Robert Flynn's Open Salon Blog

Honoring the Dishonored

Mon, 7 May 2012 17:05:04 -0400

Whereas the Constitution of the United States declares that it and treaties ratified by Congress and signed by the president are the law of the land; and

Whereas Congress ratified and the president signed the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and

Whereas some soldiers were prosecuted, defamed, dishonored and imprisoned for torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and

Whereas their Commander in Chief, George W. Bush, deserted those soldiers who were accused of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, calling them a “few bad apples,” seeing them prosecuted, defamed and imprisoned while lying that “We do not torture”; and

Whereas their Commander in Chief, George W. Bush, confessed to authorizing torture, and

Whereas, Vice President Cheney and other members of the administration participated or permitted torture; and

Whereas those who have sworn to defend or to uphold the Constitution are derelict in duty in not prosecuting those who authorized, participated or permitted torture;

Therefore: we the following petition for the reinstatement of those low-ranking soldiers who were prosecuted and punished for deeds that their military and civilian authorities authorized, participated in or permitted without prosecution; that they be returned to duty if they so desire or be given honorable discharges and back pay for time they spent in prison for serving their country in the manner authorized and permitted by superior military and civilian authorities who were not prosecuted and punished;

and that they be honored by all those who do honor, defend and uphold the Constitution.

http://signon.org/sign/honoring-the-dishonored?source=c.em.cp&r_by=427912

The Jesus of a Dozen Religions

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:04:21 -0400

If you study religion rather than or in addition to studying the Bible you discover that there are a number of stories similar to those found in the Bible. You find even more if you study mythology. By myth I do not mean a widely held but false belief such as “urban legend.” I mean universal stories that help us understand who we are, where we came from, and what that means. For a long time I avoided knowing about myths for fear that a myth might have the same plot as the Gospel of Mark. If Horus was crucified, buried, and resurrected on the third day, wouldn’t that lessen the story of Jesus? Like others I eventually faced that fear and found faith in the story.

There are some universal myths or stories that people need to know or create in order to answer universal questions, understand their own existence and give meaning to it. I believe those stories are similar to Carl Jung’s “collective unconscious.” Every tribe, every nation, every family has a creation story to explain how it began, where it came from and what that means. Many family stories are sagas of the “old country,” the ones left behind, the heroes who braved the unknown and began a new life.

Those stories are similar to the universal story of destruction and new creation. For the Babylonians (Sumerians) God (Cronus) appeared to the king and told him that the world would be destroyed and that he was to write the story of the world from the beginning and save it by burying it. He was also to build a boat and, after writing and saving the story of the world, with friends, kinfolks and animals he was to set sail. After many days the king loosed birds and they returned to the boat. Again the king released birds and they returned with mud on their feet. The third time he released birds they did not return. He grounded the boat, made a sacrifice and disappeared with his wife and daughter to live with the gods. When the other survivors sought the king and his family, God told the remnant that they were in Armenia and were to go to Babylon, recover the story and share it with all mankind.

In the Jewish Bible it is the more familiar story of Noah, the ark, the flood, a new creation evidenced by a green twig and a new covenant. In the Christian Bible it is the Easter story of crucifixion, death and resurrection. The same thread is found in Revelation: the destruction of the world followed by a new creation of a new heaven and a new earth and a new Jerusalem that comes down from heaven, (Rev. 21:1-4) with a new temple (Mark 14:58), a perfect tabernacle (Hebrews 9:1l), an eternal house not made by hands (2 Cor. 5:1). This is the formula we use in baptism. Buried in Jesus death and raised to walk in a new life with him.

Historians use the same plot to tell of the birth of America. Washington’s defeat in Pennsylvania, the agony and despair of Valley Forge, the resurrection in the defeat of Cornwallis at Yorktown, the new creation in the US Constitution. It’s the story of Texas. Defeat at the Alamo and Goliad, triumphant resurrection at San Jacinto, and the birth of a new republic. It’s the rationale of Marine Corps boot camp. Break down the boot’s culture of me first, easy victory, easy defeat, easy life, self-protection, self-pampering, and create a new ethos: the Marine Corps comes first. And a new mission: run to the guns.

