Any F-----g Questions?

Moderators: Elvis, DrVolin, Jeff

Was the Cold War optional?

Postby starroute » Mon Nov 21, 2005 12:58 pm

Disclaimer -- I have no in-depth knowledge of the late 40's. Too long ago for me to have experienced personally, too recent to have gotten in school, largely ignored by analysts since them, and damned confusing besides. But I have picked up a few points of information along the way which suggest that the Cold War was no more inevitable than the dropping of the Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki:<br><br>1) Suggestions that the Cold War was the price Truman paid to the Republican Congress for getting them to lay off the New Deal.<br><br>2) Suggestions that the persistent recession of the late 40's, and fears of slipping back into the Great Depression, were the real reasons behind the development of a permanent war economy c. 1950.<br><br>3) The enormous power of the China Lobby in shanghaing US policy to protect Chiang and shut out China through the 50's and 60's.<br><br>4) The need felt by the CIA to create an elaborate system of domestic propaganda in large part simply to keep the Cold War pumped up.<br><br>My own take on things at this point is that the situation in the immediate postwar period was extremely chancey, and I'm willing to be convinced that keeping Greece or Italy out of Communist control was worth a certain amount of unethical behavior. But by 1950, things had renormalized, plausible spheres of influence had been established, and there was no reason why the "Cold War" per se shouldn't have been allowed to come to a graceful end. It was *only* the exertions of the military-industrial complex, the CIA, and the China Lobby that served to keep it going for another 40 years.<br><br>What's more, that endlessly prolonged war mentality, the unethical behaviors it promoted, the enrichment of the forces behind it, and the distortion of our society it created are the source of virtually all the evils we are confronting today.<br> <p></p><i></i>
starroute
 
Posts: 341
Joined: Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:01 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

And why was that our business?

Postby banned » Mon Nov 21, 2005 11:16 pm

"I'm willing to be convinced that keeping Greece or Italy out of Communist control was worth a certain amount of unethical behavior"<br><br>I think there are a lot of Greeks who would disagree with that. Who DID disagree with that. What business was it of ours what that or any other sovereign nation chose after being liberated? Are you seriously suggesting that the junta was a Good Thing because it wasn't Communist?<br><br>Ever see the film "Z"? <p></p><i></i>
banned
 
Posts: 912
Joined: Sun Oct 02, 2005 5:18 pm
Blog: View Blog (0)

The Cold War

Postby robertdreed » Mon Nov 21, 2005 11:39 pm

I'm amused to find the folks around here who are obviously MUCH more interested in re-fighting the Cold War than I am. <br><br>I think this plays right into the hands of people like Ann Coulter and David Horowitz. They're more than ready to duke it out on that turf.<br><br> <p></p><i></i>
robertdreed
 
Posts: 1560
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 11:14 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

getting impatient

Postby robertdreed » Mon Nov 21, 2005 11:46 pm

"why is OUR artillery still firing while the original side no longer even exists? <br><br>Or maybe you think the war on terror is real too?"<br><br>Dream's End, you sound as if you've skipped over or blotted from your memory all of the content in my previous posts that <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>explicitly made the exact same point that you're bringing up with the comment excerpted above.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> <p></p><i></i>
robertdreed
 
Posts: 1560
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 11:14 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

Re: getting impatient

Postby Dreams End » Tue Nov 22, 2005 2:50 am

actually, Robert, I'm just disappointed. Seriously. I didn't know this was your perspective...lie, cheat, steal, murder...just keep the commies out of power. <br><br>No, of course I know you don't really support the "war on terror." It's just that the rhetorical justifications are just the same. They hate our freedoms indeed.<br><br>when you reread "Killing Hope" please do let us know which of those activities you find as "justifiable" in the war against communism and which you think are excessive because I've seen no standards offered from you on this question. <br><br>Wow. This saddens me. <p></p><i></i>
Dreams End
 

Re: And why was that our business?

Postby starroute » Tue Nov 22, 2005 3:01 am

banned -<br><br>The Greek junta and the period covered in Z were in the 60's. I was referring to events of the late 40's -- about which, as I was trying to express, I know far too little to make any definitive statements. All I really do know is that the US intervened to rig elections and such, but I don't know how much harm or good was caused in the process. <br> <p></p><i></i>
starroute
 
Posts: 341
Joined: Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:01 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

and the Left wonders why they're so ass-out...

Postby robertdreed » Tue Nov 22, 2005 3:02 am

because it's a fucking cult, that's why. <br><br>Not a populist-democrat political tactician in the lot, either...it's more about applying as many litmus tests as one can in terms of demanding agreement on everything from total congruency of historical interpretation to views on religion. Until a bunch of "propaganda of deed" "activists" shows up...then everyone's afraid to kick them out, supposedly because having a "big tent" is imperative, and to do otherwise would amount to "co-optation" by "liberals" and "gatekeepers."<br><br>You can have your cult. <br><br>Yeah, NATO had covert paramilitary units all over Western Europe during the Cold War, often staffed by neofascists. Meanwhile, on the other side of those barbed-wire fences, walls, and checkpoints that delineated the borders of the nations of Eastern Europe, where people were regularly apprehended and jailed, or even shot and killed, for trying to emigrate to the West, the Communists had no need of organizations like Gladio- they had <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>full-blown police states</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END-->. Do you not recall what happened in Poland and the GDR (East Germany) in 1953, in Hungary in 1956, and in Czechoslovakia in 1968? The populations arose in general revolt! They had to be suppressed with tanks!<br><br>And the Gehlen Organization staffed the spy services of the Eastern Bloc and Soviet Union as well as those of the West- yet another fact that seems to have ecaped your notice, Dream's End. And mighty effective they were, too. Not one single covert operative dropped behind the lines of Eastern Bloc nations by American intelligence survived. They were all betrayed and caught- imprisoned or executed. <br><br>That's how such games are played, of course. Foreign agents seeking to make contact with resistance movements- especially armed resistance movements- in sovereign nations assume that risk as part of their mission. But the best explanation for that total lack of success of infiltration is that Gehlen and Vlasov's boys were giving away the game. And you'll have to look elsewhere than "CIA meddling" to find the inspiration for all those popular revolts in the Worker's Paradise nations in the 1950s. <br><br>I feel like Nat Hentoff. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=robertdreed>robertdreed</A> at: 11/22/05 12:47 am<br></i>
robertdreed
 
Posts: 1560
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 11:14 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

Re: and the Left wonders why they're so ass-out...

