Revolution as good as its people, Part 3

This article is Part 3 of my series of articles (Part 1 and Part 2) on the Egyptian revolution.


The Luzhin defense, Fiddler on the Roof, Hollywood and Egyptian Revolution

Do you know what's the difference between art in America and everywhere else? I remember reading an article in a Russian newspaper - that was long time ago, maybe in 1991 or 1992. The author was describing a movie he had recently watched on the video - it was a Russian thriller, and I honestly don't remember the name of the movie, let alone its contents. What struck me then were the comments of the Russian movie critic - I will try to reproduce them as close to the original as possible. Of course, my reader should understand that the original article is impossible to find now, so I was complelled to rely on my rather faulty (but very inventive) memory.

The main characters of this movie find themselves in a situation where there is no way out. Mind you, if it were an American movie, a "situation with no way out" would simply mean that there is a way out but you need to work really hard to find it (and kill a bunch of bad guys in the process). But it's a Russian movie, so "no way out" means - NO WAY OUT, irrespective of how much you try.

Why am I telling you this? Please, be patient, comrades, ladies and gentlemen, the explanation is forthcoming....

When I was preparing the second part of my article on the Egyptian revolution, I decided to refresh my memory on Nabokov's immortal novel "The Luzhin Defense". What's more important though, I wanted to check the English spelling of the name "Luzhin". As I discovered, they've already shot a movie based on Nabokov's novel, and this made my search that much easier. I dutifully found the link to the movie, copied the title - and then my eyes scrolled down the page and I read the description of  the movie plot. I must confess that I was a bit startled by it. Let me compare the ending of the movie and great finale of the actual novel.

Here is the ending of the Western movie based on Nabokov's novel:

Luzhin, who is in his muddied wedding suit, sits in his room as Natalia and the hotel staff try to open the door. But before they can get in, the troubled chess grandmaster throws himself out of his bedroom window and dies. The tragic death is witnessed by Valentinov who has just arrived by car.

The film then concludes in the competition hall where Natalia completes the competition using her fiance's notes. Turati does exactly what Luzhin expected and loses. Katkov and Turati then leave acknowledging the Pyrrhic victory and the genius of Luzhin.

And here is Nabokov's version (my translation from Russian to English - with deepest and most sincere apologies to all Nabokov fans). This passage (last in the book) follows right after Luzhin climbs out the window:

Now both of his legs were hanging outside the building, and he had only to release his hold on the wall and he would be saved. But before letting the wall go, he looked down. It seemed like hasty preparations were ongoing: the reflections of the windows were leveling, and the abyss was falling apart into the pale and dark squares, and the very that instant Luzhin unclenched his hands, the instant that an ice-cold air rushed into his mouth, he saw the eternity that obsequiously and inexorably opened to him.


Someone kicked out the door. Several voices started to roar: " Alexander Ivanovich [Luzhin’s first and middle names], Alexander Ivanovich! " But Alexander Ivanovich did not exist.

In the movie you get if not the classical Hollywood happy ending - but something damn close to it. By all means, Luzhin commits suicide, but his genius is vindicated. Of course, this dilutes the entire theme of the novel - actually making the novel far weaker as a work of art. In the original, the chess match remains unfinished, and the chess experts cannot decide whose position is better - making Nabokov's ending far more dramatic. But Hollywood thinks it must make people feel better - and that certainly takes precedence over art.

Where the hell am I going with this, you may ask. Fear not, my readers, I will make my point when it's ready...

About a week ago I walked into the living room and found my wife watching "Fiddler on the Roof" on TV. I was rather perplexed - I remember reading the novel "Tev'e, the milkman" back in the 1980ies, and it was a rather unsettling experience. The novel is about a Jewish milkman, who lives in the Russian empire in the beginning of the 20th century. He has 7 daughters, a wife, and he makes money selling milk and butter and other dairy products (as the Monty Python said - "blessed are the cheesemakers"). At first his affairs go up a little bit, then things get worse, then his life becomes miserable, horrible, unbearable - and finally it gets much worse again. In short, if you want to keep your spirits up, I strongly suggest you don't read this book.

Anyway, after a couple of hours, when the movie was over, I asked my wife what in the hell she was thinking - why would she watch it? "Tev'e the milkman" would make even the most cold-hearted person feel bad for the Jews. "Well, it was not that tragic, really", she replied. "I mean, sure, things were kind of hard for Tev'e, but in the end he, his wife and his daughters leave Russia and move to America. You can even say he was lucky." Her answer puzzled me a bit. Here is the dialogue that pursued (my memory is a tad hasty, but that's how I remembered it)...

HA: Tev'e leaves Russia and moves to America?

HA wife: Yes, he does, with his daughters and his wife.

HA: No, he does not. In the end of the book, he is kicked out of his house, and he has no idea where he would go. Moreover, his wife cannot possibly follow him to America - she is dead.

HA wife: That's strange.

HA: Say that again. Anyway, I am intrigued. What did the director do with his daughters?

HA wife: They are okay, most of them are following him to US, and one of this daughters is waiting for her husband to be released from exile, so they could also join Tev'e in America.

HA: Hm. How about his daughter that had an affair with a rich youngster and drowns herself?

HA wife: That was not in the movie. BTW, his daughter Tzeitel and her husband Motel are moving to Poland, but later they plan to join Tev'e in America.

HA: That's impossible.

HA wife: Why?

HA: Well, for one, Motel is also dead.

In short, Hollywood took a very dark novel describing the life of a Jewish family and turned it into a light story with a happy ending. They even resurrected a few dead people to achieve this - definitely a miracle.

"Sure, we got it, but how does it have to do with Egypt?!" - you may ask me....

Well, it's time to put the cards on the table. I believe that Hollywood and the Western entertainment industry conditioned the common public to expect a happy ending. Indeed, after watching hundreds of movies, it's only natural to notice that every time a character finds himself in a sticky situation, he must choose the riskiest path possible - and that would be his 100% guaranteed ticket to success. And honestly, it does require a certain amount of sophistication to distinguish between the work of fiction that you see on TV and the latest reports from Egypt - which you also see on TV (and which too very often contain an unhealthy amount of fiction). Seeing the jubilant crowd gather in the Cairo downtown and hysterical media reporters shouting about democracy and freedom naturally makes you believe that things in Egypt will certainly get better once the hated dictator Mubarak is gone. As a side note I must add that only a few months age Mubarak was universally described by American media as a moderate Arab leader and a staunch ally of the United States - they loved to use this description when he was criticizing the Jewish State for her treatment of the palestinian arabs. But that is all gone and forgotten - today, Mubarak is the only one who is standing between Egypt and peace, prosperity and candy. "Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia".

 But if I may go back to the original theme - it requires sophistication to see that Hollywood Happy Ending is a rather rare thing in real life - particularly when you leave the civilized world and move to the rest of the planet. What are chances that the latest commotion in Egypt will end well? There were plenty of revolutions in the last few hundred years, and only very few of them had a happy ending. It is quite typical to hear of a revolution which starts as a popular uprising against the oppressive regime and ends up with a bunch of psychopaths taking over the country and building an even more oppressive regime - so oppressive indeed that the people wish they never revolted against the previous oppressive regime. Let's go through the memory lane, and take a look at a dozen of significant revolutions.

