SOLZHENITSYN’S POWER OF WORDS
Days after this newspaper began publication, now nearly a half century ago, editor Bill Dorvillier wrote a hard editorial about a traffic accident on Munoz Rivera Avenue. Two nuns on their way to Old San Juan were hurt when their car, in heavy rain, slid off the avenue and down a bank.
The next day, a rookie reporter on assignment, I saw government workers putting up a protective rail at the site of the accident. So this is the power of the press, I said to myself with satisfaction and pride. The power of Dorvillier’s editorial.
A decade and a half later, I had a similar sensation – on a much grander, global, historic scale – when I read Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s “The Gulag Archipelago.” This one man, a writer, had taken on the fearful colossus, the indestructible Soviet Empire. Considered in the Kremlin a “dangerous man”, in 1974 the Soviet secret police broke into his Moscow home, arrested him. But he was now too famous -- awarded the 1970 Nobel Prize for Literature-- to be sent again to a Gulag, a Soviet slave labor camp. He was sent into exile.
When the “The Gulag Archipelago” appeared in Paris in 1973 and in English in the U.S. in 1974, it had an enormous immediate impact. But no one could dream the eventual impact. Yes, there were cracks in the Soviet Empire, and between the communist giants, the USSR and China. But in critical Cold War battlegrounds, the communist fought the U.S.to a stalemate in Korea, humiliated and defeated the U.S. in Vietnam. The Soviet satellite, Castro’s Cuba, taunted the U.S. just off the Florida coast. A good part of the world map was still red – from East Germany to East Europe to Russia, China, now Indochina as Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos went communist.
And many democrats in the West had a problem opposing communism. Simply put, that communism as an ideology was “morally right” and capitalism “morally wrong.” That the goal of communism was social justice, a classless society free of exploitation. That the goal of capitalism was profit, based precisely on class exploitation. Yes, Lenin and Stalin did bad things to their people. But as one prominent leftist English politician put it, they in fact “deformed” communism. And in the 1950’s, the vicious demagoguery of McCarthyism made “anti-communism” synonymous to “reactionary capitalist propaganda.”
Add to this ideological mindset the reality of the Cold War. In the nuclear age, “detent” with the Soviet Union seemed the only sane policy for the U.S. and the West. If the goal was “co-existence,” to frontally attack the very foundations of the Soviet Union seemed to many a dangerous policy.
This is precisely what Solzhenitsyn did and he was seen as “dangerous” not only in the Kremlin, but in the West. As a Wall Street Journal editorial pointed out this week, Sweden refused to give him the Nobel Prize at its embassy in Moscow. Once in exile in the U.S., President Ford initially refused to receive him in the White House.
Through the decades, of course, thousands of others had denounced the Soviet Union and communism. But what made Solzhenitsyn “dangerous” was precisely the power of his words. The three-volume “The Gulag Archipelago” is the true story of his eight years in a Gulag slave camp, a loyal communist, a World War II Red Army officer now accused of having slandered Stalin – and the true stories of hundreds of other victims. Soviet leaders and others, including European intellectuals, tried, but could not dismiss him as just another “anti-communist tool of capitalism.”
As the August 5th Washington Post editorial put it: Solzhenitsyn “with his writings and dauntless moral courage shook Soviet power as no other individual had done… Who again could doubt the rot that was at the system’s core or the sinister cynicism of its leadership?”
How essential the 476 Gulag complexes (some consisted of hundreds of camps) were to the Soviet system, from the very beginning of Lenin’s Russian Revolution until Mikhail Gorbachev began Dissolving then in 1987, is described in detail by the journalist Anne Applebaum, in her important 2003 book, “Gulag: A History.” And how devastating they were. Her extensive research leads her to the “conservative” estimate that 28.7 million people were Gulag victims, and that at the very least, 2,749,163 died.
In the 1970’s it seemed impossible but today we know that Solzhenitsyn’s words changed history. “The books impact on the moral legitimacy of the Soviet regime,” the Post writes, “was so corrosive, and so irrefutable, that it can be said to have sown the first seeds of the Soviet Union’s eventual collapse.”
In July, 1980, I had the opportunity to publish one of his long articles in the first issue of a new daily newspaper, El Reportero. A small token of gratitude in Puerto Rico to a big, great man. Two full pages of words, the first part of a series. Here again were his powerful words, as he did often in the 20 years he lived as a virtual hermit in the U.S., chastising the U.S. and the West for not understanding the irremediable evil nature of the Soviet Union and communism.
#Solzhenitsyn died in Moscow last Sunday at the age 89. In the second half of his life he decried the superficiality of Western culture as much as he had the Soviet system. And today there is indeed reason to wonder about the future of the power of words. Especially when I see children with their eyes glued endlessly to moving images on those small computer gadgets.
I wonder about the power of words to change things -- the words of a Dorvillier editorial to get a protective rail built in San Juan, the power of Solzhenitsyn’s words to change history and bring down an evil empire.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Friday, August 1, 2008
THE BRUTAL REALITY OF BOXING
Puerto Rico was stunned. The big July 27th newspaper headline was one word: “Destroyed.” The full-page photo of the boxer on his left knee, his face battered and bloodied, his puffed eyes closed, his puffed lips open. His arm, gloves, boxing shorts splattered with blood.
This could not be Miguel Cotto. Not the invincible Miguel Cotto. His face so bloated, battered and bloodied that it didn’t even look like him.
It was. But it wasn’t only that he was no longer champ, no longer unbeaten. It was that he was “destroyed” by Antonio Margarito. That the Mexican, in the graphic words of the AP report, sent “Cotto to a hospital for enough stitches to make a quilt.”
And this is the thing about boxing. You pick up the paper in the morning, turn to the sport pages, and when you see that your baseball, or basketball, or football team lost, you feel disappointment. But this huge headline and photo provoked an emotion far beyond disappointment. This is a human being. These are real wounds on his face, real blood throughout his body. But what about the damage to what you don’t see? Just how bad, how seriously, has this man been “destroyed?”
Now, talking about heartbreak in boxing, take a newspaper story published a few months ago on another Puerto Rican boxer that was as idolized as Miguel Cotto. Wilfredo Benitez was born in New York City in 1958 from a Puerto Rican boxing family. At the age of 15 he was already world-ranked. At 17, he made boxing history as the youngest ever world champion. By 1981 he made boxing history again becoming the youngest champion in three divisions.