Postby Dreams End » Tue Nov 22, 2005 3:45 am

I've never demanded agreement from you. We disagree on most things and had some good debates on it. I just didn't know you were...<br><br><br>By the way, is it ALL the left that's a cult? Is this REALLY your position on this? Are you the SAME rdr who used to post here?<br><br><br>you know, speaking of cults. Have you ever checked into the connections of the World Anti-Communist League. Here's a lengthy article...that militant anti-communism of yours could land you with some dodgy characters:<br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><br> World Anti-Communist League<br><br>Acronym/Code: WACL<br><br>Updated: 10/90<br><br> <br><br>Categories:<br><br>Political, Paramilitary<br><br> <br><br>Background:<br><br>The World Anti-Communist League was founded in 1966 in Taipei, Taiwan. WACL was conceived as an expansion of the Asian People's Anti-Communist League, a regional alliance against communism formed at the request of Chiang Kai-shek at the end of the Korean War. (1,9,30,35) The Asian People's AntiCommunist League (APACL) had roots in the China Lobby, a group dedicated to stopping official international recognition of the Chinese Communist government. The China Lobby had U.S. government connections, and allegedly Ray Cline of the CIA assisted this group in establishing the Taiwanese Political Warfare Cadres Academy in the late 1950s. (45) The founders of APACL were agents of the governments of Taiwan and Korea, including Park Chung Hee who later bacame president of Korea; Yoshio Kodama, a member of organized crime in Japan; Ryiochi Sasakawa, a gangster and Japanese billionaire jailed as a war criminal after World War II; and Osami Kuboki and other followers of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, head of the Unification Church. (4,8,9,11,30) Sasakawa provided major funding for Moon and the Unification Church. When Park became president of South Korea after the 1961 coup, he adopted the Unification Church as his political arm. (45)<br><br>One resource states that the Anti-Bolshevic Bloc of Nations (ABN), headed by the notorious Yaroslav Stetsko since the 1950s, entered the group in the early 1960s. (11,45) The ABN is the largest and most important umbrella for former Nazi collaborators in the world. (11)<br><br>During the 1970s WACL spread to all six continents and chapters were opened in Japan, Europe, Britain, Australia, the U.S. , and Latin America. The organization attracted former Nazi supporters in Europe and in Latin America. The Latin American group, Confederacion Anti-Comunista Latinoamericana (CAL), headed by Raimundo Guerrero, sprang from the roots of Los Tecos, a World War II facist group. (11) CAL was overtly fascist and connected to a chain of rightwing military plots in Latin America. (59)<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The Unification Church (UC) of Sun Myung Moon (hey...wasn't he some kinda cult leader....?) has remained a major power within WACL.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> Moon claimed that he raised $1. 4 million for WACL's 1970 annual conference. (41) In 1975, Moon denounced WACL as being too facist, and claimed to sever connections between it and the UC. Reports in the New York Times, Searchlight and elsewhere, however, indicate the separation is nominal only. (41) In 1985, WACL's Japanese branch was still run by Osami Kuboki who also headed the Japanese Unification Church. (5)<br><br>From 1978 to 1980 Roger Pearson, well known for his theory of white supremacy and his fascist sympathies, was chairman of WACL. Pearson concentrated his efforts in Europe and attracted more radical fascist elements to WACL. For a time WACL appeared to be more anti-semitic than anticommunist. (11) Pearson and the more radical WACL branches attempted to oust more moderate groups, but his attempted coup failed. In 1980, WACL expelled Pearson and said it had purged its fascist elements. As with the separation from the UC, however, the separation from the fascists was cosmetic only. Most of the individuals involved were reported by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers to be among the attendees at succeeding annual conferences. (2,31)<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>After Pearson's ouster, Major General John K. Singlaub (ret. ) (that's a familiar name)</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> and his newly-formed U.S. chapter of WACL, the United States Council for World Freedom (USWCF), became WACL's most active branch. USCWF was founded in 1981 by Singlaub with a $16,500 loan from the Taiwanese branch of WACL and generous support from beer baron Joseph Coors. (28,35) From 1984 through 1986, Singlaub was the chairman of WACL. (11)<br><br>In 1984, columnist Jack Anderson wrote a series of exposes on WACL connecting the group with death squads operating in Latin America, and once again linking them with fascists, this time in Latin America. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>He reported that the "godfather" of the death squads in Guatemala, Mario Sandoval Alarcon, a principal of the CAL, had been on the CIA payroll for 30 years--since the National Liberation Movement (MLN) was organized by the CIA to overthrow progressive President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman of Guatemala.(is this one of those times it's okay to bend the rules a little?)</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> (24,25) Further articles by Anderson reported that CAL, which operated out of Guadalajara, Mexico, was an outgrowth of Los Tecos. (26,27)<br><br>As a result of this expose, Singlaub put pressure on Dr. Ku, the life-chair of WACL from Taiwan, to expel CAL. (2<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> Ku complied but, as with the fascists in Europe, the disassociation was probably only nominal. (30) A new Latin American wing, the zFederacion de Entidades Democraticas de America Latina (FEDAL), was begun with Dr. Carlos Barbieri Filho of Brazil as head. Barbieri Filho has connections to the Argentine AAA death squad. Moreover, former CAL chieftan Mario Sandoval Alarcon was present at the 1985 WACL convention in Dallas. (30)<br><br>WACL maintains offices in a Taipei, Taiwan government building, and runs its daily affairs out of "The Freedom Center," a cluster of buildings in Seoul, South Korea. (30,3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> WACL has an executive structure headed by an honorary chairman, chairman, executive board, and secretariat. It has eight regional organizations: Asian Pacific Anti-Communist League (APACL); North American Regional WACL Organization (NARWACL); European Council for World Freedom (ECWF); African Organization for Freedom and Democracy (AOFD); Federacion de Entidades Democraticas de America Latina (FEDAL); Middle East Solidarity Council (MESC); Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations (ABN); and World Youth Freedom League (WYFL). (54) WACL has 130 chapters, and estimates of the number of countries involved ranges from 90 to 100. (31,35,3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> The group publishes a quarterly magazine, Freedom Digest. (54)<br><br>Funding:<br><br>The U.S. affiliate, USWCF, had tax exempt status from the Internal Revenue Service from 1982 through 1987. (3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> This enabled Singlaub to solicit tax-deductible donations from private parties. The status was withdrawn because of complaints to the IRS about the types of activities in which the USCWF was involvedin Nicaragua. (50) Dallas heiress Ellen Garwood donated $65,000 to WACL to buy a helicopter for the Nicaraguan contras. (35) Burt Hurlbut of the USWCF board stated that Taiwan and South Korea were providing $50,000 a month to WACL for the contras. (11,33) Singlaub reported that USWCF was raising $50,000 a month from a group of wealthy Texas conservatives including Bert Hurlbut of First Texas Royalty and Exploration Co and John Howell of Howell Instruments. (35) Singlaub told the Washington Post in May 1985 that the Brazil and Argentina chapters of WACL were very active in supporting WACL activities. (11) A 1985 article attributes donations of $100,000 a year to the WACL chapter in Saudi Arabia. (35) Other contributors include Nelson<br><br>Bunker Hunt and Herbert Hunt, oil fortune heiress Tarlton "Topsy" King, and Scott Parrott of the Parrott Oil fortune. (63)<br><br>An undetermined amount of WACL's funding comes in non- monetary form. For example, a large donation of clothing was obtained from a Korean manufacturer at greatly reduced prices. WACL also receives support from other rightwing groups. Singlaub reported that he received commitments for $100,000 from a fundraising campaign with fellow members of the Council for National Policy. (35)<br><br> <br><br>Activities:<br><br>The purpose of the World Anti-Communist League is spelled out clearly in its name. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>WACL operates internationallyto overcome and eliminate groups or governments considered to pose a "communist" threat. To achieve this end, WACL appears to be willing to align itself with any and all governments and movements it considers to be anticommunist. (3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> The group revised its charter in 1987 to include among its purposes the development of "political and psychological warfare methods in order to expose and counteract the evil designs and intrigues of Communist imperialism."</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->(53) At the 1984 convention the group established committees to support and assist eight anticommunist resistance groups: Nicaragua, Angola, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. (6,17,21)<br><br>Much of the inspiration for WACL activities and the training in psychological and political warfare come from Taiwan. (11,30,39) Training courses are offered, with all expenses paid by WACL, at the Political Warfare Cadres Academy in Peitou. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Political warfare is described by the academy as a system "to remove obstacles to national unity within and to resist aggression from without."(11) Roberto D'Aubuisson (gulp) said of his training there,"(It was) the best course I ever took."</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->(11) Taiwan is no longer recognized by only the United Nations and its government is recognized by two dozen nations, half of which are in Latin America. (11)<br><br>WACL activities in Central America expanded greatly in 1984 when Congress shut off all funds to the contra forces. (11) Between 1984 and 1986 WACL became the principal publicly identified source of funding for the contras. Singlaub said that he "quite frankly used the WACL organization... to meet with some people who are capable of contributing" to the contra cause. He identified his three principal WACL sources for funding as Latin America, Taiwan, and South Korea. (59)<br><br>Afghanistan: <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>At its 1984 and 1985 conventions WACL voted to support the anticommunist mujahedeen rebels in Afghanistan. (that darn blowback!) (6,17,21,39) WACL was very active in the foundation and support of the Committee for a Free Afghanistan (CFA). CFA was founded in 1981 and was given office space at the Heritage Foundation. (21) CFA--directed by retired Major General J. Milnor Roberts, a board member of USCWF--raised large sums of money to purchase arms, ammunition and medical supplies for the mujahedeen. </strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->(21,4<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> In 1985 WACL, through USCWF, initiated "Project Boots" to bring humanitarian aid to the Afghan resistance. (21) <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>In 1988, General Daniel Graham, vice chair of USCFW, was one of an eight-man delegation that met with President Ronald Reagan in an effort to block the Geneva accords calling for a withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. (but....but....but...)(21)<br></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br>Canada: After the U.S. Congress prohibited the CIA from further assistance to the contras in 1984, the Canadian WACL chapter became active in procuring and shipping goods to the contras. In 1984 and 1985 the Canadian WACL, Canadian Freedom Fdn (CFF), headed by John Gamble, a former conservative member of parliament, arranged a series of fundraising meetings for Singlaub, including some with members of parliament. (3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> CFF also supported the WACL campaign on behalf of the mujahedeen in Afghanistan by raising funds and holding anti-Soviet demonstrations. (3<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> A WACL affiliate, the Freedom Council of Canada, was active in rallying anticommunist sentiment in Canada following the student protests in Tienanmen Square and the violent response by the Chinese government. The group claimed to rally the support of some 4,500 Chinese students studying in Canada. (55) The group is presently trying to act as official representative of the Vietnamese exile groups in North America, but as yet agreement has not been reached. (55)<br><br>Costa Rica: In 1986, Bernal Urbina Pinto headed the WACL chapter in Costa Rica and was vice president of FEDAL. FEDAL replaced CAL after it was expelled from WACL because of its fascist connections in 1984. Urbina Pinto was also the leader of the political group, Free Costa Rica Movement, which coordinatedthe Organization for the National Emergency (OPEN), a paramilitary, anti-terrorist force. OPEN trained thousands of peasants in the basic tactics of counterinsurgency. (11)<br><br>In 1982, Argentinians came to Costa Rica to organize contra forces who had slipped across the border from Nicaragua. They worked with Urbina Pinto and the Free Costa Rica Movement. (11) Cuban exiles who are members of WACL also live in Costa Rica. Most notable among them is Nazario Sargen head of Alpha 66, a Cuban terrorist group and long-standing WACL member. (11)<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>John Hull (heard of HIM?)--whose ranch in Costa Rica was used as a base by the CIA and private groups to bring supplies and military support to the contras--is a member of WACL.