Some people may reasonably say that "Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results" - but surely it is quite instructive to look at past results ("Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.") It's also fair to ask - does Egypt have a better chance to succed than numerous Soviet "stans" (Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan) and become a prosperous free country? While you are pondering this, here is the poll of the Egyptian population - and this poll answers all the questions you may have on how Egypt will most likely look after genuinely democratic elections (which is what many people are pushing for)....


Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hezbollah: 30%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hamas: 49%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of al Qaeda: 20%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think it’s good that Islam is playing a large role in politics: 95%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians who think it’s bad that Islam is playing a small role in politics: 80%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think Islam’s role in politics is positive: 85%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalists in Islam and identify themselves with moslem fundamentalists: 59%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalists in Islam and identify themselves with moslem modernizers: 27%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support gender segregation in the workplace: 54%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support stoning people who commit adultery: 82%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support whippings, cutting off hands of people for theft and robbery: 77%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support death penalty for people who leave Islam: 84%
Egyptian demographics: 90% of the Egyptian population is moslem.
Last but not least – about 95% of Egyptian girls suffer genital mutilation.




And if you are a bit more sophisticated than an average lamestream journalist and you want to know who are those people standing on the streets and fighting against Mubarak - I can tell you right now. These are the people who mutilate Egyptian girls, who support death sentence for apostasy, who stone couples for committing adultery and yes, they would also cut off hands of the people for theft and robbery. Who wouldn't wish such a crowd to run a country, right? Heck, an average Egyptian makes taliban look moderate.


Last but not least - in 2009 and 2010, liberal activists and their lackeys in the mainstream media were counting percentages of black people among the Tea Party (apparently they were not enough blacks according to the voluntary government diversity standards updated daily in the New York Times). There were unconfirmed reports that someone shouted "Nigger" at a black congressman - and that was considered to be the conclusive proof that the entire Tea Party was scarily evil. Egyptian protesters draw the Star of David on the photos of Mubarak (apparently it means he is evil) - and the media yawns.

Imagine the outrage if it were revealed that 10% of the people in the Tea Party (not 90% as in Egypt) were mutilating girls? Or what would the journalists say if they discovered that 10% of the Tea Party activists supported the murder of anyone who renounced Christianity? God Almighty, we would have heard non-stop stories about the evil, racist, misogynist, and fundamentalist Tea Party monsters. And yet, same journolistas find nothing alarming about the views of Egyptian people. Why is that? Is it because they are so conditioned to the Hollywood Happy Ending? Is it political bias? Is it because Egyptians are "the  other", the "noble savage" - and it's "politically incorrect" (i.e. blasphemous) to be critical of them? Or maybe, it's all of the above - the perfect marriage (in California and 5 other states - perfect civil union in the rest of the nation) of "Hollywood Happy Ending", "Political Correctness" and political bias.

And here is my conclusion:  infamous Hollywood Happy Ending plays a critical role in the current inability of the American cultural and intellectual elite to correctly estimate the inherent risks of the Egyptian revolution. In short - the guys who claim to be the smartest people in the room are stupid. And anyone who thinks that Moslem Brotherhood is a "largely secular group" is a f*cking moron who ought to have his head examined with a baseball bat - that would be the Russian-style Happy Ending.

President Hosni Mubarak

Journalists: President Mubarak, is it true that you are preparing a farewell address to the Egyptian people?
President Mubarak, surprised: Why? Are my people leaving somewhere?


— Господин президент, — обратились к Хосни Мубараку журналисты. — Говорят, вы собираетесь выступить с прощальным посланием к народу?
— А что, мой народ куда-то уходит? — с удивлением ответил Мубарак.

Taken from here.

Revolution as good as its people, Part 2

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--

Liberal radio talk show as free entertainment
I was listening to the NPR a few days ago (before the recent uptick of violence), and I caught the last few minutes of the Robert Siegel's show "All Things Considered". I must confess that this NPR anchor is adorable (they all are, but this one is really something special), his arrogance can only be matched by his ignorance and stupidity. And trust me, his arrogance is amazing - just listen to his voice when he introduces himself - this man is practically collapsing from a sudden realization of his importance. He can't even pronounce his name in one breath "Robert Siegel" - it's crucial for the listeners to remember his name, every syllable and vowel of it, for the rest of their lives - and thus he proudly presents himself as "Robert Sea-gul". Dale Carnegie famously quipped "The most beautiful thing a person can hear is their name" - but I bet he never expected Robert Siege to take this figure of speech so literally. Damn, I love Booby - he never fails to lighten up my day.

Anyway, Booby is interviewing an American student in Egypt, and two themes of the interview become quite obvious. On the one side, this student is very excited for the Egyptian people and is very happy that they are rebelling against Hosni Mubarak. The second theme - she feels compelled to cut short her studies in Egypt and to come home. The rather stark contrast between these two themes did not seem to bother neither the highly-esteemed NPR talk show host Robert See-eee-Gull, nor the American student (whose name escaped me because of its irrelevance).

Amazingly, same disconnect can be noticed in the reports from the mainstream media - on one side you can feel the euphoria of Western tourists in Egypt - but on the other side, it's clear that same euphoric tourists are getting into fistfights in the Cairo international airport for the right to get on the first plane out of Egypt. As the expression goes - those folks are voting with their feet (and fists), and their vote does not betray much confidence in the Egyptian revolution. And I can relate to that - after all, who wants to spend the next couple of years as a hostage in the dungeon run by the peace activists from the Moslem Brotherhood? It's not 1979, some people have learned their lessons about the "religion of peace" - at least as much as it may relate to their own ass. They may strongly support the Egyptian revolution, but they prefer to do so at a safe distance of at least 10,000 miles under the protection of Western troops. Even the most devoted multi-culturist knows the difference between theory and practice - Karl Marx called it "dialectics", simpler minds call it "hypocrisy".


Who among us hasn't lived through a revolution?
I will volunteer a guess and say that probably none of you have lived through a revolution, let alone two. I was lucky enough to personally witness the last two revolutions in Russia - in 1991 and 1993. And I must add, I saw them up-close and personal because at the time I lived in an apartment which was in a walking distance from the Moscow White House. To tell you the truth, living through troubled times provides you with a plethora of experience, knowledge and wisdom - which may not be in high demand when the things are quiet, but are golden when society enters turbulent times. Therefore I claim my expertise of the Egyptian revolution and compel you to read carefully this story about Kings and Cabbage that I am about to share with you.

A bit of self-promotion
I must confess that even though my education is purely technical (I earn my modest living as an Electrical Engineer working for a large corporation), I have a passion for history, economics and literature. I must add that my engineering background helps a lot in my non-technical studies - because I am trained to spot bullshit and notice patterns. If you add the fact that I was born, raised and educated in the USSR, then moved to the US and settled there - it's clear that I have a rather odd blogger, I may even be one of a kind. Kind of like Barack Obama - but with smarts, sense of humor and valuable personal experience. And yes, I don't need the teleprompter - I believe a baseball bat is much more handy. Speaking of the game of baseball - I've heard that in 2010, they sold in Russia one baseball glove, two baseballs and 100,000 baseball bats. Isn't it amazing?!

Where is this all going to?
I am writing this article to share my views on the revolution in Egypt and what we should expect from it. In summary - if Mubarak and/or his henchmen do not hold to power, and the protesters are successful, Egypt will see the rise of a theocracy much more reactionary than Iranian regime, and the war with Israel is inevitable. In the meantime, Egyptian people will suffer, and the Egypt will be a much more oppressive and poor society than it is today (and it's not like Egypt is a beacon of freedom and prosperity today). In the immortal words of Shenderovich, "In Tunisia, people are joyful from the fall of the authoritarian regime, and can see the return of their local Islamic fundamentalist. Soon, there will be such spiritual revival on the wreckage of authoritarianism, that you will wear yourself out burying all the corpses."

