendations on how to talk to your constituents:

Keep the numbers small: Your audience doesn’t know how trillions and billions differ. They know these numbers are large, but not how large nor how many billions make a trillion. Boil numbers down to “your family’s share.” Also avoid percentages; your audience will try to calculate them in their head–no easy task while listening to a speech–and many will do it incorrectly.

and, maybe more incredible, in a different vein:

Don’t say, “Social Security lifts seniors out of poverty”: People don’t appreciate all that Social Security does, and believe that despite the program, many seniors are still in poverty. Instead, talk about how Social Security is a “floor of protection” that keeps seniors out of the most dire circumstances.

This isn’t really what I imagine when I hear the word “democracy”: the people are venal and ignorant; fortunately, they can be guided like cattle to the correct line of thinking that their leaders have determined. Ugh. +4 cynicism for me.