Like Cotto, he had mega fights in Las Vegas against boxing legends, losing to Sugar Ray Lenard but beating Roberto Duran. Still in his 20’s, however, after losing a brutal 15-round fight to Thomas Hearns in 1982, his lifetime of boxing began taking its toll. It is evident and inevitable: you can’t take hundreds, thousands of blows to the head without some sort of brain damage. In 1987, something bizarre happened to Benitez after losing a fight in Buenos Aires. He accused his fight promoter of stealing his money and passport. It took a year to get the Argentine government to allow him to leave the country.
Benítez, by now having fought 62 times as a professional and many more as an amateur, with each new fight was suffering bad beatings. The newspaper story on Benitez described a fight in Quebec: “For eight rounds, the Canadian Mathew Hilton gave Benítez a terrible beating. Finally, in the ninth round, Hilton cornered him against the ropes and plummeted him with combinations to the head. Just before the round ended, a devastating left hook yanked Benítez’s head to the back. As he sank to the canvas his head moved from side to side like the ‘doll bobblehead’.”
Now virtually destitute, living in the Saint Just barrio in Trujillo Alto, Benitez gets a $200 a month pension from the World Boxing Council. The newspaper story describes the skeleton of what was once a gym: the rusty frame of what was once the boxing ring, a punching bag lying dead on the floor. When Benítez tried to walk, he lost his balance, reminiscent of that “dance of death” in that terrible knockout in Quebec.
It was useless to try to interview Benítez. He kept asking “how old am I?” Next to him was his 81-year-old mother, Clara. Some 15 times in less than an hour, staring at his mother, Benitez asked: “Are you my mother?”
Some professional boxers survive without terrible brain damage. According to scientific reports, some 20 percent don’t. According to the American Medical Association, four out of five boxers suffer some degree of noticeable brain damage, like dementia, loss of memory, or worse.
As the heartbreaking attempt to interview Benitez shows, he is one that didn’t survive. As other great champions like Muhammad Ali. Is there anything sadder than to see him today, his once great hands shaking uncontrollably, this once great communicator now trying desperately to mumble words?
Now, also heartbreaking was the newspaper story after the Cotto fight describing the crying of his three children, at ringside, as they witnessed the pounding of their father’s profusely bleeding face. Cotto’s wife, Melissa, confessed that, as all Puerto Rico, she never dreamed this could happen.
There is a reason why Puerto Rico loves boxing perhaps more than any other sport. From Sixto Escobar in 1934 to Miguel Cotto, Puerto Rico has had no less than 55 world champions. This small island ranks third in the world in producing champions.
But as hard as it is today to believe, some day Puerto Rico will follow other parts of the world that see professional boxing for what it is, a form of entertainment too brutal, too destructive, to have a place in a civilized, humane society. Some day it will be banned, and one hopes before it does to other young men what it did to Wilfredo Benítez.
And to what it did to another boxer a week before the Cotto-Margarito fight. In San Antonio, for ten rounds, Mexican welterweight Oscar Diaz was also destroyed. He collapsed. Unconscious and unresponsive, he was rushed to a hospital for surgery for bleeding on the brain. As of this writing, he was in a coma.
Loving the sport and loving the champions as much as Puerto Ricans do, does not erase the reality of professional boxing. It is a brutal, inexcusably inhumane sport.
Puerto Rico was stunned. The big July 27th newspaper headline was one word: “Destroyed.” The full-page photo of the boxer on his left knee, his face battered and bloodied, his puffed eyes closed, his puffed lips open. His arm, gloves, boxing shorts splattered with blood.
This could not be Miguel Cotto. Not the invincible Miguel Cotto. His face so bloated, battered and bloodied that it didn’t even look like him.
It was. But it wasn’t only that he was no longer champ, no longer unbeaten. It was that he was “destroyed” by Antonio Margarito. That the Mexican, in the graphic words of the AP report, sent “Cotto to a hospital for enough stitches to make a quilt.”
And this is the thing about boxing. You pick up the paper in the morning, turn to the sport pages, and when you see that your baseball, or basketball, or football team lost, you feel disappointment. But this huge headline and photo provoked an emotion far beyond disappointment. This is a human being. These are real wounds on his face, real blood throughout his body. But what about the damage to what you don’t see? Just how bad, how seriously, has this man been “destroyed?”
Now, talking about heartbreak in boxing, take a newspaper story published a few months ago on another Puerto Rican boxer that was as idolized as Miguel Cotto. Wilfredo Benitez was born in New York City in 1958 from a Puerto Rican boxing family. At the age of 15 he was already world-ranked. At 17, he made boxing history as the youngest ever world champion. By 1981 he made boxing history again becoming the youngest champion in three divisions.
Like Cotto, he had mega fights in Las Vegas against boxing legends, losing to Sugar Ray Lenard but beating Roberto Duran. Still in his 20’s, however, after losing a brutal 15-round fight to Thomas Hearns in 1982, his lifetime of boxing began taking its toll. It is evident and inevitable: you can’t take hundreds, thousands of blows to the head without some sort of brain damage. In 1987, something bizarre happened to Benitez after losing a fight in Buenos Aires. He accused his fight promoter of stealing his money and passport. It took a year to get the Argentine government to allow him to leave the country.
Benítez, by now having fought 62 times as a professional and many more as an amateur, with each new fight was suffering bad beatings. The newspaper story on Benitez described a fight in Quebec: “For eight rounds, the Canadian Mathew Hilton gave Benítez a terrible beating. Finally, in the ninth round, Hilton cornered him against the ropes and plummeted him with combinations to the head. Just before the round ended, a devastating left hook yanked Benítez’s head to the back. As he sank to the canvas his head moved from side to side like the ‘doll bobblehead’.”
Now virtually destitute, living in the Saint Just barrio in Trujillo Alto, Benitez gets a $200 a month pension from the World Boxing Council. The newspaper story describes the skeleton of what was once a gym: the rusty frame of what was once the boxing ring, a punching bag lying dead on the floor. When Benítez tried to walk, he lost his balance, reminiscent of that “dance of death” in that terrible knockout in Quebec.
It was useless to try to interview Benítez. He kept asking “how old am I?” Next to him was his 81-year-old mother, Clara. Some 15 times in less than an hour, staring at his mother, Benitez asked: “Are you my mother?”