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> (20) In fact, WACL was considered by some to be the main CIA conduit in the supply network for the contras. (20)<br><br>El Salvador: Roberto D'Aubuisson, Adolfo Cuellar and Raul Molina, worked together under the direction of National Guard commander General Jose Alberto "Chele" Medrano. All were members of WACL and all rose to power in El Salvador. (11) D'Aubuisson, who rose through the ranks of the Salvadoran National Security Agency (ANSESAL)--the Salvadoran counterpart to the CIA--became El Salvador's national representative to WACL. (31,61) In 1977, he went to Peitou, Taiwan for three months of training at the Political Warfare Cadres Academy. In 1980, D'Aubuisson went to the WACL convention in Buenos Aires where he arranged for Argentine intelligence operatives to come to El Salvador and give the National Guard instruction in countersubversion. (31) The advisers helped Salvadorans set up safe houses out of which the death squads operated. (2<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> The project was funded by WACL. (11) D'Aubuisson became an important figure in politics in 1981 when he established the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party. ARENA is modeled after the ultra-right, militarist MLN of Guatemala. Soon after ARENA's founding, investigative reporters linked D'Aubuisson with Mario Sandoval Alarcon of the MLN. Sandoval Alarcon is head of WACL in Guatemala and of La Mano Blanco, a major Guatemalan death squad. (10,11) Testimony of U.S. Ambassador Robert White fixes responsibility for the murder of Archbishop Oscar Romero on D'Aubuisson. (11)<br><br>Adolfo Cuellar was a member of the National Assembly for the National Conciliation Party (PCN), a rightwing party in El Salvador. In 1970, he became head of the Democratic National Organization (ORDEN), a rural paramilitary group of some eighty thousand anticommunist informers and vigilantes. He was assassinated in 1981. Medrano went on to achieve power in the National Guard. (11)<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Guatemala: In 1954, with the formation of the CIA-sponsored Army of Liberation (AOL) organized to overthrow reformist President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman, Guatemala became fixed in a pattern of anticommunist political violence which persists today. (11) The Eisenhower administration tagged Arbenz as procommunist and sent E. Howard Hunt of the CIA (and, later, of Watergate fame) to organize the AOL. (45) In 1957, a radical right faction of the government set up by the U.S. to replace Arbenz assassinated his successor, President Castillo Armas, and formed a new party, the National Liberation Movement (MLN).</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>Mario Sandoval Alarcon was the driving force behind the government, and the MLN became the legitimizer of his paramilitary operations. (11)<br><br>Sandoval Alarcon, known as the "godfather," launched his career in the AOL, and has been head of the WACL in Guatemala since 1972. (11) He was the coordinator of La Mano Blanco, which oversaw the operations of many of the death squads in Central America. La Mano Blanco was coordinated by CAL. The death squads have terrorized Guatemala since their formation in the 1960s. When interviewed by the authors of Inside the League a political analyst said,"People ask if the death squads are controlled by the [Guatemalan] Army. They are the Army."(11) Sandoval Alarcon was head of the National Congress and vice president under Colonel Kjell Laugerud Schell from 1974 to 1978. While vice president, he established close ties with Taiwan through his leadership of WACL. He sent an estimated fifty to seventy Guatemalan army officers to the Academy in Taiwan for training. (11) In 1980, WACL requested that Sandoval Alarcon help D'Aubuisson establish death squads in El Salvador. (11,45)<br><br>In 1979, John Singlaub and Daniel Graham of the American Security Council and soon to be founders of the new U.S. WACL branch, the USCWF, visited Guatemala. The purpose of their junket was to begin to heal the relationship between the U.S. and Guatemala that had become strained under the Carter administration. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>They also informed the Guatemalan government that a Reagan victory would lead to a resumption of military ties between the countries. Mario Sandoval Alarcon attended President Ronald Reagan's inaugural ceremonies. (11) Alberto Piedra, WACL member, was appointed ambassador to Guatemala by President Reagan. (or did you think the WACL had no government ties?)</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->(38,40)<br><br>While Sandoval failed in his bid to become president of Guatemala, he remained the power behind the throne. In 1985, he was still the head of WACL, claimed to have a private army of three thousand, and the ability to put thousands more paramilitary troops into action on short notice. (11)<br><br>Honduras: In the late 1970s, General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez brought Honduras into the anticommunist warrior ranks. During his term as president, he created the Honduran AntiCommunist Movement (MACHO) and its action arm, the AntiCommunist Combat Army (ELA)."Lobo," a leader of the ELA, was a member of the United Democratic University Front (FUDD) which served as the ELA's front group. (11) He was also a member of the youth wing of the Latin American Anti-Communist Confederation (CAL)."Lobo" and other representatives of FUDD were present at the 1980 WACL conference in Buenos Aires, and there arranged for WACL members from Argentina to come to Honduras to train contras from Nicaragua. (11) During 1980 and 1982, Jesse Helm's aide John Carbaugh, who attended the WACL convention in 1980, made numerous trips to Honduras. (11) The WACL chapter in Honduras was headed by Moises Jesus de Ulloa Duarte, a conservative radio commentator who traveled to Korea at the invitation and expense of the Unification Church. (11)<br><br>Refugee Relief International, a project of Soldier of Fortune, joined forces with WACL to deliver supplies to contra camps in Honduras in 1984. (11)<br><br>Mexico: The Confederacion Anticommunista Latinoamericana (CAL) was run out of the Autonomous University in Guadalajara. (11) CAL was formed from a well-established, elite, pro-Nazi network called Los Tecos. (26,27) CAL did not cast off its anti-semitism to don the cloak of anticommunism; it simply incorporated the latter into its agenda. (11) The Jack Anderson expose of fascist elements in CAL forced WACL to expel the group in 1984. However, an article in the Village Voice noted that "the core of the old Latin fascist apparatus remains."(30)<br><br>Philippines:<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong> In 1987, General Singlaub visited the Philippines with Ray Cline, former CIA deputy director.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> (32,51)<br><br>They met with CIA station chief Norbett Garrett. Singlaub set up an office in Manila at the Nippon Star, a subsidiary of the Japanese firm, Nippon Electronics. (51) Cline and Singlaub, along with Garret and General Robert Sweitzer met with Juan Ponce Enrile and General Fidel Ramos prior to an abortive November coup. (62) Singlaub has also met with Alberto "Magri" Maguidad, alias Jack Madigan, infamous vigilante leader from Taguegarao. Madigan has acknowledged that his group has the backing of Singlaub and WACL. (62)<br><br>The Manila Chronicle reported that Singlaub offered financial support to sugar planters organizing an anticommunist drive on the island of Negros. (51) Meetings were held with General Luis Villa-Real, the president of WACL in the Philippines and head of the National Intelligence Coordinating Authority. (51)<br><br>The Counter-Insurgency Command (CIC), a rightwing civilian vigilante squad, admitted having the backing of "an international organization led by retired General John Singlaub." The CIC claims to have 2,000 members and 100,000 sympathizers. (34)<br><br>The Philadelphia Reporter and the Washington Post reported that Singlaub had recruited 37 mercenaries from around the world to train Philippine soldiers in counterinsurgency tactics. Singlaub denies this. (51)<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong> A Senate Committee headed by Frank Church commented on Singlaub's activities in the Philippines, calling it "sheep-dipping," i. e."the process by which military men are given civilian documentation, ostensibly resign from the service and are employed overseas as civilians primarily for the CIA."</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> (that whacky Michael Meiring is quaking in his boot about now.)(62)<br><br>Taiwan: Taiwan, home of the China Lobby and founder of WACL, is still run by the Kuomintang (KMT). (1,11,45) The Taiwanese government is no longer recognized as the government of China and has diplomatic legitimacy in few countries. As a result, some observers feel that Taiwan uses WACL as its main political conduit for its anticommunist political policies. (11) It is through WACL that the KMT offers training in unconventional warfare, interrogation and counterterror tactics at their Political Warfare Cadres Academy. The KMT philosophy, carried out in the academy training, is to create a politicized military whose first loyalty is to the party, then to the military, and finally to the nation. Through the academy, both Taiwan and WACL have established a military and political network in Latin America. (11)<br><br>According to the authors of Inside the League, Taiwanese students in the U.S. are watched by KMT agents who fill out monthly reports about the total number of students suspected of being "communist."(11)<br><br>United States: The first WACL chapter in the U.S. was the American Council for World Freedom (ACWF) founded in 1970 by Lee Edwards. Edwards was the former director of Young Americans for Freedom, the youth arm of the John Birch Society. (11) John Fisher of the American Security Council served as ACWF's first chairman. The American Security Council is a virulently anticommunist group that originally focused on internal security. It currently heads up the rightwing lobby group the Coalition for Peace Through Strength, which includes among its members a number of members of Congress. (61) In 1973, the ACWF, at the urging of board member Stefan Possony, complained to WACL about the fascist members from Latin America. The report was discredited, but in 1975, ACWF left WACL and its members drifted off to other groups in the New Right. (11)<br><br>The second U.S. chapter of WACL (1975-1980), the Council on American Affairs, was headed by noted racialist Roger Pearson. During this period Pearson had strong links to the American Security Council. (61)<br><br>In 1980 John Singlaub went to Australia to speak to the Asian branch of WACL. (46) Shortly thereafter he was approached to begin a new U.S. chapter of the organization. The U.S. Council for World Freedom (USCWF) was started by the retired General in 1981 with a loan from WACL in Taiwan and local funding from beer magnate, Joseph Coors. (28,35) USCWF has been the most active chapter of WACL of this decade, with the action picking up tremendously in 1984 with the cessation of offficial U.S. government funding to the contras. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Singlaub was selected by the White House in 1984 to be the chief private fundraiser for the contras. </strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->The key private funders were to be wealthy business people, Taiwan, South Korea, and "an anti-communist organization with close ties to those governments."(9) Other major contributions came from Guatemala and Argentina, countries where Singlaub had strong WACL connections. In his position as chief private fundraiser for the contras Singlaub reported directly to Colonel Oliver North of the National Security Council. (59) It is highly likely that Singlaub's USCWF/WACL high-profile,"private" contra fundraising may have served as a cover for North's illegal government-sponsored supply network.<br><br>In his deposition at the Iran-Contra hearings, Singlaub's claims that he raised $10 million in contra aid were questioned. In 1985, for example, when claims of millions of dollars in aid raised from private sources were reported frequently by the media, the USWCF financial statement reported income of $280,798. (46) In the previous year, reported income was just over $41,000. (47) Singlaub responded that a good deal of the aid was "in-kind" and that the dollar values were somewhat uncertain. He also claimed that his statements had been exaggerated by the press. (46)<br><br>What Singlaub has done as a private citizen and what he has done in the name of USCWF and WACL is unclear. However, WACL paid for the services of the public relations firm of Carter Clews Communications to improve Singlaub's public image in order to enhance his fundraising efforts. (46)<br><br>The USCWF and Soldier of Fortune established a private training academy for Salvadoran police forces and Nicaraguan contras. Located in Boulder, Colorado, the Institute for Regional and International Studies was headed by Alexander McColl, the military affairs editor of Soldier of Fortune Magazine. (11) Robert Brown of Soldier of Fortune invested $500,000 in Freedom Marine. In December 1985 Freedom Marine sold three "stealth boats" to USCWF for $125,000. The hulls of the boats had been reinforced for machine gun mounts. In Honduras the coastal resupply system for rebels inside Nicaragua utilized three "stealth boats."