How do I intend to prove this thesis? My article will put together a potpourri of stories from the past and present, analysis of previous revolutions and a healthy amounts of speculation. The whole story will be told in concentric spiral - the way Nabokov wrote his famous novel "The Gift". Good luck digesting that mess.


Let's learn from the past: Communist revolution and Doctor Zhivago
There are plenty of books about the communist take-over in 1917, the subsequent Civil War, mass murder, starvation and destruction engineered by Lenin - the unhappy summary of the unhappy 74 years of communist rule. I would recommend reading Paul Johnson's "Modern Times", Alexander Solzhenitsyn's "One day in life of Ivan Denisovich", " Gulag Archipelago", "In the First Circle". Moreover, don't forget to familiarize yourself thoroughly with Michael Bulgakov's "Heart of a Dog", "A Dead Man's Memoir: A Theatrical Novel" and "White Guard" and Isaac Babel's "Red Cavalry".

I must confess that although all these books are excellent guides to history and some of them are true literary jewels (I believe Bulgakov is the best Russian writer of all times), "Doctor Zhivago" by Boris Pasternak is most relevant to our conversation about the revolution in Egypt.

The first time I read "Doctor Zhivago" in the 1990ies - and I could not get pass the first 100 pages. The plot was a bit too thick for my taste, too many characters, and the book as a whole was a mixture of Maxim Gorkiy and Vasiliy Aksenov. The second time I attempted to read it was a year ago - after all Pasternak was a famous Russian writer, and I felt ashamed that I was unfamiliar with his work. Moreover, I decided that I was too young 2 decades ago, and this time I would surely enjoy the novel by the Nobel Prize winner. And lo and behold, by the page 100 it all came back to me and I was ready to call it quits. The plot and the characters did not upset me (these were quite traditional and did not raise my ire), it's the number of cliches that suffocated me. For example the main heroine Lara, a young and bright girl, is wondering who is shooting at the tsarist police and the army during the Moscow uprising in 1905 - and answers her own question with a jaw-dropping banality. It goes like this:

"It must be the boys" - Lara thought... She was thinking not just about Nikkie and Patul, but about all the people in the city who were shooting at the army. "Good honest boys", she thought, "they are good - that's why they are shooting at the army".

This passage made me puke my guts out - damn, Pasternak was writing this in the 1950ies, when the criminality of the communist revolution was already apparent to all decent people (and decent people don't read the New York Times). But still, I decided to finish the book - this time there was no surrender, I would read the entire novel. And what would you think - it got only worse. By the end of the first 1/4 of the book, doctor Zhivago is singing a panegyric to the 1917 revolution calling it the breath of fresh air. Here is the quote which literally made me nauseous:

I could say the following: everyone had two revolutions, a private one and a common one. I believe that socialism is an ocean, and like an ocean absorbs the rivers, it will absorb all the private revolutions and become the ocean of life, the ocean of originality. The ocean of life, as I say, of life that you could see in the paintings, the genius life, an enriched life. But now people decided to try it not by reading books, not as a hobby, but in reality.

Damn, I was pissed after I read this crap. The communist revolution was a breath of fresh air?! How could he? How could he even write this? At this point I decided I needed to finish this book - I had to know what the hell Pasternak was thinking.

And then slowly but steadily things start changing. The life gets worse for Zhivago and his lover, Lara. Eventually they escape from the communist regime, and settle in a abandoned house. After a while, Zhivago is "nationalized" and forced to serve in a communist insurgent gang as a doctor, and he is lost for some years. When the gang falls apart, he comes back in search of Lara - and you can feel how all the characters steadily lose all hope to ever get back to a normal life, and death is creeping closer and closer to them. By this time, the inhuman cruelty of the communist regime was seen as a natural - as Dovlatov once said "cruelty was as common as humidity".

In one of the later chapters, doctor Zhivago is talking to the commander of a group of red insurgents, Pamphil Palyh - a devoted murderer, a man with the blood of thousands of people on his hands. The description given to this man is unbearable. Here is my translation:

At the beginning of the revolution [1917], based on the experience of the 1905 uprising, they [the communists] were afraid that the revolution would be a short-lived event in the history of educated elites, and won't touch the lower classes. This is why they tried to propagandize among the common folks, to revolutionize them, to excite them, to inflame them.

During the first days [of the revolution], people like soldier Pamfil Palyh, who without any need for persuasion deeply hated the intelligentsia the noblemen and the officers, seemed a rare find by the excited left-wing intellectuals and was highly valued. Their inhumanity was seen as a highest achievement of class consciousness, their barbarity - as ideal proletarian firmness and revolutionary instinct. That was Pamfil's fame. He was indispensable to the leaders of insurgents and the party leaders.

The end of the novel is instructive - the main characters finally realize not just the nature of the communist revolution - but also how they themselves were personally responsible for it. Lara's explanation for the horrors of the communist regime is quite instructive:

All of a sudden, there was this jump from idle, innocent life into blood and screams, total insanity and wilderness of every-day and every-hour, legalized and glorified murder. Maybe, this can never go by and be forgotten. I am sure you remember how everything started to crumble. The train schedule, the food supplies to the cities, the basics of the family foundation, the foundations of morality.

What came to the Russia was not truth. The worst horror, the root of the future evil was the loss of belief in the value of one's own point of view. People imagined that the time to follow the voice of one's own conscience is gone, that you must follow the opinion of someone else, and live according to the views of other people. The slogans took precedence over everything else, first the tsarist slogans, then the revolutionary slogans. Society's delusion became all-encompassing. Everything was under its influence.

The way the book turned around was absolutely amazing - and I had to read it in its entirety to comprehend that Pasternak was showing the process by which the pre-revolutionary views of intelligentsia in Russia were changing from radical pro-socialist romanticism to post-revolutionary skepticism (The New York Times intellectuals would call it "fanatical anti-communism").

On a lighter note, I must add that I could think of two other works of art which had a similar unexpected twist. The first of one is more obvious (and much more trivial) - "Fight Club". I am sure my readers remember the moment when it is revealed that the main protagonist Tyler Durden and the positive hero Jack are one and the same person.

Please return your seatbacks to their full and upright and locked position.
We have just lost cabin pressure.

It's called a "changeover". The movie goes on and nobody in the audience has any idea.

 The second example that comes to mind is Nabokov's novel "Luzhin Defense". In this book, the main character is a talented Russian chess player Alexander Luzhin, a man who has only only passion - playing chess. And this game drives him to insanity he starts seeing the whole world as part of a giant chess game. In the end, he attempts to leave the world of chess and live a normal life, but this proves to be impossible in spite of all his attempts. In the end, he finds the ultimate effective defense from the chess insanity - he jumps from a building with his head first. Apparently, the only defense that he could find was suicide - the "Luzhin Defense".