Some professional boxers survive without terrible brain damage. According to scientific reports, some 20 percent don’t. According to the American Medical Association, four out of five boxers suffer some degree of noticeable brain damage, like dementia, loss of memory, or worse.
As the heartbreaking attempt to interview Benitez shows, he is one that didn’t survive. As other great champions like Muhammad Ali. Is there anything sadder than to see him today, his once great hands shaking uncontrollably, this once great communicator now trying desperately to mumble words?
Now, also heartbreaking was the newspaper story after the Cotto fight describing the crying of his three children, at ringside, as they witnessed the pounding of their father’s profusely bleeding face. Cotto’s wife, Melissa, confessed that, as all Puerto Rico, she never dreamed this could happen.
There is a reason why Puerto Rico loves boxing perhaps more than any other sport. From Sixto Escobar in 1934 to Miguel Cotto, Puerto Rico has had no less than 55 world champions. This small island ranks third in the world in producing champions.
But as hard as it is today to believe, some day Puerto Rico will follow other parts of the world that see professional boxing for what it is, a form of entertainment too brutal, too destructive, to have a place in a civilized, humane society. Some day it will be banned, and one hopes before it does to other young men what it did to Wilfredo Benítez.
And to what it did to another boxer a week before the Cotto-Margarito fight. In San Antonio, for ten rounds, Mexican welterweight Oscar Diaz was also destroyed. He collapsed. Unconscious and unresponsive, he was rushed to a hospital for surgery for bleeding on the brain. As of this writing, he was in a coma.
Loving the sport and loving the champions as much as Puerto Ricans do, does not erase the reality of professional boxing. It is a brutal, inexcusably inhumane sport.
THE GREATEST BASEBALL PLAYER
Last week’s All Star game was a spectacular celebration of baseball with the 49 Hall of Famers on the field before the game. Held at Yankee Stadium – the 85-year old “baseball cathedral” in its last season – it was also a celebration of Yankee greatness.
But what came to mind, however, was another ball park, a little, dinky park, hard to get to, hardly fitting between streets and avenues in the middle of a borough some people were ashamed to call home. It didn’t even merit the name “stadium”. It was called Ebbetts Field. And the men who played there were called “bums.” Not meant to insult them, but to describe them. Everyone knew that when the sport sections of the New York newspapers used the word “bums” they were referring to the Brooklyn Dodgers.
I never knew why my father was a Brooklyn Dodger fan. He was anything but a masochist. We lived in the Bronx, a sea, of course, of New York Yankee fanaticism. And now and then, not often, he would take me in that endless subway train ride, then that long, long walk, to Ebbett Field, where, except in rare occasions, we saw why they were called “bums.”
So I was a Dodger fan in the early 40’s and the sea of Yankee arrogance was hard to take. I could not deny, of course, that the Yankee won and seemed to be every year in the World Series. But it occurred to me to argue that the real reason was that the Yankees were simply “lucky.” And to prove it I would cut newspaper stories showing how the Yankees won with bloop singles and ground balls with “eyes” that got through the infield, while the losing team tore the ball with line drives hit right at the fielders, or just inches foul.
Then, after the war, something happened.
It is hard today to imagine how big this was. At the start of the 1947 season, at first base in a Brooklyn Dodger uniform, there was a black man. Today it will seem an exaggeration to compare this to an African-American running for President. But it was big. Jackie Robinson was the first black man permitted to play in the Mayor Leagues in the 20th Century.
Everyone today recognizes that Robinson is one of the great figures in American history. In 1997, the 50th anniversary of that April afternoon in 1947, President Bill Clinton on down led celebrations of that historic event in every ball park.
But for this lonely Dodger fan beleaguered in the Bronx, Robinson did something else. No one could know it that afternoon, but the moment Robinson began to play, the Dodgers were no longer “bums.” By the end of that year, everyone knew it. The Dodgers won the pennant. And Robinson had survived the racism, the death threats and the indignity of racial segregation in some of the cities where he played, to become the first ever Rookie of the Year.
But there was still the Yankees. If it was true, as I passionately argued, that the Yankees were “lucky”, the Dodgers seemed cursed. Who could forget the 1941 World Series when the Dodgers seemed to have won game four as the last Yankee batter struck out, but the ball went through the Dodger catcher? The Yankees went on to win the game and the series.
#Now, after Jackie Robinson, the Dodgers became an overpowering team that won the pennant in 1949, 1952, 1953. But they lost the series each time to the Yankees. Again in 1955 they seemed destined to lose still again, losing the first two games. Then a pitcher named Jonny Podres somehow handcuffed the Yankees twice. The Dodgers finally won a series. The New York Daily News front page was a giant caricature of a bum with a wide toothless smile. It was now official: bums no more.
Of the millions of words written about the Brooklyn Dodgers through the years, the word that keeps popping up is “heartbreak.” In 1956, the Dodgers again played the Yankees in the series and again lost. But the biggest heartbreak was about to happen. The Dodgers had become too big for the little, dinky ball park, but the team owners got into a nasty fight with the City of New York over a new stadium.
In dramatic contrast to the spectacular All Star game, the Hall of Fame celebration at Yankee Stadium this past Tuesday, on September 24, 1957, the Brooklyn Dodgers played their last game in Ebbetts Field. There are today old Dodger fans – Larry King confessed to being one not too long ago – who still cannot believe that it happened. The fans lost their team – the Brooklyn Dodgers ceased to exist, and a few years later, so did Ebbetts Field.
Decades later I would still argue that the Yankees were indeed “lucky” – I had after all all those newspaper clippings – but I now know that “luck”, chance, is simply an integral part of the game, more so, I think, than football or basketball. Listen to any baseball player and more often than not he will use the world “luck.
After the All Star game, the front page of the same New York Daily News was a huge close up photo of “King George:” the aging, frail Yankee owner, George Steinbrenner. No use denying that the Yankees have been baseball’s royalty with great players from Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig to Joe DiMaggio.
But the greatest player was not a Yankee. Defining “great” as we do in science, politics, art – that is, in terms of positive impact – the greatest player in baseball history was Jackie Robinson. No baseball player had a greater positive impact on the game, on the nation, on the “bums.” That is one thing no one can take away from a Brooklyn Dodger fan.
