On Kim Jong-Il and Idiots

A brief missive from the blogging wilderness:

Today is a special sort of a day. Today you may get incontrovertible proof that some people you know are total idiots. Because today some people, in the wake of his death, may feel lead to defend Kim Jong-Il. They may well feel that he represented some sort of realistic alternative to the capitalist liberal democratic model of statehood dominant in much of the rest of the world. If they believe this, then they have fallen foul of the empty politics of symbolism. They see problems in capitalism, yet are unthinkingly embracing an alternative that is far, far worse. If they defend him, then they have shown their commitment to evidence free idealism over actual engagement with reality. In short, they have shown themselves to be absolute idiots.

Because Kim Jong-Il really was a vile human being. He exploited his father's personality cult to propagate a regime that is virtually at war with its own people. He led the world's sole remaining Stalinist regime committed to an experiment with a whole nation that not only failed, but failed decades ago - leaving many starving and a whole people brutalised and brainwashed. If this is the socialist future, then we'd be as well to consign it to the past as soon as we possibly can.

In short: Kim Jong-Il is dead. While it is impossible to say what happens next, at this point the only appropriate response is good riddance to bad rubbish.

Things can get worse...

“Things can’t get much worse in this country” a friend said to me recently. They were speaking from a socialist perspective, and lamenting the spending cuts and the fact that the coalition is not quite as spendthrift as its predecessor. The validity of these justifications are not my main concern today – I think anyone who reads this blog regularly will know where I stand on such issues – but the notion that things can’t get much worse in this country is not unique to the left. It can be seen in some in the right. It can be seen in statist and in libertarians. And it is, of course, bollocks.

While things ain’t grand at the moment, it could get much, much worse in this country. You can look elsewhere in the world, to countries like North Korea, to see just how bad things can get with ever increasing state intervention. Likewise, you can look to various war-torn African nations to see what happens when the state collapses in on itself and effectively disappears. Yeah, you might be paying more tax than you would like (I know I certainly am) and you might be sick of paternalistic types tutting at you when you enjoy a drink or a cigarette, but you aren’t dodging bullets in a civil war or avoiding the secret police in an authoritarian regime. Things could be worse.

Because one of the things we still have in this country despite the continued erosion of our civil liberties by successive statist government is the right to bellyache about it all. You can protest – in writing, verbally or in person. Sure, you might not like the fact that the state attempts to control your protest (and again I don't) but you can still do it. And you can protest about anything you like – it doesn’t even have to make sense. So you can have a pop at the government about spending cuts, even though they have precious little choice but to decrease the rate at which government spending rises. You can also have a go at nonsense conspiracy theories like the currently fashionable idea of the domination of “cultural Marxism” (a spurious concept that seems to be an attempt to add an ersatz veneer of respectability to the old claim of “it’s political correctness gone mad!”) While we have the right to protest, things can get much worse. And history has shown us just how bad things can get. The worst case scenario isn’t social shunning of the non-comformist or even legislating against them; it is the death camp for that non-conformist.

And the wonderful yet terrifying truth about our current situation is that what happens next remains, to a large extent, in our hands. It’s wonderful because we can potentially shape a version of tomorrow where we are freer. It is terrifying because we might not take that opportunity or fuck that opportunity up. But we should always remember, no matter what our frustrations are in the here and now, that things can get much worse. And that can be a motivator; to make sure that they don’t.

On Libyan Intervention

So, we're bombing Libya. Cue rapturous applause from neo-conservative types and wails of disgust from our peacenik brethren. I can't manage either emotion. There's nothing to celebrate here, but equally it had become pretty difficult for the Western world to stand by idly as Gaddafi continues to cling to power using some of the most brute force.

Which is the point, really. There seems to be a tendency among many to want to see issues in international relations in black and white terms - or rather making immediate and sweeping assumptions about whether any interventions are right or wrong. The reality is a little more complicated that.

Basically, as far as I can see, we had three options. Standing by and doing nothing would ensure that the coalition kills no-one. At least not directly. At best, this option would leave us with blood on our hands indirectly. At worst we would, once again, be turning a blind eye as an evil dictator kills his way to further power.

The second option - limited intervention - is the one we've gone for. And I have no doubt whatsoever that it is only a matter of (very limited) time before we start seeing reports about collateral damage - of innocents slayed by our armed forces. Then we drift into the difficult calculations about military interventions - would more people have died had we not intervened, or are our actions creating carnage that otherwise wouldn't exist?