(7) Bruce Jones, former CIA liaison to the contras in Costa Rica, worked for USCWF in Tucson. (11)<br><br>In 1987, USCWF lost its tax-exempt status because of complaints about the group's support of the Nicaraguan contras and is reported to be short of money. (38,50) USCWF apparently moved its offices from Phoenix to Alexandria, Virginia in 1988. Singlaub was indicted in 1986 and 1988 over USCWF activities in support of the contras. (56,57) Because of these costly legal problems USCWF has been politically inactive and NARWACL did not hold its annual meeting in 1988-1989. (55)<br><br>David Finzer and Rafael Flores founded the World Youth Freedom League (WYFL), the youth branch of WACL in 1985. Flores, worked for contra fundraiser, Carl (Spitz) Channell, also indicted in the Iran-contra case. Finzer and Flores worked together at the International Youth Year Commission, a group linked to Oliver North's contra supply network. (44)<br><br>In April 1989 the ABN held a policy seminar at the Heritage Foundation in Washington DC. The conference was attended by 100 representives from the subjugated nations and Rep. Bill Young from the U.S. Congress was the main speaker. (55)<br><br> <br><br>Government Connections:<br><br>The following is a brief summary of the military and intelligence activities of Major General John K. Singlaub (USA - ret. ). Singlaub was an officer in the Office of Strategic Services (predecessor to the CIA) during World War II. He served on the China desk of the CIA in 1948 and 1949 and became deputy chief of the CIA in Seoul during the Korean War. (30) He served for two years in Vietnam during the 1960s. There he was commander of the Joint Unconventional Warfare Task Force (MACVSOG), the outfit that ran Operation Phoenix, infamous for its assassinations and counterterror tactics, and responsible for the deaths of thousands of Vietnamese civilians. Singlaub denies participation in Operation Phoenix. (11) As chief of staff of the United Nations Command in South Korea in 1978, he publicly condemned the decision of President Jimmy Carter to reduce the number of U.S. troops in Korea. He was then forced to retire. (11) Singlaub served as honorary chairman of Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign in Colorado. (30) In 1984, Under Secretary of Defense Fred Ikle appointed Singlaub to head a committee studying U.S. responses to the insurgency in El Salvador. (2<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <br><br>When questioned on the CBS Television show "60 Minutes" about his connections with contra funding Singlaub was asked by Mike Wallace,"Let me put a thesis to you, General Singlaub. Private citizen Jack Singlaub has become Ronald Reagan's secret weapon to sidestep a Congress that will not permit him to act in the areas where he believes that our security interests are at stake. True?" Singlaub's response: "True."(52)<br><br>Lieutenant General Daniel O. Graham, former director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, is on the board of USCWF. Graham is the head of High Frontiers, an organization promoting the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). He is also on the board of the Council for National Policy and has been an important figure in CAUSA, the major political arm of the Unification Church. (11,39,43) Graham, Singlaub, Walter Judd, and John LeBoutillier are members of the American Freedom Coalition, an organization which is the result of a merger of a rightwing Christian lobby organization and an offshoot of the Unification Church. (13,14)<br><br>John Carbaugh, chief aide to Jesse Helms, attended WACL conventions in 1980 and 1984. Upon receiving a memo from Carbaugh, Helms assisted in the creation of the Conservative Caucus, headed by Howard Phillips, who was working in Helm's office at the time. (12) Margo Carlisle, aide to Sen. James McClure (R-ID), also attended the 1980 convention. (11) Carlisle was on the 1982-1983 board of governors of the Council for National Policy, listed there as the executive director of the Senate Republican Conference. (39) Rep. Tom Loeffler (R-TX) spoke at the WACL convention in 1985. (19) Other congresspeople who have participated in WACL events include: Rep. Robert Dornan (RCA), Sen. Jake Garn (R-UT), Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC), Sen. James McClure (R-ID), Sen. Steven D. Symms (R-ID), Sen. Stromm Thurman (R-SC), Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA), and Rep. Walter Judd (RMN). (11)<br><br>Roger Pearson, WACL chairman from 1978 to 1980, was oustedfrom WACL in 1980 for Nazi affiliations and attempting to expel more "moderate" WACL groups in Europe. (30) The same Roger Pearson received a letter of commendation from President Ronald Reagan in April 1982 for an article he wrote. The AntiDefamation League protested to the president about support of a man known to be a promoter of neo-Nazi, anti-semitic and racist ideology but received no response. In 1986, Pearson was head of the Council of American Affairs in Washington DC (11,23)<br><br>Lev Dobriansky, a former OSS officer in Germany in World War II, was chairman of the National Captive Nations Committee and on the U.S. WACL board in the 1970s. (11) He was appointed U.S. ambassador to the Bahamas by President Ronald Reagan. (11,30) Dobriansky's daughter Paula was on the National Security Council during the Reagan administration. (61)<br><br>Lewis Tambs, the ambassador to Costa Rica until 1986, was a WACL member as was Alberto Piedra, appointed by Reagan as ambassador to Guatemala. (38,40)<br><br>The Washington Post in December of 1984 reported Singlaub saying that,"he and others have sent millions of dollars in uniforms, food, medicine and other aid to contras or their families and to refugees in Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala."<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong> He went on to say,"the Defense Department has helped to coordinate the private aid."</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->(11) In an Oct 1986 interview on "60 Minutes," Singlaub acknowledged that he and Col. Oliver North worked together to establish the Nicaraguan contra supply network. (52)<br><br>Representative Gerald B. Solomon was a keynote speaker at the 1989 WACL conference in Brisbane. The message he carried was that we must not let our guard down in the fight against communism. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>It is up to "us" to "finish the job and liberate this world from the blight of communism!"</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> Solomon also delivered a personal message from President George Bush. (55)<br><br> <br>-----discussion of private connections deleted for brevity-----------<br> <br><br>Comments:<br><br>WACL is an international, anticommunist, mercenary group available to rightwing governments around the world to assist in carrying out "extra-legal" activities. Since its inception it has been closely linked to the governments of South Korea and Taiwan. Fred Clarkson contends that "the Moon organization is an integral part of WACL, which in turn has played a pivotal role in the development and activities of the Unification Church."(41) Jonathan Marshall, Peter Dale Scott, and Jane Hunter in their book The Iran-Contra Connection state that<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong> WACL has played a role in the drug-funded secret war of the CIA which began in the 1950s in the Far East, was active in Vietnam and now in Latin America."A leading institution in this historic continuity has been the drug-linked WACL, which between 1984 and 1986 was the principal publicly identified source of funding for the contras."(59)(well, as long as we're FREE!)</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>To quote from Inside the League,"As long as it serves such important purposes for so many notorious groups around the world, and as long as there are men and women who will wail about the influx of 'criminal elements' but turn around and quietly work with those elements, there will be a World AntiCommunist League.<br><br>"The League is not a 'paper tiger. '<br><br>"It is a well-funded, six-continent federation of men and women who have given up on democracy, or who never believed in it in the first place, and who are now fighting their enemies on their own terms."(11)<br><br>U.S. Address: 108-A South Columbus Street, Barrister Square, Alexandria, VA 22314<br><br> <br><br>Principals:<br><br>WACL council chairman in 1989 was Genevieve Aubry. (55) Dr. Ku Cheng-Kang was honorary chairman and Hon. Sen. Jose Desmarets was council chairman in 1987. Prof. Dr. Woo, JaeSeung of Korea is or was secretary-general in 1987. (54) Major General John Singlaub, was chair until mid-1986. (1<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> Osami Kuboki, head of the Unification Church in Japan and co-founder and chair of Shokyo Rengo, the Japanese branch of WACL and has been an executive board member for many years. (41,21) Dr. Yaroslav Stetsko, executive board member, is a former Nazi collaborator from the Ukraine; Dr. Manuel Frutos, executive board member from Paraguay; Sheik Ahmed Salah Jamjoon of Saudi Arabia, a member of the royal family representing the Middle Eastern Solidarity Council on the executive board; and Patrick Walsh of Canada, executive board member. (11)<br><br>In 1989 heads of the regional organizations were: Dr. Robert N. Thompson, NARWACL; Dr. Han, Lih-wu, APACL; Cdt. Georges A. Rombouts, ECWF; and Mme. Slave Stetsko, ABN. Sergio Tapia is vice president of FEDAL. (The acronyms are defined later in the text. )(55)<br><br>The World Anti-Communist League (WACL) does not print annual reports or publish other documents available to the public giving details about the organization and its membership. However, WACL does hold elaborate, by-invitation-only annual meetings at which the purpose of the organization is reconfirmed and long- and short-term planning is conducted. It is presumed, therefore, that those who attend the annual meetings play a principal role in setting the goals and planning the operations of WACL. Throughout this report the past tense will be used when referring to WACL memberships, but many of these people are still presumed to be active in the group.<br><br>A number of significant people have attended WACL annual conferences from Latin America. These include Carlos Barbieri Filho of Brazil, reportedly an agent of the Taiwanese government and head of the Federacion de Entidades Democraticas de America Latina (FEDAL). (37) Mario Sandoval Alarcon (the "Godfather"<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START ;) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/wink.gif ALT=";)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> of the National Liberation Movement (MLN) of Guatemala; Adolfo Calero of Nicaragua, a leader in the Nicaraguan Democratic Front (FDN) contra forces; Roberto D'Aubuission of El Salvador, founder of the rightwing ARENA party and founder of the Salvadoran death squads; Benito Guanes, former chief of Paraguayan military intelligence; and Raimundo Guerrero of<br><br>Mexico, professor at the Autonomous University of Guadalajara and principal leader of the Tecos were other attendees. (11)<br><br>From the South African WACL chapter, Ivor Benson, known for his racist and anti-semitic books, has attended. (37)<br><br>The "former ruling class" has been represented by Anastasio Somoza, former ruler of Nicaragua;(37) former president of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos;(36) and former president of South Vietnam Nguyen Van Thieu. (36)<br><br>European WACL chapters have included these participants at conferences: St. C de Berkelaar of the Netherlands, former SS officer and president of Sint Martinsfonds, an organization of hundreds of former Dutch SS officers;(11) Alfred Gielen from Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry who represented West Germany until the mid-1980s;(21) and Giorgio Almirante of Italy, an official in the Benito Mussolini government. (9)<br><br>The U.S. WACL delegation has included many people from anti-Soviet (often pro-fascist) groups from eastern Europe. Among them have been Dr. Anton Bonifacic of Croatia, wanted in Yugoslavia for war crimes, and a member of the American chapter of the Croatian Liberation Movement, and John Kosiak of Byelorussia, wanted in the U.S. S. R. for war crimes. Kosiak is now in the U.S. and is chairman of the Byelorussian Liberation Front. (11) Others from the U.S. delegation were Anthony Bouscaren, William Starr, Lee Edwards, and Roger Peterson. Bouscaren, a professor at Le Moyne University has served on the board of the U.S. Council for World Freedom (USCWF). (9) William Starr of Tucson, AZ represented CAUSA, the political arm of the Unification Church. (9) Lee Edwards, founder of the first U.S. chapter of WACL, acted as a registered foreign agent for WACL until 1982. (11) An anthropologist and author of racial supremacy books, Roger Pearson was chairman of WACL from 1978 to 1980. (23)<br><br>Yaroslav Stetsko, chairman of the Anti-Bolshevic Bloc of Nations (ABN), attended many WACL conferences. Stetsko was a Nazi collaborator and briefly was the self-declared leader of the Ukraine. (11)<br><br>The Canadian WACL was represented at the conference by Patrick Walsh of the executive board and by Chirila Ciuntu, who remains a member of the Rumanian Iron Guard, a group notorious for its pogroms against the Jews. Ciuntu is active in WACL in Canada. (11)<br><br>The Asian WACL chapters have sent numerous representatives to the WACL conferences. From Japan came Ryiochi Sasakawa, a member of the Diet in World War II who was classified as a war criminal by the U.S. and served two years in prison. Takeshi Furuta, a representative of the Intl Federation for Victory Over Communism, the original political organization of the Unification Church is another major Japanese WACL supporter. (11)<br><br>South Korean representatives have included Colonel Lee Byung Hee, member of the KCIA and minister-without-portfolio for President Park and General Lee Yung-Joon. The latter was a member of the Japanese army in World War II, Korean army chief of staff in 1949, minister of communications in 1955, and in 1986 was an adviser to the Assoc of Veterans and a member of the State Affairs Advisory Council of South Korea. General Honkon Lee, in 1986 a member of the State Affairs Advisory Council, a former army chief of staff and former ambassador to the Philippines and Great Britain, has also participated in WACL conferences. Colonel Shin Chan, also a participant in WACL conferences, was a spokesman for the ministry of national defense in 1975, executive director of the Association for Promotion of War Industry in 1979, and the director of the KCIA in 1981. Another Korean participant was General Yoo Hanksoung, director of the KCIA in 1980. (11)<br><br>Edward Entero Chey of Cambodia, attended a WACL conference as a representative of Son Sann, a rebel organization fighting against the Cambodian government. Chey's expenses were paid by the government of Taiwan. (9)<br><br>Dr. Ku Cheng-kang of Taiwan is the honorary life chairman of WACL and was a high-level leader of the Nationalist Party when the group began in Taiwan. In 1986, he served as senior policy adviser to the president and was the president of the Republic of China's National Assembly. (11,2<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <br><br><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://rightweb.irc-online.org/groupwatch/wacl.php">rightweb.irc-online.org/g...h/wacl.php</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> (sources listed on the site.)<br><br>Yeah, I'll take my fucking cult. <p></p><i></i>
Dreams End
 