Last week’s All Star game was a spectacular celebration of baseball with the 49 Hall of Famers on the field before the game. Held at Yankee Stadium – the 85-year old “baseball cathedral” in its last season – it was also a celebration of Yankee greatness.
But what came to mind, however, was another ball park, a little, dinky park, hard to get to, hardly fitting between streets and avenues in the middle of a borough some people were ashamed to call home. It didn’t even merit the name “stadium”. It was called Ebbetts Field. And the men who played there were called “bums.” Not meant to insult them, but to describe them. Everyone knew that when the sport sections of the New York newspapers used the word “bums” they were referring to the Brooklyn Dodgers.
I never knew why my father was a Brooklyn Dodger fan. He was anything but a masochist. We lived in the Bronx, a sea, of course, of New York Yankee fanaticism. And now and then, not often, he would take me in that endless subway train ride, then that long, long walk, to Ebbett Field, where, except in rare occasions, we saw why they were called “bums.”
So I was a Dodger fan in the early 40’s and the sea of Yankee arrogance was hard to take. I could not deny, of course, that the Yankee won and seemed to be every year in the World Series. But it occurred to me to argue that the real reason was that the Yankees were simply “lucky.” And to prove it I would cut newspaper stories showing how the Yankees won with bloop singles and ground balls with “eyes” that got through the infield, while the losing team tore the ball with line drives hit right at the fielders, or just inches foul.
Then, after the war, something happened.
It is hard today to imagine how big this was. At the start of the 1947 season, at first base in a Brooklyn Dodger uniform, there was a black man. Today it will seem an exaggeration to compare this to an African-American running for President. But it was big. Jackie Robinson was the first black man permitted to play in the Mayor Leagues in the 20th Century.
Everyone today recognizes that Robinson is one of the great figures in American history. In 1997, the 50th anniversary of that April afternoon in 1947, President Bill Clinton on down led celebrations of that historic event in every ball park.
But for this lonely Dodger fan beleaguered in the Bronx, Robinson did something else. No one could know it that afternoon, but the moment Robinson began to play, the Dodgers were no longer “bums.” By the end of that year, everyone knew it. The Dodgers won the pennant. And Robinson had survived the racism, the death threats and the indignity of racial segregation in some of the cities where he played, to become the first ever Rookie of the Year.
But there was still the Yankees. If it was true, as I passionately argued, that the Yankees were “lucky”, the Dodgers seemed cursed. Who could forget the 1941 World Series when the Dodgers seemed to have won game four as the last Yankee batter struck out, but the ball went through the Dodger catcher? The Yankees went on to win the game and the series.
#Now, after Jackie Robinson, the Dodgers became an overpowering team that won the pennant in 1949, 1952, 1953. But they lost the series each time to the Yankees. Again in 1955 they seemed destined to lose still again, losing the first two games. Then a pitcher named Jonny Podres somehow handcuffed the Yankees twice. The Dodgers finally won a series. The New York Daily News front page was a giant caricature of a bum with a wide toothless smile. It was now official: bums no more.
Of the millions of words written about the Brooklyn Dodgers through the years, the word that keeps popping up is “heartbreak.” In 1956, the Dodgers again played the Yankees in the series and again lost. But the biggest heartbreak was about to happen. The Dodgers had become too big for the little, dinky ball park, but the team owners got into a nasty fight with the City of New York over a new stadium.
In dramatic contrast to the spectacular All Star game, the Hall of Fame celebration at Yankee Stadium this past Tuesday, on September 24, 1957, the Brooklyn Dodgers played their last game in Ebbetts Field. There are today old Dodger fans – Larry King confessed to being one not too long ago – who still cannot believe that it happened. The fans lost their team – the Brooklyn Dodgers ceased to exist, and a few years later, so did Ebbetts Field.
Decades later I would still argue that the Yankees were indeed “lucky” – I had after all all those newspaper clippings – but I now know that “luck”, chance, is simply an integral part of the game, more so, I think, than football or basketball. Listen to any baseball player and more often than not he will use the world “luck.
After the All Star game, the front page of the same New York Daily News was a huge close up photo of “King George:” the aging, frail Yankee owner, George Steinbrenner. No use denying that the Yankees have been baseball’s royalty with great players from Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig to Joe DiMaggio.
But the greatest player was not a Yankee. Defining “great” as we do in science, politics, art – that is, in terms of positive impact – the greatest player in baseball history was Jackie Robinson. No baseball player had a greater positive impact on the game, on the nation, on the “bums.” That is one thing no one can take away from a Brooklyn Dodger fan.
THE FEAR MONGERS STRIKE AGAIN?
At high noon on January 20th, the life of the man who takes the oath of office will have what can be called an “existential transformation.” From that moment and for the next four years, he will carry an inescapable, constitutional and profoundly personal responsibility: prevent another horrific terrorist attack in the United States.
Whoever becomes president, in varying degrees, for years has found fault, criticized, attacked how President Bush and his administration have conducted the “war on terror” since the 9/11 terrorist attack. For the man taking the oath of office, all that is over.
The 9/11 attack was an “existential” event because it changed not only America and Americans, but fundamentally what it means to be president. It is to live every minute of every day with a responsibility awesome beyond words: asking himself he has done everything in his power to prevent another terrorist attack that may kill, not thousands, but hundreds of thousands of Americans.” Going to bed every night not knowing, as Hillary Clinton warned in her campaign, if the phone will ring at 3 in the morning.
But isn’t this kind of talk precisely what so many Democrats and so many in the media have been denouncing for years? Isn’t this “fear mongering?” Isn’t this the “despicable” tactic of Bush and the Republican Party of using 9/11 to creating fear in the American people in order to justify the Iraq war? Isn’t this the tactic of using “the war on terror” as excuse to undermine fundamental political rights? And isn’t this the Republicans tactic to defeat Barrack Obama in November?
Lets look at two reports in the July 14th issue of Time magazine that ask a relevant question: is Osama bin Laden still a real threat to the U.S.? We know he is alive somewhere in the Pakistani-Afghanistan frontier and there are reports that he may have a serious kidney disease. According to Time, the answer is clear. “Bin Laden remains determined to kill large numbers of Westerners and disrupt the global economy.”