It’s the appeal of Cinderella and a thousand variations of Cinderella. Zoroaster is treated with ill will in his mother’s house until the Holy Spirit gives Buddha an invitation to the place where he belongs and Jesus enters the palace. Those present recognize who he is. They shout hosannas and throw palm branches at the feet of Krishna, son of a carpenter. But the clock strikes midnight in the garden, Dionysus is killed and his body eaten by believers to purify themselves. Deliverance comes with the dawn bringing a crown fit for only one head. Boy loves girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl.

The similarity doesn’t reduce the story, it verifies the story and the universal need for such a story of redemption and rebirth.

The problem the Gospel writers faced was to tell of an event unique in history with words that were not singular but ordinary. Think of the birth of your own child. Didn’t you think he/she was unique? And it was. Had there ever been born anyone like your child? No. How did you explain that to others? You couldn’t without the template of a noble child born in ordinary circumstances, welcomed with gifts from people who recognized the child’s worth, raised among those who did not acknowledge the child’s magnificence. Nevertheless, your child would ride into town with flags waving, people cheering, and bands trying to be heard over the hosannas. Like Mary you harbored those thoughts in your heart.

There had never been anyone like Jesus. How could they tell of his birth in a unique way? They couldn’t. The universal longing to touch the eternal had already created the story, a story that required transfiguration. Jesus was of royal blood, like Cinderella or Siddhartha, but born into low estate like Muhammad. He stood apart from others, like Saul or Samson or David. Rather than going mad like Saul because his own disowned him, finding redemption in self-destruction like Samson, or planting the seed that would undermine all that he had created like David, Jesus triumphed over death and created a new foundation for a new life.

The similarity of stories shouldn’t be surprising. The yearning for a relationship to something greater, more lasting than oneself is universal. That yearning produces the stories. The closer we get to the original stories, the more primitive they are. The refinement of the stories is progressive revelation. The Greek word “logos” means “word” as the expression of thought. It is translated as “sayings” (Mat. 7:24) , “communications” (Luke 24:17), “treatise, book, narrative, story” (Acts. 1:1). “In the beginning was the Story, and the Story was with God, and the Story was God.” (John 1:1) The story became flesh (John 1:14) and walked among us.

As the presence of the story “that dwelled among us” faded, followers of the way neglected telling the story and seeking to enlarge the relationship in order to collect Jesus’ words and codify his stories. To keep the story from growing beyond them they sought to enshrine it, embalming it instead. The story made flesh became institutionalized, embedded in tradition and dogma so that it would not change and grow even as the relationship changed and understanding grew. Those in power held the story privately from those who wanted to make it their story, reserved to a few, first the Jews, then the Greeks and the Romans, then a war between the Eastern story and the Western story. Debating the details of Jonah, they forgot the message of Jonah. They withheld the story from those who wanted to make it their story, the Buddhist story, the Hindu story, the Muslim story.

Rather than allowing the story made flesh to be reincarnated in other stories and creating a commonality that could make us a brotherhood the Eastern story and the Western story chose exclusivity warring over whose story would prevail, creating a new story of exclusivity with attendant wars and strife. Christianity became less a relationship with the story made flesh and more an approved way of thinking and acting. “Every thing begins in mysticism and ends in politics,” wrote the French poet Charles Peguy.

The story made flesh cannot be entombed in one place or one time or one religion. The story that was from the beginning is resurrected by those who seek the eternal and find the story made flesh.

We are not at the end of revelation. Living in the story of the one who walked among us will move us from devotion to commandments of stone, the Christmas tree, baby Dionysus in the manager to faith in our common parentage and our unique part in the story until the story made flesh dwells with all of us.

The Jesus of a Dozen Religions

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:04:58 -0400

The similarity doesn’t reduce the story, it verifies the story and the universal need for such a story of redemption and rebirth.

The story made flesh cannot be entombed in one place or one time or one religion. The story that was from the beginning is resurrected by those who seek the eternal and find the story made flesh.

