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My Country, right or wrong?

by Ibrahim Turner

Extract from an article about Tony Blair by Alan Hart, “A Manifestation of Evil or Just Plain Madness?” published on Information Clearing House.

“Just occasionally terrestrial television comes up with a documentary that provides real and (to my way of thinking) terrifying insight into the mindset of leaders. One such documentary, actually a series of three, The Blair Years, has just ended on BBC Television.

The third and last programme, which like all three was constructed on an in-depth conversation between the former prime minister and Sunday Times columnist David (am I really a Zionist?) Aaronovitch was titled Blair In Power.

Throughout the programme, as in power, Blair insisted that he did what he did because he truly and totally believed it was “the right thing to do.” That, said Sir Ming Campbell, the former Liberal Democratic Party leader, was “a very frustrating phrase”. Why? “Because if I say to you (David Aaronovitch) that it’s ‘the right thing to do,’ there’s no forensic skill you can exercise that can disturb that. It’s a phrase of last resort, impervious to argument.”

In discourse analysis it’s known as the false dilemma. You can’t argue with somebody, particularly a leader, who insists that he was doing what was right because, implicitly, you invite yourself to be seen as arguing for what is morally wrong. And that’s why conviction politicians are so successful and can get away with murder. Literally. (It’s analogous to the assertion that “God promised us the land.” The only sane response to that, if ones dares, is “You’re mad.”)

After a line of commentary that said, “He had become a divisive and unpopular prime minister,” Blair said: “The very moment when I was becoming less popular and less publicly acceptable was when I felt a greater confidence.” Translated that could only mean, “The more people told me I was wrong, the more believed I was right.” (When I discussed this with a former senior BBC producer and friend, he said: “I’m different from Blair. When people tell me I’m deep in shit, I look down and see how I can get out of it!”)”

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According to philosophers, gurus and other enlightened people, when a man feels that he is right, he is never more wrong.

How is that possible?

When you feel you are right, you have no doubts about it. You can initiate wars and atrocities without conscience. Doubts about a course of action only ‘get in the way’ of your ambition; your ‘rightness’.

A man with doubts necessarily looks at the results or consequences of this or that action. Someone who feels that they are ‘right’ does not even entertain the possibility of doubt.

Going further down the road of the consequences of the actions, which lead to bad results, only reinforces the ’rightness’ of the conviction. The ‘conviction’ comes under attack from inconvenient facts.

The personality under attack defends itself vigorously, going on the attack against perceived threats. The personality paints itself into a corner from which there is no escape, therefore it reinforces this conviction of ‘rightness’, refuses to acknowledge all and everything, which does not conform to the picture and the feeling of ‘faultlessness’.

This is a dangerous position to be in, for the person’s understanding of himself, and also for the rest of us, should he or she be in a position to make decisions that effect many peoples, countries and even the environment.

How can a person look at the results of his or her conviction of being ‘right’ such as the deaths of a million Iraqis, without conscience speaking up? The answer is simple – they bury their conscience or refuse to acknowledge that ‘still, tiny voice’.

This leads to a decisive ‘split’ in the psyche of such a person, a divide. The conscience is buried, but it is still there, perhaps manifesting itself in other hidden ways. An analogy could be that when you try to give up smoking, for example, on the surface you succeed, but do not notice that you are more irritable, or that you have taken an inordinate liking for eating chocolate.

What does this have to do with political personalities? You may well ask.

Many people who ‘go into politics’ profess that they do it for altruistic reasons; like wanting to make a difference; to bring ‘what the people want’ (and themselves) to come about. How can people who aspire to positions of power, reconcile their motivations to work for the good of the people, with the obvious climate of privilege and cronyism that prevails in every political system?

They must compromise or bury their conscience.

No man with a fully functioning conscience could possibly want to put himself into such a position as to make decisions for or on behalf of others. No woman either. Just ask any mother, who succumbed to the desire to have children, watching their offspring growing up and making mistakes. They are torn between guiding them and letting them learn for themselves. The mothers have doubts and if their consciences’ are near the surface, then their children grow up with that influence.

One only has to delve into the world of the abused and abusers, to see the perpetuation of parental behaviour manifest itself again and again in their offspring. Is not the opposite also likely; that ‘good’ people bring good children to maturity? I know that that is perhaps a generalization. It is also a generalization that almost everyone, deep down, is plagued by fear, according to psychologists and some gurus.

Some people manifest this more strongly than others, some are ‘control freaks’ and others want to be dominated, taking away their responsibility for themselves. All try to hide the emptiness within, where conscience lives, where the basic tendency for religious feeling resides. Mohammad, (PBUH) is reported to have said that everyone one is born ‘a Muslim’. That is how it is usually translated, but he meant the underlying feeling of spirituality, that one is not just an animal.