“Since 9/11,” the reports continue, “al Qaeda and its affiliates have bombed Western-owned hotels around the Muslim world, attacked a number of Jewish targets and conducted suicide operations against oil facilities in the Middle East: we can expect more of the same in the future. Al Qaeda has also used new tactics and weapons – like the surface-to-air missile that brought down an Israeli airliner in Kenya in 2002. And it retains a long standing desire to acquire a radiological bomb. But al-Qaeda’s most dangerous weapon has always been unpredictability. That’s why it is dangerous to dismiss bin Laden as a spent force.”
Now, again, all this is pretty much what the Bush administration have been saying, and that often is dismissed, in the words of a recent newspaper editorial, as “the White House indulging in…its signature fear mongering.”
But if bin Laden is still alive and at large in November, something similar to the Time reports is likely to be what the president-elect will be told in intelligence briefings. No American president will again underestimate bin Laden. The American government ignored his 1996 “declaration of war against the U.S, ” then minimized his deliberate acts of war against the U.S. – the 1998 deadly attack on U.S. embassies in Africa and the 2000 attack of an American war ship.
Precisely because “al Qaeda’s most dangerous weapon is unpredictability,” the president must make decisions and act on the assumption that al Qaeda, or any other of a number of terrorist groups, is preparing and waiting for the opening to again attack the U.S.
It is this assumption that changes the nature of the American presidency. There is the famous aphorism by Samuel Johnson in the 18th century: “Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates the mind wonderfully.” Nothing focuses the mind of a person, or a nation, than the reality of imminent destruction. Priority – not what is important, but what is most important – becomes evident. This is what happened, of course, after the shock of the 9/11 attack. What everyone believed to be the inevitability of another attack concentrated the minds of the President, of everyone in his government, and for a time, virtually every American.
The excellent book “Decision and War” by former Pentagon official Douglass J. Feith describes that the terrible fear after 9/11 was not only that new terrorist attacks would take many more lives and cause more physical destruction, but that it would destroy what Americans have most cherished throughout the nation’s history – the “American way of life,” beginning of course with individual freedoms.
So back to January 20th. If the man taking the oath is Barack Obama, he made “ending the war in Iraq” the essential campaign promise that won him the nomination. After he began to indicate that he may “refine” his position as to when and how, he felt he had to emphatically reaffirm that he has not changed. That as President, the first question he will ask the Joint Chiefs of Staff is how soon can we withdraw the troops out of Iraq.
But there is a prior question: are we doing everything in our power to prevent the next terrorist attack? The details of when and how to “withdraw” from Iraq, generating so much heat during the campaign, will depend on the answer. The new president will have no choice but to assume that if he doesn’t prevent it, there will be another terrorist attack that may involve a nuclear weapon, or other weapon of mass destruction, with unimaginable consequences.
Does this sound like “the fear mongers strike again?” It is in fact the existential reality facing the President and the American people.
At high noon on January 20th, the life of the man who takes the oath of office will have what can be called an “existential transformation.” From that moment and for the next four years, he will carry an inescapable, constitutional and profoundly personal responsibility: prevent another horrific terrorist attack in the United States.
Whoever becomes president, in varying degrees, for years has found fault, criticized, attacked how President Bush and his administration have conducted the “war on terror” since the 9/11 terrorist attack. For the man taking the oath of office, all that is over.
The 9/11 attack was an “existential” event because it changed not only America and Americans, but fundamentally what it means to be president. It is to live every minute of every day with a responsibility awesome beyond words: asking himself he has done everything in his power to prevent another terrorist attack that may kill, not thousands, but hundreds of thousands of Americans.” Going to bed every night not knowing, as Hillary Clinton warned in her campaign, if the phone will ring at 3 in the morning.
But isn’t this kind of talk precisely what so many Democrats and so many in the media have been denouncing for years? Isn’t this “fear mongering?” Isn’t this the “despicable” tactic of Bush and the Republican Party of using 9/11 to creating fear in the American people in order to justify the Iraq war? Isn’t this the tactic of using “the war on terror” as excuse to undermine fundamental political rights? And isn’t this the Republicans tactic to defeat Barrack Obama in November?
Lets look at two reports in the July 14th issue of Time magazine that ask a relevant question: is Osama bin Laden still a real threat to the U.S.? We know he is alive somewhere in the Pakistani-Afghanistan frontier and there are reports that he may have a serious kidney disease. According to Time, the answer is clear. “Bin Laden remains determined to kill large numbers of Westerners and disrupt the global economy.”
“Since 9/11,” the reports continue, “al Qaeda and its affiliates have bombed Western-owned hotels around the Muslim world, attacked a number of Jewish targets and conducted suicide operations against oil facilities in the Middle East: we can expect more of the same in the future. Al Qaeda has also used new tactics and weapons – like the surface-to-air missile that brought down an Israeli airliner in Kenya in 2002. And it retains a long standing desire to acquire a radiological bomb. But al-Qaeda’s most dangerous weapon has always been unpredictability. That’s why it is dangerous to dismiss bin Laden as a spent force.”
Now, again, all this is pretty much what the Bush administration have been saying, and that often is dismissed, in the words of a recent newspaper editorial, as “the White House indulging in…its signature fear mongering.”
But if bin Laden is still alive and at large in November, something similar to the Time reports is likely to be what the president-elect will be told in intelligence briefings. No American president will again underestimate bin Laden. The American government ignored his 1996 “declaration of war against the U.S, ” then minimized his deliberate acts of war against the U.S. – the 1998 deadly attack on U.S. embassies in Africa and the 2000 attack of an American war ship.
Precisely because “al Qaeda’s most dangerous weapon is unpredictability,” the president must make decisions and act on the assumption that al Qaeda, or any other of a number of terrorist groups, is preparing and waiting for the opening to again attack the U.S.
It is this assumption that changes the nature of the American presidency. There is the famous aphorism by Samuel Johnson in the 18th century: “Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates the mind wonderfully.” Nothing focuses the mind of a person, or a nation, than the reality of imminent destruction. Priority – not what is important, but what is most important – becomes evident. This is what happened, of course, after the shock of the 9/11 attack. What everyone believed to be the inevitability of another attack concentrated the minds of the President, of everyone in his government, and for a time, virtually every American.
The excellent book “Decision and War” by former Pentagon official Douglass J. Feith describes that the terrible fear after 9/11 was not only that new terrorist attacks would take many more lives and cause more physical destruction, but that it would destroy what Americans have most cherished throughout the nation’s history – the “American way of life,” beginning of course with individual freedoms.