How does it all have to do with Egypt?
You may ask "What is the connection between "Doctor Zhivago" and the Egyptian revolution?" Well, the fundamental truth is - no revolution cannot be better than the people. And a revolution which involves the whole country cannot be better than the average citizen of the nation. If the average citizen is a neanderthal, then what you will get is a revolution that will inevitably promote the values of neanderthals - irrespective of the phraseology used by the leaders. Take a quick look at the latest polling results of the Egyptian people:

Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hezbollah: 30%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hamas: 49%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of al Qaeda: 20%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think it's good that Islam is playing a large role in politics: 95%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians who think it's bad that Islam is playing a small role in politics: 80%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think Islam's role in politics is positive: 85%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalists in Islam and identify themselves with moslem fundamentalists: 59%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalists in Islam and identify themselves with moslem modernizers: 27%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support gender segregation in the workplace: 54%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support stoning people who commit adultery: 82%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support whippings, cuttings of hands of people for theft and robbery: 77%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support death penalty for people who leave Islam: 84%
Egyptian demographics: 90% of the Egyptian population is moslem.

Last but not least - about 95% of Egyptian girls suffer genital mutilation. Note, the people that you see on the streets of Cairo, demonstrating for democracy and freedom are the same people who would kill anyone who wishes to leave Islam. Same ones who cut of women's genitalia. Same ones who would stone people for committing adultery. Do you really feel like they are just like you, or maybe you are a tad more evolved than those people?

 In all fairness, I must note that cutting off female genitals is hardly the biggest concern for the people of Egypt - it is far more important to them that dictator of Egypt keeps peace with Israel instead of whacking those pesky Jews like Hitler did (or did not - depends who and when you ask in the Middle East). For example, while the moslem world is not currently known for its flourishing book industry (I wonder if the whole moslem world of more than 1 billion people publishes more books than a tiny state of Israel), it surely spends considerable resources on publishing and popularizing Hitler's memoirs.

For example, recent Al Jazeera's report on the Cairo book fair is a tad discomforting: "The fair also has its darker sides, with anti-Christian polemics advocating conversion to Islam as the only solution to a flawed religion and of course plenty of editions of Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf" for sale."

And sure, OF COURSE, there are plenty of editions of Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf" for sale in Cairo's book fair - what else would you expect?! That "Of course" from the Arabic meida outlet is worth more a thousands pages of research about anti-semitism among moslems, and what we should expect from the Middle East "Peace process".  And it surely is expected that when the Egyptian populace wants to show their dislike of their beloved leader, Hosni Mubarak - they OF COURSE draw a Jewish Star on his portrait. After all, calling someone a Jew is the ultimate insult, is it not (reminds me of Obama's spiritual leader, rev. Wright and his talk about evil "Jews" who don't let his favourite student talk to the teacher)? Just look at the photo from Reuters (a few more photos can be seen here) and wonder - why hasn't the media paid a little bit of attention to this nazi symbolism? But never mind the media - think what you are to expect from the Egyptian revolution if it is successful. I am not sure about you, but to me, this revolution speaks with a little bit of a German accent. And I don't mean to insinuate that Egyptian cars will soon be produced with German quality.

When I think of Hosni Mubarak and the Egyptian revolution, I remember Kissinger's wise remark on the Iran-Iraq conflict: "It's a shame they can't both lose".

Revolution as good as its people

It's too late, and tomorrow I need to get up early, drive my son to school, and then go to work and earn my living. Hence this post will be short and to the point....


Daily Mail Reporter: Cameron and Obama hold crisis talks, both calling for 'political reform'; Death toll reaches 102 and at least 2,000 have been injured. Thousands of prisoners escape from jails as riots go into sixth day. Around 30,000 British tourists were stranded in Egypt today as army planes buzzed low over Cairo on the sixth day of uprisings.At least 102 people have been killed, more than 2,000 are injured and there were calls for a multi-party democracy to emerge as President Hosni Mubarak's grip on power loosens. Gangs of armed men attacked at least four jails across Egypt before dawn today, helping to free hundreds of Muslim militants and thousands of other inmates as police vanished from the streets of Cairo and other cities.

Governments scramble to fly citizens out of Egypt: FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Governments started arranging for planes on Sunday to bring home citizens stuck in Egypt, where violent protests of the rule of President Hosni Mubarak have given way in some parts of Cairo to looting.

Jerusalem Post: "Cairo: Anger starting to focus on Israel, US"

Famous museum in Cairo looted and partly destroyed during the riots. Point of reference - video of Taliban barbarians destroying the statue of Buddha in Afghanistan.

History of Islamic reform in the 20th century - the most important contributor is the "Moslem Brotherhood". One cannot understand Osama ben Laden, Hezballah, Hamas, Taliban and Iranian mullahs without acknowledging  the influence of the Brotherhood. Here is the excerpt on Moslem Brotherhood from wikipedia:

"The Society of the Muslim Brothers (often simply الإخوان Al-Ikhwān, The Brotherhood or MB) is an Islamist transnational movement and the largest political opposition organization in many Arab statesThe group is the world's oldest and largest Islamic political group, and the "world's most influential Islamist movement." It was founded in 1928 in Egypt by the Islamic scholar and Sufi schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna."Today, Moslem Brotherhood is the strongest organized force in Egypt.

According to Stratfor: "The Egyptian police are no longer patrolling the Rafah border crossing into Gaza. Hamas armed men are entering into Egypt and are closely collaborating with the MB. The MB has fully engaged itself in the demonstrations, and they are unsatisfied with the dismissal of the Cabinet. They are insisting on a new Cabinet that does not include members of the ruling National Democratic Party."



Let's look at some key  statistics, which give us some perspective on the people of Egypt...

Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hezbollah: 30%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of Hamas: 49%
Percentage of Egyptians that have a favorable view of al Qaeda: 20%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think it's good that Islam is playing a large role in politics: 95%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians who think it's bad that Islam is playing a small role in politics: 80%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that think Islam's role in politics is positive: 85%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalist in Islam and identify with moslem fundamentalists: 59%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that believe there is struggle between modernizers and fundamentalist in Islam and identify with moslem modernizers: 27%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support gender segregation in the workplace: 54%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support stoning people who commit adultery: 82%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support whippings, cuttings of hands of people for theft and robbery: 77%
Percentage of moslem Egyptians that support death penalty for people who leave Islam: 84%



Egyptian demographics: 90% of the Egyptian population is moslem.

Last but not least - let's walk down the memory line. Let's look at the photos of the graduates from the University of Cairo (photos were taken from this site).

Class of 1959

Class of 1978

Class of 1995

Class of 2004

How do you feel about the events in Egypt? Please, don't be shy, share your opinion. If you want to know my opinion - people who installed Ayatollah Homeini as a supreme leader of Iran in 1979 were far more moderate than the Egyptians in 2011.

In summary, my view on the struggle between Mubarak and Moslem Brotherhood is best explained by Henry Kissinger (he said this about the Iran-Iraq war, but is equally applicable to the current situation): "It's a shame they can't both lose".

What happens in the Middle East, does not stay in the Middle East

The latest news from the Middle East are rather bleak. Firstly, the Tunisian strongman was ousted, and the country is in chaos. Next, we got the Egypt on the verge of collapse. And now there are reports of violent demonstrations in Jordan and Algeria. On one side, I have no sympathy for these "towelhead monarchies", as they were aptly called in the movie "Body of Lies". But realistically, the people who are battling these dictators are even worse - just think about Iran or Cuba, and what happened to those countries when the American-supported dictators were ousted. Once the anti-American assholes come to power (democratically or not), they have a tendency to stay in power for a long time, and make everyone feel nostalgia for the old regimes. As Mark Steyn described Middle East democracy - "one man, one vote, one time".