go ahead, take your cult then...

Postby robertdreed » Tue Nov 22, 2005 4:21 am

but don't act so bewildered. <br><br>"I've never demanded agreement from you."<br><br>By my reading, that's exactly what you've been doing. <br><br> "We disagree on most things and had some good debates on it. I just didn't know you were..."<br><br>Do you mind finishing that sentence, so I'm not required to guess what you think of me?<br><br><br>"By the way, is it ALL the left that's a cult?"<br><br>That depends on how one defines "the Left" in practical terms, as a movement. One pronounced tendency I've noticed on the RI board is the preoccupation of many of the self-defined Leftists with hunting "gatekeepers", "disinformationists", "sell-outs", and similar poseurs. In some ways, it strikes me as similar to the debates I've heard among indie rock snobs about how to determine who's really "alternative." But then I think about the real legacy of so many Left regimes that assumed power in recent history- Dzerinshky's NKVD in the 1920s, the show trials of Stalin's regime in the 1930s, SMERSH, the Red Guards, etc.- and I don't find the resonances to be nearly as amusing.<br><br>To answer your question in brief, without elaboration- no, I don't view the entire Left as a cult- just the prevailing mentality I'm seeing among the self-pronounced Leftists on the RI board. Although it's also a tendency that I've encountered elsewhere. <br><br>I've been meaning to provide a brief abstract of my views on the Left-Right spectrum for a while. I won't do it tonight. For now, I'll simply note that I think there's more to Left perspectives than simply Marxism and its spin-offs.<br><br>Please- spare me the lecture on WACL. I've been following that trail for 10 years, now. I read Anderson & Anderson's <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Inside The League</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> and Peter Dale Scott & Jonathan Marshall's <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Iran-Contra Connection</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> back around 1995, and I've developed a lot more material out of researching the references supplied by those books. I'm familiar with every last historical detail in the article you've supplied. In fact, I can add considerable supplemental material without having to crack a single book, or do a single search. <br><br>I don't think much of arguments that rely on counterattack as an exclusive substitute for defense in debate. That holds true whether it's Republicans who "defend" George W. Bush by bringing up Chappaquiddick, or Leftists who gloss over the historical threats represented by the Gulag Archipelago State or the MaoThought Cultural Revolution by bringing up WACL. <br><br>I think that recognizing the character of the Soviets and of the Marxist-Leninist regimes of the Cold War era is imperative to having a balanced perspective on the era. You seem to consider it to be nothing more than pro-CIA apologism. That begs the question of why I'm at least as much in favor of "Glasnost in the West" (as Philip Willan put it in his book <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Puppetmasters</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> ) as anyone else on this board. The Cold War is over, a thorough review and a housecleaning is long overdue. In fact, the failure to do it posthaste as part of the promised post-Cold War "peace dividend" accounts in large measure for many of the messes that the USA is in today. But that doesn't mean that I have to put myself in the business of (for example) sticking black hats on everybody in the CIA, the ARVN, and the Peruvian military, while sticking white hats on everyone in the KGB, the Viet Minh, and Sendero Luminoso, in the course of doing historical review. I find that approach as intellectually dishonest as the obverse. It's a much more complicated world. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=robertdreed>robertdreed</A> at: 11/22/05 1:48 am<br></i>
robertdreed
 
Posts: 1560
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 11:14 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

Re: go ahead, take your cult then...