So back to January 20th. If the man taking the oath is Barack Obama, he made “ending the war in Iraq” the essential campaign promise that won him the nomination. After he began to indicate that he may “refine” his position as to when and how, he felt he had to emphatically reaffirm that he has not changed. That as President, the first question he will ask the Joint Chiefs of Staff is how soon can we withdraw the troops out of Iraq.
But there is a prior question: are we doing everything in our power to prevent the next terrorist attack? The details of when and how to “withdraw” from Iraq, generating so much heat during the campaign, will depend on the answer. The new president will have no choice but to assume that if he doesn’t prevent it, there will be another terrorist attack that may involve a nuclear weapon, or other weapon of mass destruction, with unimaginable consequences.
Does this sound like “the fear mongers strike again?” It is in fact the existential reality facing the President and the American people.
CAN THE ISLAND PULL OUT OF THE RECESSION?
Ramon Cantero Frau, former head of the Economic Development Administration, this past week painted a grim picture of the island economy, focused on two statistics.
One, the banking crisis. From late 2004 to the present, the market value of Puerto Rican bank stocks has declined by $19.4 billion. Assuming that 40 per cent is owned by local residents and corporations, Puerto Ricans have lost $7.7 billion.
Two, the energy crisis. Puerto Rico consumes some 70 million barrels of oil a year. The increase in the price of oil since 2005 up to now has cost Puerto Rico $9.9 million. This is real money: “money that has not created roads, schools, housing, hospitals. It is money that has evaporated from the pockets of the Puerto Ricans.”
This is a massive decrease of wealth in Puerto Rico. In the past, Cantero writes, Puerto Rico has overcome serious economic crisis. But they were basically one dimensional and the solutions consisted in one form or another of fiscal stimulation.
Today’s crisis, he writes, is different. It is multi dimensional and extremely complicated. Short term there is little Puerto Rico can do about the world-wide banking credit crisis or about the world-wide energy crisis. Long term, he writes, Puerto Rico must recognize that the magnitude of the crisis “transcends political parties. This is the first time that we have to establish national consensus to resolve the economic crisis.”
How bad is the recession? As island economist Mohinder S. Bhatia puts it: “The overall picture of the economy is not pretty.” The Gross Domestic Product declined by 2.1 per cent in fiscal year 2008. It would be worse if not for the $1.2 billion in U.S. economic stimulus money sent to nearly one million Puerto Rico a few weeks ago. Bhatia also points out that although unemployment is up to 11.4 percent, this is still far below the 1975 recession, 26 percent, or the 1983 recession, 25 percent.
But the fundamental question is whether Puerto Rico, this time, can pull out of the recession. The point of Cantero’s article is that there must be a political “national consensus”: a recognition that this crisis is so serious, so deep and so complex, that Puerto Rico must transcend partisan politics. This, of course, is what numerous other private sector leaders and organizations have been pleading for months – with the one important achievement being last month’s bipartisan approval of a wide-ranging investment incentive law.
And this brings us to what happens in November of this year. Whoever wins, needless to say, will be faced with the economic crisis. And the newly-elected government will have to make a fundamental, and crucial decision: in fact, a decision that in island history all governors and parties have had to make. What will be the priority – the economy or political status?
#At this point the opinion polls say not only that Luis Fortuno and the New Progressive Party will win, but that they will sweep the entire government. The NPP has always called itself an “ideological party”, that its reason- to-be is statehood. And we see once again that the NPP cannot wait for next year to “eliminate” Commonwealth status. The NPP Legislature passed a bill that would allow the next Governor to change the official name of the government from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico to the Government of Puerto Rico. Governor Anibal Acevedo Vila vetoed the bill pointing out that “Commonwealth” is the government’s constitutional name.
This sounds like, and in fact is, superficial ideological politics. But if the he polls are right and Fortuno and the NPP control the entire government, the executive, the Legislature, and soon after, ideologically the Supreme Court, there is no question that there will be another statehood crusade on this island and in the U.S.
Puerto Rico has seen the economic effect of past crusades. Carlos Romero Barcelo went to Congress to give up Puerto Rico’s vital exemption in federal minimum wages. Pedro Rossello lobbied Congress to eliminate of Section 936. In both cases because both were seen as “obstacles to statehood.”
Statehooders have always argued that statehood will boost the island economy. The problem is that economic reality tells us that they are dead wrong. We see precisely today the negative effect of the latest increase in the federal minimum wage from $5.85 to $6.55 an hour. And we have seen the decline in new industrial promotion, and the loss of over 40,000 manufacturing jobs, since the repeal of 936 in the late 1990’s.
There is no mystery here. A big NPP victory here, and in the U.S., if the Democrats win the presidency and control of Congress, will produce the perception that Puerto Rico is finally on the road to statehood. Democrats, believing that Puerto Rico would give them seven more members of the House and two Senators, have been increasingly statehood-friendly. Yes, Fortuno is a national Republican, but resident commissioner candidate Pedro Pierluisi is an Obama Democrat.
Perception, of course, is not reality. The reality is that in the end, statehood is economically impossible. But the perception of the inevitability of statehood will have an effect on the island economy far worse than the loss of minimum wage flexibility and the loss of 936.
The obsession to eliminate Commonwealth will undermine the foundation of the island economy. The perception will be that Puerto Rico will soon lose federal tax exemption, triple Puerto Rico bond exemption, and other vital benefits.
Can Puerto Rico pull out of the recession? It is evident that It will depend to a great extend on world conditions. But it will also depend on how the newly-elected government answers the essential question of priorities: the economy or status? #One thing we know. As bad as Cantero’s statistics paint the economy today, a new statehood crusade will make it worse.
Ramon Cantero Frau, former head of the Economic Development Administration, this past week painted a grim picture of the island economy, focused on two statistics.
One, the banking crisis. From late 2004 to the present, the market value of Puerto Rican bank stocks has declined by $19.4 billion. Assuming that 40 per cent is owned by local residents and corporations, Puerto Ricans have lost $7.7 billion.
Two, the energy crisis. Puerto Rico consumes some 70 million barrels of oil a year. The increase in the price of oil since 2005 up to now has cost Puerto Rico $9.9 million. This is real money: “money that has not created roads, schools, housing, hospitals. It is money that has evaporated from the pockets of the Puerto Ricans.”