Peace With Taliban? politics

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 17:03:57 -0400

Politically: “Evidence now available from various sources, including recently declassified U.S. State Department documents, shows that the Taliban regime led by Mullah Mohammad Omar imposed strict isolation on Osama bin Laden after 1998 to prevent him from carrying out any plots against the United States.” (Inter Press Service {IPS} 2/11/10)

US officials called the Afghanistan oil and gas pipeline project a “fabulous opportunity” with the “prospect of circumventing Iran, which offered another route for the pipeline.” (Boston Globe, 9/20/01) Clinton made several efforts to give better international relations to the Taliban in exchange for extradition of Osama bin Laden. There were two major problems. The Jewish Bible, the Christian Bible and the Koran all include rules regarding the treatment of outsiders and provisions for places of refuge. In addition, where there were no motels for travelers there were tribal laws regarding the treatment of strangers. Most readers will remember the story of the wounded Special Forces soldier who crawled into an Afghan village as a last resort. Because of religion and tribal custom, the villagers took him in, treated his wounds and protected him. If they had come upon him outside the village they would likely have killed him or turned him over to the Taliban.

Secretary of State Christopher wrote to the Taliban in 1996 that “we wish to work with you to expel all terrorists and those who support terrorism.” This was ten years after the Reagan administration had been found guilty of international terrorism by the International Court of Justice. Taliban responded that they did not support terrorism and would not provide refuge to Osama. March 1997, the US was told that expulsion of Bin Laden was not a solution. Dec. 1997, the US was assured that Osama was being kept under restriction and would not be allowed to engage in anti-US activities, repeated March 1999. “Former Taliban Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil told IPS in an interview that the regime ‘put bin Laden in Kandahar to control him better.’ Kandahar remained the Taliban political headquarters after the organization's seizure of power in 1996.” (IPS 2/11/10)

Taliban said that expelling Osama would violate Taliban rules of hospitality and would result in the downfall of Taliban. 1998 Taliban said that Osama had to be tried by the Taliban since Afghanistan had no extradition treaty. The US said it would not be bound by the panel’s decision but hoped it would lead to extradition. Clinton warned that Taliban would be held responsible for further terrorist acts by Osama. July, 2000 Taliban declared that Osama had not been convicted and the Taliban considered him innocent. However, Taliban would restrict his activities. (US Department of State, 1/30/04)

1998, Julie Sirrs, military analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency, made an undercover trip to Afghanistan and reported that the Taliban was financed by bin Laden and the narcotics trade. Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Massoud told her that he had evidence that Unocal provided money that helped the Taliban capture Kabul. (ABC News 2/16/02); (New York Observer 3/11/04)

1998, the US fired missiles at al-Qaeda training camps. The important leaders had left, perhaps because the US had to warn Pakistan military that missiles would be launched. India and Pakistan were skirmishing and if Pakistan believed the missiles were from India they would likely retaliate with their own strikes. Elements of the Pakistan military supported the Taliban and might have warned them or al-Qaeda. The strikes prompted reclusive Taliban leader Mullah Omar to ask for confidential talks with the US. “The August 1998 U.S. cruise missile strikes against training camps in Afghanistan run by bin Laden in retaliation for the bombings of two U.S. Embassies in East Africa on Aug. 7, 1998 appears to have had a dramatic impact on Mullah Omar and the Taliban regime's policy toward bin Laden.” (IPS 2/11/10)

“On Feb. 10, 1999, the Taliban sent a group of 10 officers to replace bin Laden's own bodyguards, touching off an exchange of gunfire, according to a New York Times story of Mar. 4, 1999. Three days later, bodyguards working for Taliban intelligence and the Foreign Affairs Ministry personnel took control of bin Laden's compound near Kandahar and took away his satellite telephone, according to the U.S. and Taliban sources cited by the Times.” (IPS 2/11/10) An e-mail from two leading Arab jihadists in Afghanistan to bin Laden in July 1999, later found on a laptop previously belonging to al Qaeda and purchased by the Wall Street Journal, referred to “problems between you and the Leader of the Faithful”(Omar) as a “crisis.” The e-mail, published in The Atlantic (9/04) said, “Talk about closing down the camps has spread.” The message suggested that the Taliban might expel them from Afghanistan.