It's fair for my reader to ask - Hyphenated American, what makes you think that those nice people protesting on the streets won't try to build a nice Western liberal democracy? Well, as I often confess on my blog - it's a hunch - and given the fact that my intuition on all things political was perfected in the USSR, I tend to trust my hunches. Here is why I think we have little good to expect from Tunisia: it was wildly reported that the crowds in Tunisia were extremely violent, they were shooting people left and right, and they ransacked the stores. This is not how the liberal democrats (I mean it in European sense, of course - American liberal democrats are famous for their riots) behave. Back in the 1980ies, anti-communist demonstrations in Eastern Europe were non-violent, peaceful and no one thought of attacking the stores. Fast forward to 2009 - Iranian people were non-violent, they even protected policemen who were were surrounded by crowds. But those bums in Tunisia (and I think the situation is same in Egypt, Algeria and Jordan) are not like that.

The positive side of this dynamic is that the more anti-American the government is, the more likely that the people love America. So, if we want Egyptian people to be on our side - Moslem Brotherhood should come to power. Of course, this would lead to another war in the Middle East (I think it won't take long until the new government formed by the moslem moderates will move to re-militarize Sinai and/or close Suez to Israeli ships), but then any objective observer saw it coming. The actions of the current American president will push the region to another bloody conflict in the very near future. It's "Sputnik time" for the Middle East - time for the moderate moslems to start bombarding Israeli cities with their rockets. Stay tuned, things will get very interesting very soon. Don't forget to buy the popcorn.

The saddest thing about the Ground Zero Mosque - nothing about it surprises me

I am sure the readers are painfully aware of the controversial plan to build a mosque on the Ground Zero. The promoter of this project, Imam Feisal Rauf is highly regarded by the liberals (from the US president all the way to the lowly community organizer), while conservatives are outraged. The Imam is highly critical of American foreign policy (really, it's US fault we were attacked on 9/11), and he steadfastly refuses to denounce Hamas. In short, he is the epitome of moderate Islam - or at least the Islam that is promoted by the media in this country.

But very recently it was decided Imam Feisal was too controversial (or maybe he had other things to do), and the moslem community elected another moderate Imam Abdallah Adhami to be the senior adviser to the Ground Zero Mosque. And it did not take long until it became clear just how moderate this Imam Abdallah is - he proclaimed that it is necessary jail people who leave Islam. Here is the exact quote: ""If someone leaves the din, leaves the path privately, they cannot be touched. If someone preaches about apostasy, or preaches their views, they're jailed." He added: "In Islam, in the Quran, theoretically, if you look over the Quran from cover to cover, you literally have the right to the choice to reject God's message. The only thing you do not have the right to do is to spread this conviction, lest you, quote unquote, pollute others."

He showed some mercy by proclaiming that today situation is slightly different, and that "If you left Islam, nothing happens. The Muslims are 1.5 billion people; they are not going to be hurt by a few thousand leaving." Should you be allowed to "pollute others"? I've listened to the audio quite carefully, and it does not seem like he is against punishing the polluters. Very moderate indeed.

And the saddest part - I am not surprised.

Your comment is awaiting moderation

Today I've got into a discussion with an Associate Professor in the History Department at Colorado State University, HistoryAnn. On her blog, she shared her outrage that a former republican congresswoman Heather Wilson expressed doubts about the quality of American higher education. The essence of HistoryAnn's disagreement was quite obvious - surely this republican is a blind ideologue, and her views should be ignored. What caught my attention was the following passage, which revealed quite a lot about HistoryAnn. Quite a lot, I must add.

I’ve always thought that there was a very straightforward reason for why university faculty and other highly educated people tend not to support Republican ideas: the more you know about the world, the dumber they seem. There’s no conspiracy at universities against conservative ideas–indeed, even Marxist Feminists like me teach about very conservative ideas all the time: patriarchy, hierarchy, Thomas Hobbes, the Divine Right of Kings, nineteenth century proslavery ideology, anti-women’s suffrage, anti-unionism, anti-communism, Father Coughlin, the John Birch Society, Impeach Earl Warren bumper stickers, “free market” ideology, and the like. And you know what happens? When students read the primary sources laying out these ideas, they usually see them for what they are: brutally, coarsely self-interested, unfair, and un-American.

I've wrote a letter to historyAnn, expressing my utter puzzlement with her rather arbitrary decision to describe a wide range of very contradictory ideas as "conservatism". We quickly got into a sparring match, and it seems like your own blogger, Hyphenated American, is now listed as a "person of interest". My latest entry was not published, and "is awaiting moderation". Here is what I wrote - luckily I was able to save my last message to the Marxist Feminist Ann (I am not sure if it will be published or not):

Ann,

I guess our discussion is getting too long, and indeed it is your blog, and you can do whatever you want with it. Sorry for bothering you.


What upsets me most is that liberals very often flat out refuse to debate the pros and cons of conservative ideology, and instead prefer to fight with the straw men.

Instead of listening to honest critique of conservatism, we hear denouncements of wacky ideas of the past, which have no connection to conservatism. Just as you called pro-slavery movement “conservatism”, I can say that naziism and communism and benladeism are part of the history of liberalism. I know world history pretty damn well to make whole lot of factual connections, and we can play this game non-stop. But then – does it REALLY help you to understand the ideas that I believe in? Does it REALLY make you confident that you are correct, and I am wrong (let alone dumb and evil and un-American)? And honestly, between you and me, I need to tell you that if you truly were convinced that American conservatism is wrong, you would have debated it head on, instead of indulging in criticism of evil ideas of the past, ideas which have nothing, absolutely nothing in common with American conservatism. I don’t know if it is patriotic or not to abandon the straw men (I am a bit idiosyncratic of the word “patriotic” for the reasons we don’t have to discuss now), but it surely is intellectually honest to do so. But then – who cares, really, we all will be dead in 3 million years.

Anyway, here is the rub. On what basis did you decide that Father Coughlin, a revolutionary socialist, was a conservative? On what basis did you conclude that pro-slavery was part of conservatism? On what basis would you NOT qualify the 21st century movement to abolish social security, welfare, medicaid and medicare as non-conservative? And what about Hitler-Mussolini-Lenin-Stalin-Mao – these 5 were clearly revolutionaries – so are they conservatives or liberals? And if the popular point of view, a point of view which was dubbed “conservatism” some decades ago, is according to its very supporters, fundamentally, irreversibly, standing in defense of individual liberty, small limited government and justice – then why are you are discussing ideas which run contrary to the essence of American conservatism – and assume these two are identical?!

I understand why you believe that this discussion may seem to be only tangentially tied to the issue of Rhode scholarship. But in reality it is not – about 40% of what you wrote was devoted to the rather bizarre claim that conservatism is “brutally, coarsely self-interested, unfair, and un-American”. I assumed that you took some time to think it through, before accusing 30% of American population of being (let’s be honest here) dumb scumbags. Was I wrong?

Miss HistoryAnn clearly believes that "conservatism" is same as "status-quo-ism" - but does it make sense? And then - if someone is "fiscally conservative" - does it mean that he supports 1.5 trillion dollar annual deficits? And shouldn't defense of Roe vs Wade be called "conservatism"? Questions, questions...

P.S. Comrades, please, don't flood her blog with attacks. I still want to play there. Pretty please with sugar on top of it?
P.P.S. I am curious if I were to proclaim that "history of infection diseases" is the history of liberalism - would that be considered an intellectual argument by Ann?