This is a massive decrease of wealth in Puerto Rico. In the past, Cantero writes, Puerto Rico has overcome serious economic crisis. But they were basically one dimensional and the solutions consisted in one form or another of fiscal stimulation.
Today’s crisis, he writes, is different. It is multi dimensional and extremely complicated. Short term there is little Puerto Rico can do about the world-wide banking credit crisis or about the world-wide energy crisis. Long term, he writes, Puerto Rico must recognize that the magnitude of the crisis “transcends political parties. This is the first time that we have to establish national consensus to resolve the economic crisis.”
How bad is the recession? As island economist Mohinder S. Bhatia puts it: “The overall picture of the economy is not pretty.” The Gross Domestic Product declined by 2.1 per cent in fiscal year 2008. It would be worse if not for the $1.2 billion in U.S. economic stimulus money sent to nearly one million Puerto Rico a few weeks ago. Bhatia also points out that although unemployment is up to 11.4 percent, this is still far below the 1975 recession, 26 percent, or the 1983 recession, 25 percent.
But the fundamental question is whether Puerto Rico, this time, can pull out of the recession. The point of Cantero’s article is that there must be a political “national consensus”: a recognition that this crisis is so serious, so deep and so complex, that Puerto Rico must transcend partisan politics. This, of course, is what numerous other private sector leaders and organizations have been pleading for months – with the one important achievement being last month’s bipartisan approval of a wide-ranging investment incentive law.
And this brings us to what happens in November of this year. Whoever wins, needless to say, will be faced with the economic crisis. And the newly-elected government will have to make a fundamental, and crucial decision: in fact, a decision that in island history all governors and parties have had to make. What will be the priority – the economy or political status?
#At this point the opinion polls say not only that Luis Fortuno and the New Progressive Party will win, but that they will sweep the entire government. The NPP has always called itself an “ideological party”, that its reason- to-be is statehood. And we see once again that the NPP cannot wait for next year to “eliminate” Commonwealth status. The NPP Legislature passed a bill that would allow the next Governor to change the official name of the government from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico to the Government of Puerto Rico. Governor Anibal Acevedo Vila vetoed the bill pointing out that “Commonwealth” is the government’s constitutional name.
This sounds like, and in fact is, superficial ideological politics. But if the he polls are right and Fortuno and the NPP control the entire government, the executive, the Legislature, and soon after, ideologically the Supreme Court, there is no question that there will be another statehood crusade on this island and in the U.S.
Puerto Rico has seen the economic effect of past crusades. Carlos Romero Barcelo went to Congress to give up Puerto Rico’s vital exemption in federal minimum wages. Pedro Rossello lobbied Congress to eliminate of Section 936. In both cases because both were seen as “obstacles to statehood.”
Statehooders have always argued that statehood will boost the island economy. The problem is that economic reality tells us that they are dead wrong. We see precisely today the negative effect of the latest increase in the federal minimum wage from $5.85 to $6.55 an hour. And we have seen the decline in new industrial promotion, and the loss of over 40,000 manufacturing jobs, since the repeal of 936 in the late 1990’s.
There is no mystery here. A big NPP victory here, and in the U.S., if the Democrats win the presidency and control of Congress, will produce the perception that Puerto Rico is finally on the road to statehood. Democrats, believing that Puerto Rico would give them seven more members of the House and two Senators, have been increasingly statehood-friendly. Yes, Fortuno is a national Republican, but resident commissioner candidate Pedro Pierluisi is an Obama Democrat.
Perception, of course, is not reality. The reality is that in the end, statehood is economically impossible. But the perception of the inevitability of statehood will have an effect on the island economy far worse than the loss of minimum wage flexibility and the loss of 936.
The obsession to eliminate Commonwealth will undermine the foundation of the island economy. The perception will be that Puerto Rico will soon lose federal tax exemption, triple Puerto Rico bond exemption, and other vital benefits.
Can Puerto Rico pull out of the recession? It is evident that It will depend to a great extend on world conditions. But it will also depend on how the newly-elected government answers the essential question of priorities: the economy or status? #One thing we know. As bad as Cantero’s statistics paint the economy today, a new statehood crusade will make it worse.
THE HIDDEN DISPLAY IN A GREAT MUSEUM
When I visited the American Museum of National History, which is every time I went to New York City, I never saw it. This past week, I took the museum tour and the guide mentioned that over in the biodiversity section, there was an “interesting” world population display.
After the tour, which incidentally was excellent and no one should miss, I looked for the display. I could not find it. After several attempts, I asked a museum employee who had to think, and finally pointed at the direction. I still had trouble finding it, and in fact walked by it several times, and finally I saw it, almost by chance.
It was easy to miss. You could almost say that it was hidden. The “display” was really a relatively small screen up on a wall in a deserted corner. It consisted of a short video that depicted world population growth since year one. There was a map of the world totally blank. And as the number of years increased, white dots appeared – each representing a million people. The dots began to appear in Southern Asia, then in Europe, then in the East Coast of North America, then in South America.
As the years, decades, centuries moved on, you could see the entire world being covered by the white dots.
This is a great museum that seems to get better every time I visit. But it’s more than an entertainment, even an educational experience. It can be a philosophical, metaphysical experience. In the huge Rose Planetarium, faced with the incomprehensible vastness of what we call the universe, composed, we are told, of the space travelled by light since the Big Band 13 billion years ago, and the billions of galaxies within, you can inverse the effect: not how big the universe is, but how small our planet is.
And the absolute wonder of life on this planet – the incredible diversity of life so dramatically displayed in the huge biodiversity area. And, of course, the miracle of human life: the wonder of human evolution, the tiny rat-like mammals that somehow survived the dinosaur era. Talk about the understanding the vastness of our universe, how about understanding these gigantic creatures, some of them incredibly vicious, ruling this planet for some 250 million years? We, humans, have been around some 100,000 years. Literally the blink of an eye.
Now, as I looked up at the population video, I said to myself: with all the truly wondrous things in this museum, is there anything more important than this? Is there anything more important on this planet than the amazing growth in human population?
The private organization, The Population Reference Bureau, has just published the latest data on world population. In 2007, it was 6.6 billion. At the beginning of the 20th century, it was 1.6 billion.