1999, Clinton froze Taliban’s US assets. (CNN 7/6/99) The US and Russia planned an attack to destroy al-Qaida. Again, Iran would have been the natural route and no other Central Asian country would permit an attack from its territory. (Washington Post 12/19/00)

At least twice before 9/11 Bush repeated Clinton’s warning to the Taliban that the US would hold Taliban responsible for an al Qaeda attack. (Washington Post 1/20/02) March 2001, a Taliban envoy offered to turn over bin Laden to a third country. A CIA official later said, “Ours was, ‘Give up bin Laden.’ They were saying, ‘Do something to help us give him up.’ I have no doubts they wanted to get rid of him.” The envoy also proposed holding bin Laden long enough for the US to locate and destroy him. (Village Voice 6/6/01) Offers regarding bin Laden continued until 9/11. (Washington Post 10/29/01) Taliban offered to surrender bin laden after 9/11 “if proof was offered of his involvement in the 9/11 attacks.”(The Guantanamo Files, Andy Worthington, Pluto Press, London, 2007)

July, 2001, Three former US officials met with Pakistani and Russian intelligence officers to discuss Afghanistan. Pakistan’s ISI relayed the information to the Taliban. Lee Coldren, former State Department expert on South Asia later said, “I think there was some discussion of the fact that the United States was so disgusted with the Taliban that they might be considering some military action.” (Guardian 9/26/01) Former Pakistani Foreign Secretary Niaz Naik, who was present at the meeting stated that the US military planned to overthrow the Taliban “before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of October at the latest.” Naik also reported, “It was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even if bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taliban.” (BBC 9/18/01)

August 2001, Christina Rocca, Director of Asian Affairs at the State Department, secretly met the Taliban ambassador in Islamabad to secure a pipeline deal. Rocca was previously in charge of contacts with Islamic guerrilla groups at the CIA, and oversaw the delivery of Stinger missiles to Afghan mujaheddin in the 1980s.( Irish Times 11/19/2001); (Salon 2/8/02) US embassy officials in Islamabad held secret talks with Taliban security chief Hameed Rasoli. (Washington Post 10/29/01) Senior Taliban political leadership met in Pakistan, November 2002 and agreed to “join the political process” in Afghanistan if they were not arrested upon return. (Paper published by the Center on International Cooperation at New York University. (2/7/11) Bush and Karzai rejected the proposal believing the Taliban had been defeated.

Conclusion: Iran could have been a valuable ally in transporting the oil from the Caspian area and in a war on Afghanistan if that had been necessary. Instead, relations have gotten worse since Bush named them as part of an “Axis of Evil.” Rapprochement is badly needed rather than continued threats of a stick. Iran is aware that Bush did not attack North Korea that had WMD and US troops on its border but Iraq that had neither. Like Iran, Iraq had oil.

Clinton failed to capture or kill Osama and Bush didn’t try, although he had armed drones that could find and track Osama until he could be killed with little collateral damage. (Washington Post 1/20/02) However, it seems that neither the capture nor the death of Osama would have prevented 9/11 as the plans were made in Germany and no Afghans were involved in the attack. If, in addition to warning the Taliban of retaliation, Bush had warned US defense forces, the State Department, the FAA, the airlines, first responders and citizens 9/11 might have been prevented.

It seems likely that the Taliban would have permitted US Special Forces to destroy al-Qaida if the Taliban were not attacked.

Taliban has little experience in diplomacy but the stick has not worked. Perhaps it is not too late for the carrot. Taliban consists largely of Pashtuns, the dominant tribe in Afghanistan. Defeating them will be difficult because they wish to die in Afghanistan and few foreigners have the same desire.

No matter how difficult negotiations may be, no legitimate or lasting government can be formed in Afghanistan without including the Pashtuns who comprise half the population. Improving humanitarian conditions in Afghanistan will require time, patience, a major internal effort and international assistance. Even then, keep your fingers crossed.

Peace With Taliban? politics

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 17:03:17 -0400

It seems likely that the Taliban would have permitted US Special Forces to destroy al-Qaida if the Taliban were not attacked.