Postby Dreams End » Tue Nov 22, 2005 4:54 am

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>I don't think much of arguments that rely on counterattack as an exclusive substitute for defense in debate. That holds true whether it's Republicans who "defend" George W. Bush by bringing up Chappaquiddick, or Leftists who gloss over the historical threats represented by the Gulag Archipelago State or the MaoThought Cultural Revolution by bringing up WACL.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>...or alleged "moderates" who "defend" the CIA by bringing up the former Soviet Union. Do we both have to follow your guidelines, or just me?<br><br>I"ve asked you repeatedly what sorts of activities you think were justified in the name of anti-communism. somewhere you talked about Greece but I can't find that anymore for some reason. I listed all kinds of things that we both know the CIA engages in. I listed all kinds of countries the CIA was active in. I posted a lengthy article about the extent to which they are willing to go (using "private" parties as conduits) to achieve their objectives and I provided some analysis as to what those objectives are. <br><br>In response: <br><br>You talked more about the Soviet Union.<br><br>And said the left was a fucking cult.<br><br>I don't think your book on the art of debate is gonna be a big hit.<br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=dreamsend@rigorousintuition>Dreams End</A> at: 11/22/05 1:55 am<br></i>
Dreams End
 

tango

Postby jenz » Tue Nov 22, 2005 7:01 am

very interesting thread, (which I've only just read.) seems to be 2 ideas having a tango - cia funding of arts a) what was its political punch b)what did it do to the arts. b seems to have fainted on the floor, pity because I have head buzzing over this. its long tormented me, arts funding and patronage questions, how in mid renaissance the funding did seem to help art, through to the early 20th cent. when only a few richish but aware persons seemed to help artists of talent, in a climate of oppositiion to what they were doing. then somehow, something else seemed to start operating. a star system in fact. I'm struggling to work out how the Saatchi effect on British art fits in. <br>ideas?<br><br>also, I don't think that argument that artists must engage with overt politics to be worthy (representations of suffering etc) holds water. think Matisse, works of joy wrought out of suffering, a different kind of statement. when first pole-axed by 'the knowledge', only listening to music by a composer who had worked through suffering helped, when I could look at no visual images and read no books. both on the level of the music speaking and on the level of grasping at the idea that human spirit could transcend suffering. art is about our humanity asserting itself.<br><br> I do think that the potential of artists gets stifled by the star system. both the chosen ones, who get to churn out endlessly their own genre, a recognisable product, and the unchosen; it is not an argument that I can't name them. once heard, singing on the street in a small french town, jazz singer to wipe all others off map - who he? no idea. had no funds to offer him a recording contract. most talented individuals who don't strike lucky end up earning the crust some other way, art stifled by economic necessity. somehow it bothers me a lot more that cia funding of arts in creating a star system which distorted the market may have inhibited the art of our era, than that it may have been a political tool of control of our thought processes. and did they just recognise what an anarchistic free thinking lot art students tend to be, and decide to get in there and sort it out? <p></p><i></i>
jenz
 
Posts: 278
Joined: Sat Jul 02, 2005 6:35 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

Re: PW

Postby israelirealities » Tue Nov 22, 2005 7:43 am

Of course my "take" on Ostrovsky is in the context of his more famous aspect...he is still the sole survivor of whistleblowing against the mightiest organization in the world (according to some paranoids). By definition, one has to be somewhat simplistic in psychological/spiritual make up, in order to take such a bold act, AND survive it. I'd say his art is "naive". I found out that bravery requires an amount of "thickness". <br>A Propos Dali. Following DE's stargate thread, I googled good ol' Uri Geller, and landed on his "art gallery". First image is "Uri Geller says he is ", and a picture of Dali holding a bent spoon, with Uri next to him. Geller has some paintings, says he was mainly influenced by Dali (and then Picasso etc and others whom he met). He also did pottery and drawings and jewelry design. I wonder what he thinks about his life these days. just curious.<br>This naturally led me to suspect Dali's connections...but that's silly, of course. <br>This just makes me have a quick thought about the difference between ra/mc survivors based on gender...i'd say the male survivors would never admit the full extent and depth of the control they are or were under. which must be reflected in surviving strategies and the level of interpreting past experiences. this would also change the artistic expressions.<br><br> <p></p><i></i>
israelirealities
 
Posts: 385
Joined: Fri Sep 02, 2005 8:47 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