Almost all of this phenomenal growth is taking place in what is called “the developing world” – the poorest countries that are least able to cope with exploding population. There are 80 million more people every year in these countries, compared to 1.6 million more in the developed world.
To highlight the great and growing divide between the developed and “less developed” world the PRB compares the U.S., Germany and Ethiopia. The U.S. population is 302 million: Germany 82 million: Ethiopia 77 million. Life expectancy: U.S. 78 years, Germany 79 years, Ethiopia 49 years. Infant mortality per 1,000 births: U.S. 6.5 years, Germany 3.8 years, Ethiopia 77. Children under five underweight: U.S. 1 percent: Germany zero: Ethiopia 35 percent.
Every year almost 6 million children die of malnutrition, almost all in the developing world: 16,000 a day. That’s more than the total population, the PRB reports, of Denmark.
Back to the Museum of National History. There is a fundamental message that it communicates. We, the human race, are doing great damage to this planet. Humans burn fossil fuels for energy, cut down forests, contributing to climate change that is expected to produce rising temperature, more extreme weather, facilitate the spread of infectious diseases. One of the many other videos in the museum is by the famous actress, Meryl Streep, describing how humans are producing one of the greatest periods of species extinction in the planet’s history.
Add to this that the great divide between the developed and developing world can only get deepen as the population explodes in the poor countries. And this, needless to say, has enormous political, economic, social and security consequences.
On a world map, Puerto Rico, when it appears, is little more than a dot. But we know something about the consequences of rapid population growth. At the beginning of the 20th century, this island with it limited land and resources, was already overpopulated with one million people. Improved sanitation and health services produced a population explosion. Today there are some 4 million people on this island, and another 4 million on the U.S. mainland.
It was not easy for a small number of Puerto Ricans back in early century to convince anyone that the fundamental cause of Puerto Rico’s tragic social and economic ills – not, of course, the only, but the fundamental cause – was the population explosion.
Now, at the museum, it seemed to me that precisely this was dramatically symbolized by the fact that the world population “display” was easy to miss, practically hidden away. Yet if any of the great number of people walking around feel anything like the metaphysical experience at the wonder of human life on this planet, and think about the consequences of how it is multiplying, there is no more important display in this great museum .
When I visited the American Museum of National History, which is every time I went to New York City, I never saw it. This past week, I took the museum tour and the guide mentioned that over in the biodiversity section, there was an “interesting” world population display.
After the tour, which incidentally was excellent and no one should miss, I looked for the display. I could not find it. After several attempts, I asked a museum employee who had to think, and finally pointed at the direction. I still had trouble finding it, and in fact walked by it several times, and finally I saw it, almost by chance.
It was easy to miss. You could almost say that it was hidden. The “display” was really a relatively small screen up on a wall in a deserted corner. It consisted of a short video that depicted world population growth since year one. There was a map of the world totally blank. And as the number of years increased, white dots appeared – each representing a million people. The dots began to appear in Southern Asia, then in Europe, then in the East Coast of North America, then in South America.
As the years, decades, centuries moved on, you could see the entire world being covered by the white dots.
This is a great museum that seems to get better every time I visit. But it’s more than an entertainment, even an educational experience. It can be a philosophical, metaphysical experience. In the huge Rose Planetarium, faced with the incomprehensible vastness of what we call the universe, composed, we are told, of the space travelled by light since the Big Band 13 billion years ago, and the billions of galaxies within, you can inverse the effect: not how big the universe is, but how small our planet is.
And the absolute wonder of life on this planet – the incredible diversity of life so dramatically displayed in the huge biodiversity area. And, of course, the miracle of human life: the wonder of human evolution, the tiny rat-like mammals that somehow survived the dinosaur era. Talk about the understanding the vastness of our universe, how about understanding these gigantic creatures, some of them incredibly vicious, ruling this planet for some 250 million years? We, humans, have been around some 100,000 years. Literally the blink of an eye.
Now, as I looked up at the population video, I said to myself: with all the truly wondrous things in this museum, is there anything more important than this? Is there anything more important on this planet than the amazing growth in human population?
The private organization, The Population Reference Bureau, has just published the latest data on world population. In 2007, it was 6.6 billion. At the beginning of the 20th century, it was 1.6 billion.
Almost all of this phenomenal growth is taking place in what is called “the developing world” – the poorest countries that are least able to cope with exploding population. There are 80 million more people every year in these countries, compared to 1.6 million more in the developed world.
To highlight the great and growing divide between the developed and “less developed” world the PRB compares the U.S., Germany and Ethiopia. The U.S. population is 302 million: Germany 82 million: Ethiopia 77 million. Life expectancy: U.S. 78 years, Germany 79 years, Ethiopia 49 years. Infant mortality per 1,000 births: U.S. 6.5 years, Germany 3.8 years, Ethiopia 77. Children under five underweight: U.S. 1 percent: Germany zero: Ethiopia 35 percent.
Every year almost 6 million children die of malnutrition, almost all in the developing world: 16,000 a day. That’s more than the total population, the PRB reports, of Denmark.
Back to the Museum of National History. There is a fundamental message that it communicates. We, the human race, are doing great damage to this planet. Humans burn fossil fuels for energy, cut down forests, contributing to climate change that is expected to produce rising temperature, more extreme weather, facilitate the spread of infectious diseases. One of the many other videos in the museum is by the famous actress, Meryl Streep, describing how humans are producing one of the greatest periods of species extinction in the planet’s history.
Add to this that the great divide between the developed and developing world can only get deepen as the population explodes in the poor countries. And this, needless to say, has enormous political, economic, social and security consequences.
On a world map, Puerto Rico, when it appears, is little more than a dot. But we know something about the consequences of rapid population growth. At the beginning of the 20th century, this island with it limited land and resources, was already overpopulated with one million people. Improved sanitation and health services produced a population explosion. Today there are some 4 million people on this island, and another 4 million on the U.S. mainland.
It was not easy for a small number of Puerto Ricans back in early century to convince anyone that the fundamental cause of Puerto Rico’s tragic social and economic ills – not, of course, the only, but the fundamental cause – was the population explosion.
Now, at the museum, it seemed to me that precisely this was dramatically symbolized by the fact that the world population “display” was easy to miss, practically hidden away. Yet if any of the great number of people walking around feel anything like the metaphysical experience at the wonder of human life on this planet, and think about the consequences of how it is multiplying, there is no more important display in this great museum .
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