This is even more pronounced in the third option - a direct onslaught, including ground forces, against the Gaddafi regime. We may yet end up in this situation; for what it's worth, I really hope that we don't. But with this option you can be pretty much guaranteed that Gaddafi will fall (the US army could destroy his forces on their own without too much fuss) but again there's the question of carnage. How many will have to die - on both sides, and among the civilians - for regime change to occur in Libya?

And there's a further problem with options 2 and 3. They leave us open to the charge of hypocrisy. We are fighting to protect rebels in Libya. What about rebellions in other parts of the world? What about dealing with other abhorrent dictators? Why aren't we doing something about, say, North Korea? You could argue that there is no credible indigenous resistance in North Korea, but then again that is hardly surprising given North Korea is a brutal totalitarian state. The reality is that we cannot afford to fight every regime across the world with whom we do not agree. But then how do we prioritise them? Why is the life of a North Korean less of a priority that the life of a Libyan? Again, we can argue that change is happening in Libya; we're just giving those forces of change a push. But the charge of hypocrisy can still be leveled. After all, Iraq in 2003 was hardly in the grip of a rebellion, was it? But when there was an uprising there after the first Gulf War, it was 'turn a blind eye' time again.

International relations is a messy arena, and an ethical foreign policy is in practice impossible. But what we can do is, whatever actions we take, make sure we consider the outcomes. So we're carrying out air operations in Libya. What's our endgame here? To enforce a no-fly zone? To just protect the existing rebel strongholds? Or are we actually going for the toppling of Gaddafi? And if that's the plan, who or what is going to replace him? Such questions appear to be obvious, but if we look back on the invasion of Iraq back in 2003, they were either not asked or not credibly answered.

It is impossible to know right now whether the intervention in Libya will ultimately prove to have been the right thing to do. If you think you know already, one way or another, then you're probably being naive. We won't know whether this was the right thing to do or not until it's all over, when the blood has been shed and the history books are being written.

Provoking North Korea - a dumb idea

North Korea telling the "truth" about the attempted suicide of a US citizen in one of their prisons:

"Driven by his strong guilty conscience, disappointment and despair at the US government that has not taken any measure for his freedom, he attempted to commit suicide," the North's KCNA news agency said.

"He is now given first-aid treatment at a hospital."

Hmmm. Now, I'm not saying that a totalitarian dictatorship might tell self-serving lies, but I'm not so sure that he attempted to commit suicide because of guilt and despair at the US government. I'd imagine that the sentence of eight years of hard labour for the crime of entering the country is probably more of a motivating factor. Still, the North Korean government is responding with customary restraint; no chance of freedom for this chap, but rather "harsher punishment".

However, as much as I have sympathy for Gomes' plight, after all, he is probably living a nightmare each and every day at the moment, I do have to say that he was pretty dumb to provoke North Korea in the first place. That government has no respect for human rights of human life whatsoever; they were never going to respond well to Gomes' actions. And as a result, I do think that you have to be pretty dumb to provoke North Korea. It is a bit like prodding a rabid wolf in the bollocks with a big stick. At some point, said wolf is going to get pissed off. And when it does so, it is going to bite your fucking face off.

May I be the first to say "couldn't happen to a nicer person":

North Korea’s supreme leader, Kim Jong Il, is suffering from life-threatening cancer of the pancreas, South Korean television reported today. It is the latest indication of a leadership crisis in the isolated and nuclear armed dictatorship.

You can measure your success or failure as a political leader using many different parameters. Kim Jong Il can be defined whole-heartedly as a failure since I know I am not alone, as harsh as it might sound, in keeping my fingers crossed that the "Dear Leader" does indeed pass on. Because his death may be the best hope for that poverty stricken, abused and beleaguered nation. 

You can take your Marxism and you can shove it right up your...

… well… you can probably guess the rest.

One of the many negative aspects to this economic downturn is the rush of people towards socialism and the big daddy of socialist morons, Karl Marx himself. And what is even worse than people trying to register support for ol’ Karl is people trying to be funny about their suddenly vaguely fashionable Marxist tendencies. As this article proves.