Making conclusions based on a hunch

Long time ago, there was a Cold War going on, the war between the so-called Western Democracies and the Communist bloc - the union of the so-called "People's Democracies". This Cold War actually resulted in the rather brutal death of hundreds of millions of people in the proxy wars in Africa, Asia and South America, but apparently it was cold enough compared to the alternative.

Back then (just as now), Western intelligence services had very limited access to the internal workings of the Communist countries (as Churchill famously quipped: "Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma"). But nature abhors vacuum, and the new science was born - they called it "Kremlinology". A large number of well-paid American social scientists (I feel nauseous even using this oxymoronic term, "social scientists") were pouring over the photographs of the Soviet Politburo, counting the minutes each communist leader was speaking during the Party Congress, analyzing the sequence of names in the official newspapers. Indeed, as any former Soviet citizen would know, every step of the leaders of the communist junta was rehearsed, and every detail had a meaning. You could theoretically find out who was favored by Brezhnev and his clique by the order in which the government members were walking up the Lenin's mausoleum during the May Day parade. All that may be in the past - or is it really?

This year, the Nobel Committee, apparently ashamed of its 2009 decision to grant the award to Barack Hussein Obama (former community organizer, most famous for being the most thin-skinned US president of all times) decided that 2010 will be different. And indeed it was, The Nobel Prize was awarded to a person with actual achievements, Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo. According to wikipedia, he is a "Chinese literary critic, writer, professor, and human rights activist who called for political reforms and the end of communist one-party rule in China". What's even more amazing is how much his views are in line with the views of the pro-Western Soviet dissidents like Andrei Sakharov, Valeria Novodvorskaya, anti-Putin activist Viktor Shenderovich and pro-freedom writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Indeed, Liu Xiaobo may prove to be a little bit too progressive and too pro-Western for American progressive intellectuals. One must not forget that the denounciation of Western culture and support for socialist cannibals is a requirement for anyone who wishes to be considered an intellectual in the US. In fact, I was struck by the views that this brave man had the audacity to say – indeed he would be in danger of losing his job and face continuous harassment from the socialist thugs if he were a professor in American university – let alone the communist paradise of China. Here are a few of the most outrageous quotes from him:

“In a 1988 interview with Hong Kong’s Liberation Monthly (now known as Open Magazine), Liu was asked what it would take for China to realize a true historical transformation.

He replied: “(It would take) 300 years of colonialism. In 100 years of colonialism, Hong Kong has changed to what we see today. With China being so big, of course it would require 300 years as a colony for it to be able to transform into how Hong Kong is today. I have my doubts as to whether 300 years would be enough.”

I read this and laughed – damn, this guy is a classical Russian liberal (don’t mistake a Russian liberal for an American one – because a Russian liberal is solidly pro-Western, pro-freedom and anti-socialist).


Later Liu said something which rings true to all pro-Western intellectuals in the Soviet Empire:

“Modernization means whole-sale westernization, choosing a human life is choosing Western way of life. Difference between Western and Chinese governing system is humane vs in-humane, there’s no middle ground… Westernization is not a choice of a nation, but a choice for the human race”.

According to wikipidea, he did not stop with this heresy against the edicts of American liberalism and said something even more outrageous:

In his 1996 article titled “Lessons from the Cold War”, Liu argues that “The free world led by the US fought almost all regimes that trampled on human rights … The major wars that the US became involved in are all ethically defensible.” He has defended U.S. policies in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which he thinks is the fault of the “provocateur” Palestinians.

Liu also published a 2004 article in support of Bush’s war on Iraq, titled “Victory to the Anglo-American Freedom Alliance”, in which he praised the U.S. led post-cold-war wars as “best examples of how war should be conducted in a modern civilization.” and predicted “a free, democratic and peaceful Iraq will emerge.” During the 2004 US presidential election, Liu again praised Bush for his war effort against Iraq and condemned Democratic party candidate John Kerry for not sufficiently supporting the US’s wars.

I am in a 100% agreement with everything this man says – with the exception of one quote from 2009 - I cannot think like that :

“I have no enemies, and no hatred. None of the police who have monitored, arrested and interrogated me, the prosecutors who prosecuted me, or the judges who sentence me, are my enemies. While I’m unable to accept your surveillance, arrest, prosecution or sentencing, I respect your professions and personalities, including Zhang Rongge and Pan Xueqing who act for the prosecution at present.”

With all due respect, but I consider this approach to be fundamentally wrong. I think it was Valeriya Novodvorskaya who wrote that when she was arrested, she would specifically tell the KGB officers that’s it was their fault, their responsibility, and they should be ashamed of what they are doing. In other words, it was not business, it was very personal. Same attitude was also expressed by a famous Russian writer

 Vladimir Voinovich - he recalls in one of his books how he was shaming the KGB officer and telling him that his only noble way out was to commit a suicide (KGB was forcing Voinovich out of the country).

Last but not least I must recall Solzhenitsyn's call to Russian people to defend themselves with knives, hammers and any dangerous objects they could find during the political arrests. His slogan was "Let's make them (the KGB) scared of us".

All in all, it's obvious that Liu does not share the hatred of communism and communists, hatred which is common among many Russians, hatred so vicious that it darkens your mind and you are ready to tear your enemies bit by bit. For any Russian-speaking reader of this post who forgot this feeling, I would point to a famous song by Alexander Galich about the funeral of a Nobel-winning Russian writer Boris Pasternak - a man who was driven to death by the vicious campaign of the communist regime in the 1950ies. As Galich said (my translation) – “we will remember every name of every person who raised his hand” (i.e. voted to condemn Pasternak for his anti-communist novel “Doctor Zhivago”).


It seems though that my post somewhat slipped away from the main topic of Kreminology. But fear not, Hyphenated American is on the case.

After the Nobel Committee had announced its decision to award the prize to a famous dissident, Chinese government, quite understandably, got upset. The Chinese progressives told the world that this award was “counter-productive” (or something pompous like that) and forbade Liu’s wife to leave China – so that no one could accept the award. The communists did something even better – they told everyone who would listen that it would be very appreciative of the China’s allies who would refuse to be present during the award ceremony. And this is where Kreminology finds its use. According to the media, 18 countries openly refused to come the ceremony, and the list of the countries is not without surprises: Pakistan, Iran, Sudan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Colombia, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Iraq, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Venezuela, the Philippines, Egypt, Ukraine, Cuba and Morocco. Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu raised the stakes even further, by stating: “As far as I know, at present, more than 100 countries and organisations have expressed explicit support for China opposing the Nobel peace prize, which fully shows that the international community does not accept the decision of the Nobel committee.” All in all, only 44 countries were present during the ceremony.

It should not surprise anyone that Iran, Sudan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Serbia, Vietnam, Venezuela, Ukraine, Cuba boycotted the award ceremony. I don’t know what the hell is wrong with Tunisia, the Philippines and Morocco – but it makes sense to mark these three as supporters of oppression.