Re: PW

Postby Dreams End » Tue Nov 22, 2005 11:55 am

I'm not really a Lew Rockwell fan and I don't agree with everything in this article but I thought I'd post it because it's about the CIA and it's attack on the "isolationist RIGHT"...<br><br>I post it for a few reasons.<br><br>First, you can see how elaborate and extensive some of this CIA work is and for those who maybe don't know about the Congress of Cultural Freedom, it's interesting to learn of yet ANOTHER organ the CIA used to shape the cold war debate.<br><br>I also link it because it is someone from the right...the more libertarian right...who bemoans how the Soviet Union was used by the CIA as a bogeyman to justify all kinds of intervention.<br><br>Finally, this idea that the neo-cons are an intel operation is the one that makes the most sense to me. It talks about how many of the neo-cons were part of an effort from the "left" to attack the Soviet Union. That core group led to the neo-cons of today. I simply always wondered why all these alleged "trotskyites" suddently became Republicans. Trotsky was no friend of the USSR authorities, but he was no Republican I think it's safe to say.<br><br>The whole second half of the article has a lot of stuff I don't agree with but so as not to be accused of cherry picking I'll post the whole thing. <br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr> Neoconservatism: a CIA Front?<br><br><br><br>This article first appeared in 1997 in The Rothbard-Rockwell Report.<br><br>Not long after the Central Intelligence Agency was founded in 1947, the American public and the world were subjected to an unprecedented level of propaganda in the service of US foreign policy objectives in the Cold War. The propaganda offensive of the government centered around its obsession with securing the emerging US-dominated world order in the wake of the Second World War. It was a time when Europe lay in ruins and when subservience to US planners, in government and business, was the order of the day.<br><br>Although it is now widely conceded that there was never any serious threat of a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, let alone of the United States, the menace of the Soviet Union was the pretext underlying discussion of foreign policy. To pay for the Cold War, Harry Truman set out, as Arthur Vandenberg advised, to "Scare the Hell out of the American people." A daunting task, considering the years of pro-Soviet accolades that had been previously flowing from the executive branch.<br><br>Nonetheless, the Soviet threat served as a useful chimera to keep the masses in line. What were the targets singled out for demonization in the Cold War propaganda campaign? One of the chief aims of the government was to discredit dangerously parochial attitudes about the desirability of peace. It was also thought necessary to inoculate the public, particularly in Europe, against the virus of "neutralism."<br><br>Further, since the American government had successfully entrenched the military industrial complex as a permanent feature of American life, US planners were eager to discredit the idea of "disarmament," which meant not only a rejection of the techniques of mass murder developed and perfected by the Allied powers in the Second World War, but also a return to the pre-war days when the union of government and business was more tenuous, government-connected profits were fleeting, and market discipline provided a check on consolidation.<br><br>The degree to which the press participated as a partner in the rhetoric of the Cold War was no accident. Media penetration was a major facet of CIA activities in both the foreign and domestic context. At its peak, the CIA allocated 29 percent of its budget to "media and propaganda." The extent of its efforts are difficult to measure, but some information has slipped through the shroud of secrecy.<br><br>One report notes that the media organizations funded by the CIA in Europe included: the West German News agency DENA (later the DPA), the writers association PEN in Paris, a number of French newspapers, the International Forum of Journalists, and Forum World Features. The London-based Forum World Features provided stories to "140 newspapers around the world, including about 30 in the United States, amongst which were the Washington Post and four other major dailies."<br><br>The US Senate’s Church committee reported that the Post was aware that the service was "CIA-controlled." German media tycoon Axel Springer had received the then-substantial sum of more than $7 million from the Agency to build his press empire. His relationship with the CIA was reported to have extended through the 1970s. The New York Times reported that the CIA owned or subsidized more than 50 newspapers, news services, radio stations, and periodicals. The paper reported that at least another dozen were infiltrated by the CIA; more than 1,000 books either written directly or subsidized by the Agency were published during this period.<br><br>The penetration of CIA propaganda into the American press was far more extensive than an occasional distorted report from Europe. By the early 70s, it had been revealed that the head of the Hearst bureau in London was a CIA agent. Some suspicion was aroused among those editors not on the Company payroll, and inquiring minds among them wanted to know if CIA men were currently in their employ. Soon thereafter the Washington Star-News published a report claiming that some three-dozen journalists were on the payroll of the Agency. One agent was identified in the story as a member of the Star-News’ own staff. When the paper went belly up in 1981, the "journalist" in question went directly to work for the Reagan administration. Later, he joined the staff of the Washington Times.<br><br>Though pressured, the CIA refused for some time to release information on its tentacles in the "free press." There’s little wonder why. When George Bush assumed the role of CIA director, he agreed to a single paragraph summary of each of its journalists for the Church committee. When it submitted the last of its data, the CIA had provided information on more than 400 journalists. The final Church report was a disappointment, having been audited by the CIA. A subsequent House investigation was suppressed, though a leak it was published in the Village Voice. The House report indicated that Reuters news service was frequently used for CIA disinformation, and that media manipulation may have been the "largest single category of covert action projects taken by the CIA." According to the watchdog group Public Information Resource, propaganda expenses in the 70s may have exceeded $285 million a year. This was more than "the combined budgets of Reuters, United Press International, and the Associated Press."<br><br>By the late seventies, reports emerged that the publishing house Copley Press had for three decades served as a CIA front. Its subsidiary, Copley News Service, provided the CIA a mouthpiece in Latin America. Propaganda in Latin America was more or less constant, as the CIA influenced elections, organized the torture and murder of dissidents, including priests, and backed brutal, but pro-American patsies throughout the region.<br><br>The efforts in manipulation of opinion in Latin America were reflected in similar campaigns at home. For instance: pro-contra public relations specialist Edgar Chamorro served as a conduit of disinformation from 1982 to 1984, manipulating journalists and Congressmen at the behest of the CIA. Though domestic propaganda is a violation of the law, it was a standard Agency tactic.<br><br>The Carter administration, in an effort to soften public interest in the CIA’s involvement with the press, issued an executive order touted in the media as a ban on the manipulation of the American media. Belatedly, as another PIR report notes, the Society of Professional Journalists had this to say—"An executive order during the Carter administration was thought to have banned the practice [of recruitment of journalists by the CIA]. After a Council on Foreign Relations task force recommended that the ban be reconsidered, it was revealed that a ‘loophole’ existed allowing the CIA director or his deputy to grant a waiver." As a follow-up, the Reagan administration signed a law banning media disclosure of covert operations as a felony.<br><br>If reporters were often led to compromise their integrity at the behest of the warfare state, it was an example set at the highest levels of power in the American media. Press ownership, already concentrated to a ludicrous degree, shared a cozy relationship with the CIA from its start. Those chummy with the Company included Time-Life magnate Henry Luce, former Post owner Philip Graham and assorted New York Times owners in the Sulzberger family. Top editors of the Post and Newsweek have also served as agents, while the Post’s intelligence reporter was on the take from the CIA in the 60s. Katherine Graham, for decades owner of the Washington Post, had this to say to top CIA officials as the Berlin Wall was starting to crack. "There are some things the general public does not need to know and shouldn’t. I believe democracy flourishes when the government can take legitimate steps to keep its secrets and when the press can decide whether to print what it knows."<br><br>The conservative movement that culminated in the elevation of Ronald Reagan to the presidency was a product of those turbulent Cold War years, and perhaps more so a product of domestic intervention by the security state than many of its participants would care to admit. The armchair warriors in the neoconservative camp and the inveterate interventionists at National Review can both trace their roots straight back to the propaganda efforts of the CIA.<br><br>After the Hitler-Stalin pact, the neoconservatives moved from cafeteria Trotskyites to apologists for the US warfare state without missing a beat, as Justin Raimondo shows in his 1993 Reclaiming the American Right. The CIA’s role in establishing the influence of the neocons came out in the late 60s, though the revelations were obscured by the primary actors’ denials of knowledge of the covert funding. The premiere organization of the anti-Stalinist left, the Congress for Cultural Freedom, provided a base of operations to launch a left-intellectual crusade against the Soviet Union. The revelation that the Congress was a CIA front destroyed the organization’s credibility, and it went belly up despite the best efforts of the Ford Foundation to keep it afloat. The Congress disappeared, but as Raimondo notes, "the core group later came to be known as the neoconservatives."<br><br>The Congress for Cultural Freedom was perhaps the Agency’s most ambitious attempt at control and influence of intellectual life throughout Europe and the world. Affiliates were established in America, Europe, Australia, Japan, Latin America, India, and Africa, although its appeal was limited in the Third World for obvious reasons. It combined concerts, conferences, and publishing efforts, promoting the State Department line on the Cold War. Magazines affiliated with the Congress included, among others, the China Quarterly, the New Leader and, of course, Encounter.<br><br>The funding of the Congress and similar fronts was organized through dozens of charitable trusts and nonprofit foundations, some of which were invented by the CIA. The money was made available through seemingly legitimate means to the Congress, as well as to political parties (including the German Social Democrats), unions and labor organizations, journalists’ unions, student groups, and any number of other organizations that could be counted on to support US hegemony in Europe and the world.<br><br>The most complete story of the CIA and the Congress for Cultural Freedom is found in Peter Coleman’s apologetic book, The Liberal Conspiracy. Coleman, a former Australian barrister and editor of the Congress magazine, the Quadrant, lets slip quite a bit of revelatory information in his analysis of the Congress’s activities and its relationship to the CIA. The common targets of Congress literature, as Coleman notes, are familiar: the literature was anti-Communist, social democratic, and anti-neutralist. Other aims promoted by the Congress were cataloged by William Blum: "a strong, well-armed, and united Western Europe, allied to the United States....support for the Common Market and NATO and...skepticism of disarmament [and] pacifism. Criticism of US foreign policy took place within the framework of cold war assumptions; for example that a particular American intervention was not the most effective way of combating communism, not that there was anything wrong with intervention per se...." F.A. Hayek commented that the Congress’ strategic agenda was "not to plan the future of freedom, but to write its obituary."<br><br>Among those involved with the Congress were James Burnham, Irving Kristol, Gertrude Himmelfarb, Daniel Bell, Arthur Schlesinger, Lionel Trilling, and the self-described "life-long Menshevik" Sidney Hook. After World War Two, Kristol worked as the editor for the American Jewish Committee’s Commentary magazine, then served as editor of Encounter from 1953 to 1958.<br><br>The Congress was organized by Kristol’s boss and CIA man Michael Josselson, who maintained a tight grip on the activities of the Congress as well as the content of its publications. According to Coleman, Josselson’s criteria for his editors was simple: they had to be reliable on the State Department line. Later, Kristol was to deny he knew the organization was a front. This seems unlikely for several reasons. For one, Sidney Hook stated that "like almost everyone else," he had heard that "the CIA was making some contribution to the financing of the Congress." More to the point, as Tom Braden, then head of the CIA’s International Organizations division, wrote in a Saturday Evening Post article, a CIA agent always served as editor of Encounter. Today, Kristol is a kind of svengali in the modern conservative world.<br><br>Neoconservative prominence and influence owes quite a bit to the covert activities of this government, something they forget only rarely, as with the case of neocon Richard Perle who was caught funneling information to one of our "reliable allies" while in the Reagan administration.<br><br>While waging the CIA’s battle, the neocons were not yet billing themselves as conservatives. But the National Review was another matter, a journal aimed specifically at the American right wing. The official line holds that National Review was founded in an intellectual vacuum, and, for all intents and purposes, created conservatism in America. But events, as are most often the case, were not that simple. The idea for National Review originated with Willi Schlamm, a hard-line interventionist and feature editor with the Old Right Freeman. At odds with the isolationism of the right, Schlamm was well-known for his belligerence, having demanded that the United States go to war over Formosa.<br><br>One person in a position to know more details about the founding of NR was the late classicist and right-winger Revilo Oliver. Although late in life Oliver was associated most closely with extremist racialism, in the 50s, he was an influential member of the Buckley inner circle, a regular contributor to National Review and a member of Bill Buckley’s wedding party. Later, he went on to serve as a founding board member of the John Birch Society, until his break with the Society’s founder Robert Welch.<br><br>In his autobiography, Oliver explains that the National Review was conceived as a way to put the isolationist Freeman out of business. A surreptitious deal was cut with one of the Freeman editors (presumably Schlamm) to turn the magazine over to Buckley; a last-ditch effort saved the magazine, and control was assumed by Leonard E. Read, president of the Foundation for Economic Education. Unfortunately, Read balked at "politics," i.e., analyzing and criticizing government actions, and the magazine quickly slipped into irrelevance.<br><br>It’s hard to blame the editors of the Freeman for failing to see Buckley’s treachery coming. As late as 1954, Buckley was denouncing the US military as incompatible with a free society. Soldiers emerging from the armed forces, Buckley argued, were brainwashed with militaristic platitudes. In his essay, Buckley proposed a debriefing regime for all military men "solely based on the great libertarian documents of our civilization" and study of the lives of the world’s "great individualists." But, as they say, the times, they were a changin’.<br><br>Buckley’s decision to launch the National Review was a watershed event on the right by any measure. As Buckley’s admiring social-democratic biographer John Judis notes, "Except for Chodorov, who was a Buckley family friend, none of the right-wing isolationists were included on National Review’s masthead. While this point of view had been welcome in the Freeman, it would not be welcome, even as a dissenting view, in National Review."<br><br>As Judis notes, Schlamm, who envisioned himself as the guiding light behind NR, was not even a conservative. He "had more in common with Dwight MacDonald or Daniel Bell than with Robert McCormick; Buckley was turning his back on much of the isolationist...Old Right that had applauded his earlier books and that his father had been politically close to."<br><br>Buckley, by 1955, had already been in deep cover for the CIA. While there is some confusion as to the actual duration of Buckley’s service as an agent, Judis notes that he served under E. Howard Hunt of Watergate fame in Mexico City in 1951. Buckley was directed to the CIA by Yale Professor Wilmoore Kendall, who passed Buckley along to James Burnham, then a consultant to the Office Of Policy Coordination, the CIA’s covert-action wing.<br><br>Buckley apparently had a knack for spying: before his stint with the Agency, he had served as an on-campus informant for the FBI, feeding God only knows what to Hoover’s political police. In any case, it is known that Buckley continued to participate at least indirectly in CIA covert activities through the 60s.<br><br>The founding circle of National Review was composed largely of former agents or men otherwise in the pay of the CIA, including Buckley, Kendall, and Burnham. Wall Street lawyer William Casey, rooted in OSS activities and later to be named director of the CIA, drew up the legal documents for the new magazine. (He also helped transfer Human Events from isolationist to interventionist hands.)<br><br>NR required nearly half a million to get off the ground; the only substantial contribution known was from Will Buckley, Senior: $100,000. It’s long been rumored that CIA black funds were used to start the magazine, but no hard evidence exists to establish it. It may also be relevant that the National Review was organized as a nonprofit venture, as covert funding was typically channeled through foundations.<br><br>By the 70s, it was known that Buckley had been an agent. More imaginative right-wingers accused Buckley of complicity in everything from the assassination of JFK to the Watergate break-in, undoubtedly owing to his relationship with the mysterious Hunt.<br><br>But sober minds also believed that something was suspicious about the National Review. In a syndicated column, Gary Wills wondered, "Was National Review, with four ex-agents of the CIA on its staff, a CIA operation? If so, the CIA was stingy, and I doubt it – but even some on the editorial board raised the question. And the magazine supported Buckley’s old CIA boss, Howard Hunt, and publicized a fund drive for him." In reply, Buckley denounced Wills for being a classicist. But others close to the founding circle of National Review nurtured similar suspicions. Libertarian "fusionist" Frank Meyer, for example, confided privately that he believed that the National Review was a CIA front.<br><br>If it was, then it was the federal government that finally broke the back of the populist and isolationist right, the mass-based movement with its roots in the America First anti-war movement. What FDR tried and failed to do when he sought to shut down the Chicago Tribune, when his attorney general held mass sedition trials of his critics on the right, and when he orchestrated one of the worst smear campaigns in US history against his conservative opponents, the CIA accomplished. That in itself ought to lead conservatives to oppose the existence of executive agencies engaged in covert operations.<br><br>Today, the war-mongering right is self-sustaining. Money flows like milk and honey to neoconservative activists from the major conservative foundations. Irving’s son Bill Kristol has his sugar daddy in the form of media tycoon and alien Rupert Murdoch. National Review is boring, but in no danger of going under financially.<br><br>But the cozy relationship with the federal government is the same. Neocons Bill Kristol and Robert Kagan now insist on massive extensions of the warfare state. The Weekly Standard demands a ground war to topple the head of a foreign government unfriendly to Israel, while denouncing right-wing isolationism, libertarianism, and Murray Rothbard.<br><br>This time, the right-wing War Hawks face a potentially insurmountable challenge. The pro-war propaganda directed at the domestic population is failing badly. It is ineffective for two principle reasons: mounting intellectual opposition to the warfare state and the return of grassroots isolationism. Both trends have come to the fore. And not only with the collapse of communism. Widespread public disillusionment exists over the Gulf War of 1991. Sold to the public as a high-tech "virtual" war, the consequences have been harder to hide than the execution of the attack. With over a million Iraqis dead, Hussein still in power, US soldiers apparently poisoned by their own government and a not so far-fetched feeling that the public was duped into supporting an unjust slaughter, people are starting to regard the Gulf War as an outrage. And they are right.<br><br>At the height of the Cold War, opposition to interventionism was largely isolated to the anti-war Left. While marshaling an impressive analytic literature on the evils of US imperialism, particularly in the context of Viet Nam, the Left was suspect for its support of socialism and its sometimes overt sympathies for totalitarian regimes. On the right, things were different. Except for a noble band of libertarians lead by Murray Rothbard, conservatives and many libertarians were front and center in support of the security state and its nefarious activities. Now, virtually the entire right is opposed to interventionism. Traditionalists and even nationalist right-wingers are generally opposed to foreign military actions. The dominant anti-war force on the right is the growing number of explicitly isolationist libertarians, who want no truck with the warfare state on principle. The Weekly Standard acknowledged as much and identified Murray Rothbard as the guiding spirit behind today’s antistatist, antiwar movement. And the nonliberal left, lead by long-time noninterventionists like Noam Chomsky, remains opposed to US global hegemony. The neocons and their corporate liberal cronies are the only spokesman for militarism.<br><br>The grassroots are hated by the neocons for precisely that reason. The man on the street, the movement conservative, the Perot voter, the Libertarian Party man – they all want the troops brought home and the tyranny of the US empire brought to a halt. When the leaders of the empire try to talk down to normal people, they are jeered off the stage. The RRR position – no more war – is more and more the position of the American people. That’s a strike for peace and a strike for liberty.<br><br>Copyright © 1997 by the Center for Libertarian, Studies, I<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END-->nc<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/pavlik2.html">www.lewrockwell.com/orig/pavlik2.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--> <p></p><i></i>
Dreams End
 