Take a current situation, which is not so hypothetical. Examine Dennis Kucinich’s record. Perhaps it is not perfect, but it is unacceptable to the ‘powers that be’. He has not compromised his conscience, so he is never going to be the ‘front runner’ backed by the corporations. Contrast him with say Barack Obama, who in a country that has a large and vociferous majority who are racist. He is a black man, who traditionally, in the present climate, would stand no chance of election.

Why is he garnering massive contributions from big business? Why is he even in the top tier? Has he compromised his conscience in order to gain power?

You have to look beyond the rhetoric and the ‘issues’ that are constantly ‘reported’ and see what the true situation is, and many have the sense that something is wrong with what they see. Does Obama feel he is ‘right’ when he refuses to take military action ‘off the table’ with regard to Iran? Do you think that Hillary Clinton makes her decisions according to her conscience, or to focus group think?

The system is compromised – absolutely compromised by the corporations and Military, Industrial Complex.

The utterances of Pat Robertson about assassinating Hugo Chavez, the overwhelmingly elected President of Venezuela, which happens to have massive oil reserves under its soil, and works for the people’s benefit. Quite apart from a man of the cloth ignoring the ‘thou shalt not kill’ commandment, which as a Christian, he should be living by, he has never threatened assassination of the leader of North Korea, who by anyone’s’ judgment, does not work for the good of his people, and of course, he has no oil under his ground. Where is the conscience of this kind of religious leader?

When you look at the leaders of other countries, including the Islamic countries, like Egypt or Saudi Arabia, or Syria, you see people who also have no conscience; they oppress their people, lock up dissenters and opposition party leaders. People are manipulated, marginalized, and disaffected wherever you look.

The situation in America is not unique. Americans have their illusions of grandeur, just like nationalism manifesting everywhere. It is only seeing the light of day just now because of the likes of George Bush, the neocon agenda, which by the way, they openly have been publishing in opeds and think tank missives for quite a number of decades.

Everything in America is coming to a head. America, being the largest, (at the moment), economy, the biggest military spender on high tech armaments and private armies, the self proclaimed ‘sole super power’, the implications of what happens in America effecting the rest of the world, is very important.

With leaders like Bush talking about World War III, and stopping Iran getting ‘the knowledge’ to produce nuclear weapons, and Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown saying that he would side with the Americans in military action against Iran, and President Sarkozy of France being known as the French American, none of us can have the luxury of ignoring our own consciences.

I contend, that every leader, by default, has compromised his conscience in order to be in power. Driven and manipulated by a cabal without conscience, every leader is kowtowing to the ideology of this cabal, in every country, and of course, controlling all the money and resources enables this control. Of course, local conditions dictate the personal interests of each and every leader, but what is the underlying theme of each and every leader, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia and China? Does Putin have a conscience and work for the benefit of the people?

The standard of living in Russia since the fall of the Berlin wall has plummeted and then recovered hugely under Putin because of the enormous oil and gas reserves, has given him massive economic power. No wonder he is popular. It’s the old ‘bread and circuses’ syndrome.

And in this day and age, massively enhanced on the ‘circus’ part of that, with the hitech gadgets and TV trivia and sports programmes. I profess that I do not know intimately the situation in China, but having come out of Chairman Mao’s regime of communism, and embracing, apparently, the capitalist expansionist philosophy, like Russia and other countries such as India, the conscienceless leaders, embrace whatever works for them, either to remain in power, or, to build up their populations in order to prevent take over by other hungry for power, leaders.

Do people who hanker after power have something wrong with them? Do they not have fulfilled lives? What is the driving force behind their quest to rule over the rest of us? It is never been more apparent that ‘absolute power corrupts absolutely’, than in American politics today.

It’s a dog eat dog world in the heady heights of power. They got there by that philosophy, marginalizing or neutralising their opponents. They are driven by fear of loss of power. They profess conservative, progressive, socialist or democratic philosophies to further their aims.

Their conscience ‘speaks’ in other ways that they are not aware of, they have no introspection, they have no doubts, just like Tony Blair, they believe they are ‘right’ in what they do, in spite of all evidence to the contrary.

‘Thou shalt not kill’, does not figure in their musings.

Authors Bio:
A well traveled and slightly worse for wear 72 year old Englishman; widower, several children and grandchildren and a penchant for wondering 'what is the hidden agenda' in almost everything I read. A keen interest in American culture (an oxymoron?) (JOKE!) and politics and an international world view, except where I haven't got first hand experience of the parts of the world I have not visited. Editor of some books about the Qur'an and Islam. Teacher of English in little known countries like Mauritania, Istanbul, Turkey and Morocco.