The remaining ones are rather peculiar – Pakistan, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Egypt. Pakistan is now being pumped up with US money and military equipment with one goal in mind – to keep it from falling under the power of local moderate moslems. In spite of much advertised moderation of the “Religion of Peace”, it is known that some moderate moslems may start cutting off heads of the infidels and stoning adulterous women if US does not stop them – so it makes sense for the civilized world to keep those moderate moslems in check. The Pakistani government is now fully dependent on the US good will, and if that good will disappears, the Pakistan’s Prime Minister Prime Minister of Pakistan, Yousaf Raza Gillani make wake up one day and discover that his head is hidden in the drawer. The governments of Iraq and Afghanistan are in even worse position, given that US troops currently occupy both of these nations. Saudi Arabia exists solely because the US protects it from the neighbors with a rather large army contingent. And yet, all four of these American satellites smugly ignored Obama’s calls to democracy and instead supported Chinese brutal regime. Egypt is receiving about 2 billion of US aid annually – and yet it pissed on Obama and joined China (I support the pissing part, but I strongly disagree with cowtowing to the commies). Colombia was famously rebuffed by Obama in 2008 (he said that he would not support the trade deal with the US ally because of his support for the unions) and Obama was still stuck on stupid in 2010.

In short, I understand why Colombia, which is now seeking good relationship with Venezuela’s strongman Hugo Chavez, endorses Chinese brutality against its dissidents. Amazingly, US government has no influence over our protectorates – Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan. Moreover, while I have no illusions about the first three, Iraq and Afghanistan were supposed to be different, but apparently under Obama’s supervision they turned into classical Third-World anti-American dictatorships. In fact, I would even say that there is no reason for the US troops to continue their fight in these two countries – I officially declare that I lost all hope in the occupation. The fact that the governments of Iraq and Afghanistan sided with China against democracy is, what any Kreminologist would say, a very troubling sign which should not be ignored.


In short – Obama, bring the boys back home, there is nothing for us to achieve in Iraq and Afghanistan anymore. After all the successes in 2007-2008 in Iraq, you squandered it all. Bring the boys back home, Obama, bring the boys back home. We need them here – and maybe we can use them to control our border with Mexico. Last but not least, it would be easier for them to vote, once they are back in the country – and God knows these boys don’t vote for the anti-American scum.

Some things never change...

In case some of my readers forgot,  I was born and educated in the USSR - and the accidence of my upbringing made me a rather keen observer of some issues. There are certain details that may be missed by an American, or some things may be not given sufficient attention. Due to the complete Soviet control over media, a typical Soviet citizen was conditioned to make far reaching conclusions based on rather small details, which he could glance from the communist press, as well as getting a rather good insight through a technique called "reading between the lines". In fact, I don't think the world has ever seen people as trained to read between the lines that the Soviets. And still, even though I follow American news rather closely, I was surprised by the news that Castro's regime banned Moore's movie "Sicko". According to the wikileaks:

[T]he memo reveals that when the film was shown to a group of Cuban doctors, some became so “disturbed at the blatant misrepresentation of healthcare in Cuba that they left the room”.


Castro’s government apparently went on to ban the film because, the leaked cable claims, it “knows the film is a myth and does not want to risk a popular backlash by showing to Cubans facilities that are clearly not available to the vast majority of them.”…

The cable describes a visit made by the FSHP to the Hermanos Ameijeiras hospital in October 2007. Built in 1982, the newly renovated hospital was used in Michael Moore’s film as evidence of the high-quality of healthcare available to all Cubans.

But according to the FSHP, the only way a Cuban can get access to the hospital is through a bribe or contacts inside the hospital administration. “Cubans are reportedly very resentful that the best hospital in Havana is ‘off-limits’ to them,” the memo reveals.

I must confess that I utterly detest Michael Moore, and I know that the guy is a serial liar (which perfectly explains why he was the guest of honor during the John Kerry's Convention. And this news makes perfect sense to me - I believe that while Cubans hate their progressive slave masters - they absolutely detest Michael Moore. And yet, to find that Cuban communists decided that Moore was too deceitful even for their state propaganda - that is something that I find extremely entertaining.

Don't forget this little jewel when a liberal complains that there are no true leftists in America. For all we know, Michael Moore is significantly to the left from Fidel Castro.

Did you miss me? I am back....

I've been quite busy for the last few weeks - balancing my work and family responsibilities left precious little time for explaining what is wrong with the world. But now I am back and ready to 
smack the afflicted and the comfortable, giving comfort to no one except a few selected people (if you were not notified of being selected, then get ready for the beating).

I occasionally visit this site in order to find out the views of mainstream left-wing Americans, who freely speak their mind. It's not a terribly impressive read, but it keep me informed of what the liberals really think. I think it makes sense to spend some time today and respond to a couple of the posts.

Where did the money go?
It is customary among the left to portray the industrialists as evil incarnate. In fact, it remains unclear why we even allow those horrible creatures (the industrialists) to exist - why not kill them all? This post brings forward a caricature of the company owners, and it is no less vile than the Nazi caricatures of the Jews. Why is it okay to depict all industrialists as murderers, while no such generalization is welcome for the Religion Of Peace? After all, when was the last time you saw a corporate CEO mutilating his workers - and when was the last time you've heard of people being beheaded in the name of Religion of Peace?

It's fair to say that it makes little sense to project the actions of a few Islamic extremists (how few remains to be seen) on the whole Mohammedan religion - and we are reminded of this daily by liberals. And yet, the same liberals are ready to depict the entire group of people as evil without any hesitation (heck, the liberals are actually ecstatic every time they can slander the industrialists). In case you are wondering, I reproduced the entire list of Danish cartoons - the cartoons that resulted in multiple riots by the proponents of Religion of Peace and hundreds of deaths - and were denounced by liberals as inflammatory.

It's fair to ask - which cartoon was more inflammatory - the one that showed industrialists maiming the workers or any of the Danish cartoons? But I digress...

When one reads the original article that accompanies the cartoon, it becomes quite clear that there is practically nothing to explain the viciousness of the caricature. The author does not even attempt to explain how it is the fault of industrialists that wages stagnated in the last few decades - let alone to provide empirical evidence that real after-tax income and benefits failed to grow. This article reminded of an old anti-semitic Russian saying perfectly illustrates the liberal view of industrialists:

Если в кране нет воды,

Значит выпили жиды.

Если в кране есть вода,

Значит ссут они туда.

In my translation it becomes:

If there is no water in the faucet

It means the Jews drank all the water

If there is water in the faucet

It means the Jews peed in it.

A more nuanced (but no less wrong) analysis is proposed in the Alexandria article and relies on a Washington Post article that discusses the root causes for the lack of upper mobility of American workers. As one would guess, the reason for this is pretty straightforward - the government does not spend sufficient amounts of money on education. And, as one could have guessed, the latest cruel cuts to the state budgets caused major pain and suffering - as numerous anecdotal evidence cited by the article tries to prove.

But apart from anecdotal evidence - what is the real deal with the US education? I've plotted two graphs which show total federal, state and local education spending in US as percentage of GDP. The second plot shows how total spending on Tertiary education changed with time. Both of these graphs prove conclusively that lack of funding is NOT the issue that is negatively affecting American education. If anything, the spending grew considerably from 3% of the GDP in the 1950ies to 7% in 2010 - and the growth visibly accelerated in 2008. The same is true for the tertiary education - it's share of GDP grew from 0.4% to more than 2% - an amazing 5-fold increase. In short, the rumors about underfunded education have been greatly exaggerated, and the education spending exploded in the last few decades - and not just in nominal numbers - it clearly outpaced even the GDP growth.