Surprised

Postby FourthBase » Tue Nov 22, 2005 9:59 pm

RDR hasn't been called an unmentionable yet. Because he has certainly done everything possible in this thread to deserve it. I think the thread would be better served if he took a significant hiatus from it. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Come back at some point, RDR, but bug off for a while and let us sort these issues out without your interference</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->. Thank you.<br><br>I will merely restate Jenz's ignored post, because it reflects much of what I feel:<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>very interesting thread, (which I've only just read.) seems to be 2 ideas having a tango - cia funding of arts a) what was its political punch b)<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>what did it do to the arts</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->. b seems to have fainted on the floor, pity because I have head buzzing over this. its long tormented me, arts funding and patronage questions, how in mid renaissance the funding did seem to help art, through to the early 20th cent. when only a few richish but aware persons seemed to help artists of talent, in a climate of oppositiion to what they were doing. then somehow, something else seemed to start operating. a star system in fact. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>I'm struggling to work out how the Saatchi effect on British art fits in</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->. <br>ideas?<br><br>also, I don't think that argument that artists must engage with overt politics to be worthy (representations of suffering etc) holds water. think Matisse, works of joy wrought out of suffering, a different kind of statement. when first pole-axed by 'the knowledge', only listening to music by a composer who had worked through suffering helped, when I could look at no visual images and read no books. both on the level of the music speaking and on the level of grasping at the idea that human spirit could transcend suffering. art is about our humanity asserting itself.<br><br>I do think that the potential of artists gets stifled by the star system. both the chosen ones, who get to churn out endlessly their own genre, a recognisable product, and the unchosen; it is not an argument that I can't name them. once heard, singing on the street in a small french town, jazz singer to wipe all others off map - who he? no idea. had no funds to offer him a recording contract. most talented individuals who don't strike lucky end up earning the crust some other way, art stifled by economic necessity. somehow it bothers me a lot more that cia funding of arts in creating a star system which distorted the market may have inhibited the art of our era, than that it may have been a political tool of control of our thought processes. and did they just recognise what an anarchistic free thinking lot art students tend to be, and decide to get in there and sort it out?<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> <br><br>I have to disagree and say that I am equally bothered by how the CIA possibly inhibited the quality and depth of art <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>and</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> by how the CIA used art to control our thought processes and feelings. <p></p><i></i>
User avatar
FourthBase
 
Posts: 7057
Joined: Thu May 05, 2005 4:41 pm
Blog: View Blog (0)

What did it do to the arts?

Postby starroute » Tue Nov 22, 2005 10:38 pm

I'm reminded of two complaints I've read about the arts in America.<br><br>One was a thoughtful analysis -- though read too long ago to recall any details of where or by whom -- which pointed out that even though abstract expressionists passed as rebels and subversives, their actual paintings were perfectly compatible with the corporate world. Not only were most of them too large for actual people to afford or actual homes to accomodate, but their ultimate impact is of a kind of anonymous messagelessness, which neither rebels against nor subverts anything.<br><br>Once in the early 60's, after taking an SAT exam or some such at NYU, I was walking through Greenwich Village with my friends when we passed an artist trying to wrestle a large abstract expressionist canvas onto a truck. The colors were fairly appealing and I said out loud, "Wouldn't it be nice if you could buy it by the foot?" I didn't mean anything slighting -- I would have been perfectly glad to have had a couple of square feet worth for my wall -- but the artist overheard me and became extremely indignant. Perhaps the trouble was that he really *was* painting by the foot and knew it.<br><br>The other thing I'm reminded of is recurrent suggestions I've seen that the New York art scene in particular is not only decadent but deeply perverse. I never did get a clear sense of what this referred to -- beyond a bit of SM imagery around the edges -- but in light of everything that's come under scrutiny at this board, I'm wondering if contemporary art, in its traditional function of holding a mirror up to its intended audience, might be doing a little too much truth-telling for comfort.<br><br>Bland corporate art, decadent elite art, and nothing you could really call a people's art outside of velvet Elvises. I don't know that it's possible to blame the CIA for all this, but this thread certainly has me wondering to what extent the current state of things was engineered.<br> <p></p><i></i>
starroute
 
Posts: 341
Joined: Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:01 am
Blog: View Blog (0)

PreviousNext

Return to Deep Politics

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 3 guests