It took me about 20 minutes to get all this information and put it into the presentable form - why haven't the so-called "journalists" done same thing? What is the reason that the mainstream media feeds American citizens with plethora of anecdotal evidence, and is incapable of looking at the aggregate data? Is it because those journalists are stupid and ignorant - or because they are ideologues who refuse to cite the inconvenient numbers? My guess that it's the combination of all three - blind obedience to liberal ideology, stupidity and ignorance.

Federal, State and Local spending on education as percentage of GDP

Federal, State and Local spending on Tertiary education as percentage of GDP

Multiculturalism and liberalism

It's a common belief among liberals that all cultures are essentially equal, that a proclamation of  superiority of particular religion is morally and factually wrong. This article from Alexandria follows the usual script - an ultra-left-wing blogger Hector dared to suggest that Christianity was better than Islam, and he was attacked mercilessly by another blogger. When I read the posts like this, I always wonder if the liberals who write them are ready to include conservatism in general and Tea Party activism in particular in the list of protected ideologies (mind you that religious belief is inevitably an ideology). Should we assume that any liberal who claims the supremacy of his ideology over conservatism " as Osama bin Laden’s minions are demonstrating," is lead "inevitably to a claim to dominion"? In fact, if devoted liberal truly believe in their supremacy, then liberals should be organizing a terrorist network to establish the Kingdom of Liberalism on earth and Obama's friend Bill Ayers is not an extremist - he is nothing more than a consistent liberal.

There is of course, a bigger issue at play, which makes the comparison even less beneficial to the liberals. For example, one can believe that Jesus is the savior, and that all other religions are inferior to Christianity - while being perfectly resigned to letting other people choose their own "opium" of preference. It's not the same with people who strongly support liberal causes. For example a man who believes in supremacy of government-run medical care (aka "universal healthcare") cannot possibly support the right of other people to opt out from his plan. A president who thinks some people earn too much money, and he should have to power to seize their property at gun point and distribute it among the more deserving candidates (based on the famous Leninist concept of "revolutionary conscience") cannot allow the evil capitalists and the racist white middle class the right to choose their own way. It is ironic that liberals, people who by the very definition of their ideology require massive violence or threat of violence against the people to fulfill their dreams - to proclaim as unacceptable and tyrannical the pronouncement of supremacy of one's religious beliefs. The claim "it's for your own good" does not become any more benevolent if it does not deal with your afterlife and religious dogma - and instead requires you to give up your fruits of labor. I suggest all progressive conservatives should once and for all seize the incoherence of liberal message on multiculturalism and use it against them. It's fun, ain't it?

In order to make my blog even more entertaining, I will occasionally provide interesting quotes from interesting people. Here is what famous Russian writer Leo Tolstoy said more than a century ago:

 “...Будучи революционером, нельзя быть правдивым, нельзя не лгать, нельзя быть смиренным и добрым, а надо быть готовым для будущей мнимо благой цели на всякого рода гадости и совершать их”.

My translation:

"When you are a revolutionary, you cannot be truthful, you cannot not lie, you cannot be humble and kind - instead you must be ready to commit all kinds of awful things - and actually do commit them for the illusive future good of mankind".

Who broke the Messiah?

During the last few months, a number of political activists proposed a rather interesting meme - American people are frustrated with Obama because they simply expected too much of him. As Spike Lee correctly noted: "People expected Obama to be like Jesus and walk on water. "  And surely Lee is not alone - you can easily find thousands of articles repeating the same idea - American voters over-estimated Obama's promise, that no president could have achieved what was expected of him.

Granted, the liberal intellectuals did had some unrealistic hopes - for example watch this highly educated and motivated African-American woman telling the media that when Obama is elected, she "won’t have to worry about putting gas in my car....  won’t have to worry about paying my mortgage”. Not to be outdone, Louis Farrakhan (a respected Black leader and a renown expert of the extraterrestrial life) proclaimed that Obama was the Messiah. Surely our President did not run away from promising quite a bit on his own - for example he assured the American people that he would single-handily lower the sea levels, provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless. And yes, the Guatanamo Bay was supposed to be closed, the unemployment were to stay below 8% and the US allies would be delighted to help America to win the war in Afghanistan and kill Osama ben Laden - while Iran would be stopped from acquiring nuclear weapons.

An attentive reader may ask a rather obvious question stands - how did people in the age of information were so misinformed as to clearly over-estimate the abilities of a former community organizer? Indeed - how could it happen? Americans are known to be practical people, and yet they fell in love with the crook and gave him the keys to the house. Who is responsible for this mess?

Back in spring 2010 I told two of my liberal friends that GOP would very likely took back the House in the next elections. The guys laughed at me, and said that I was nuts. According to them, Obama was wildly popular with American people, Tea Party was crazy and would surely push away the independents. In short, they could not imagine how GOP could win the 2010 elections. Clearly, my friends were convinced that Democrats would not lose the House, and I decided to check just how certain they were in their belief. I offered each of them a $50 bet - and both of them gladly agreed to it. A few months later they both conceded that they lost the bet. As you could imagine, I was mocking them mercilessly the entire time - telling them just how much I would enjoy spending their money on a good cause. But I went further and told them that the result of this bet was not accidental. Unlike my liberal friends, I actually listen to Rush Limbaugh and watch Fox News, and both of these sources provided me with enough valuable information to conclude way ahead of my friends that GOP would take over the House. As one of my friends replied - what I said was even more painful to him than losing $50.

Indeed, the smart ass comment to my liberal friends have a lot of truth in it. Quite a lot of people did expect a lot from Obama administration - one could say no politician could do what he was supposed to do. Today, it's a rather common place argument that Obama suffers from the unreasonable expectations of the public. And yet - I did not have those unreasonable expectations - actually I thought he was a man with no experience, useless education and extreme left-wing beliefs. Nearly every man who listened to Rush Limbaugh and watched Fox News surely realized that Obama was not an able administrator, nor could expect him to be better than an average US president. And yet, millions of people saw Obama as "some kind of God".

There are two lessons that American people have to learn this debacle. Firstly, they need to understand that they need to listen to Rush Limbaugh and watch Fox News if they want to get valuable information about liberal politicians. It surely is not enough to get the news and analysis from the Mainstream Media. And secondly - anyone who proclaims that Obama was burdened with too much expectation should explain who EXACTLY created this expectation. It's not sufficient to proclaim that the Obama hype of 2008 damaged his presidency - one must immediately point out the media outlets and specific reporters and journalists who promoted the Obama myth, who failed to inform the American people about the limitations of the new president. Let's start naming names - Chris Matthews, David Weigel and thousands of others. These are the people who created the Obama myth - and who could never trusted again. And the biggest losers are the so-called "conservatives" like David Brooks who blindly fell in love with Obama. The same conservatives who smugly denigrate Rush Limbaugh and Fox News as too simplistic, fell to the primitive swindle of a used-community organizer. As Brooks infamously remembered his encounter with Obama: "“I remember distinctly an image of -- we were sitting on his couches, and I was looking at his pant leg and his perfectly creased pant and I’m thinking, a) he’s going to be president and b) he’ll be a very good president.” Well, David, you should have ignored the pants and listened to what Obama was saying.

So, do you still wonder who broke the Messiah? The media did. They turned a man of average intelligence and murky past into the Savior of the Nation. Of course he underperformed. Blame the media. Keep in mind that most of people in mainstream media are stupid, and don't forget to listen to Rush Limbaugh - he tells you the truth. I've got $100 to prove it.