I could do a detailed fisking of that article, but holy Jesus, I have better things to do with my ever diminishing life. The author tries and utterly fails to be funny repeatedly, at the same time as revealing his ignorance of the very ideology he is championing. A word to the not-so-wise; if you are going to pursue an ideology, make sure you actually know the details of whatever it is you are meant to be defending and advocating.

However the rush towards Marx, and the constant veneration of odious Marxists like Che Guevera by some, reveals a deeper ignorance of an ideology that is deeply destructive. Yeah, Marx got some things right. He reckoned that boom and bust are natural parts of capitalism. But most economists would recognise that. He also had some interesting theories about alienation of labour – ideas that still have some relevance today. But for a man who wrote as prolifically as Karl Marx, getting something right at some point was inevitable. Just as that infinite number of monkeys at those typewriters could, in theory, come up with the complete works of Shakespeare.

Yet in so many different ways, Marx was utterly wrong. And his errors are so numerous that it would almost be compelling, if they weren’t so dangerous. None more so in his conclusions about where his spurious theories of society would take us all. As counter-culture and cool as it might be to support Marx during this (perfectly natural, even according to Marx) downturn in global capitalism, I think everyone should be very clear about supporting Marxism means. It means you support violent revolution. It means you support dictatorship. It means you support the collapse of the society we live in, and handing over absolute political power to violent revolutionaries who are going to divine some sort of better society for all from a non-existent blue-print. You can claim that Marx’s ultimate intent was utopian; the practical ends of his ideology are thoroughly dystopian.

Marxist theorists (for, believe it or not, they do still exist) will argue that we have never had an actual application of Marx’s ideas. Well, bollocks to that. The Stalinist state, the Maoist state, the regimes of Pol Pot and Kim Jong Il are all examples of the deluded, insane and deeply destructive implementation of Marxism. The problem isn’t that Marxism has never been correctly applied; the real problem is that Marxism is a deeply flawed political ideology that advocates dictatorship and sees people in general as largely bovine and in desperate need of firm guidance from portly, disconnected from reality philosophers such as Marx. The end result of Marxism is the Soviet State, pure and simple.

The recession will have come as a shock to many, and will cause some to review their political beliefs. That’s fine – it is a healthy thing to review what you think in light of events (something Marx himself wasn’t that good at). But the answer to any review of ideology should not be Marxism. Marxism doesn’t work; if you try to force Marxism on societies, then your utterly, utterly destroy those societies. Applying Marxism to countries damaged by the recession will lead to the death of democracy in those countries, and the complete stagnation of their economies.

You might ask the question about what we need to do in the face of the credit crunch. The answer is not turn to Karl Marx.

North Korea: The Nightmare Society

A new book highlights some of the extreme, awful crimes being committed in this day and age in North Korea. It talks of arbitrary, state sponsored murder. It talks about the murders of the disabled. It talks about eliminating others considered to be substandard by the state:

Even short people were not safe, Professor Kim says. The government gave out pamphlets to thousands of people in Pyongyang describing a wonder drug that would raise their height. Instead "they were sent away to different uninhabited islands in an attempt to end their 'substandard' genes from repeating in a new generation. Left for dead, none of the people made it back home."

Murdering people for being short sounds like satire; yet this is actually happening. We tut at America for Gitmo, we shake our heads at Russia for invading Georgia and yet there is a nation in Asia that is systematically destroying and utterly shaft their own population using a brutal and dictatorial regime. I haven't got the first clue about what can be done about North Korea - a society that is one of the most militarised in the world and may possess nuclear weapons. But the smell of pungent hypocrisy is overwhelming when you consider the ongoing talk about an "ethical foreign policy" against the godawful brutality of regimes like this.

H/T: Link emailed to me by the Moai.

Review of the Year

“And so this is Christmas, and what have you done?” asked the wife beating hippy John Lennon is his simultaneously simpering and preachy Christmas song from 1971. Personally, the answer is “not a lot.” In fact, the sole goal I set myself last year I have totally failed to achieve. Hooray! Go me! So rather than review my own year, which would be dull and pointless, I thought I would cast a caustic eye over the rest of the world. And you know what? This has been a really disappointing year. So much potential for change, and none of it realised.

For the first time, the Tories have managed to gain a respectable, solid lead in the polls and also have had a measure of electoral success. And how have they celebrated that lead? By selling out, and rushing to embrace the policies of the left and the Greens. Magnificent work from Cameron – for the first time the Tory party is in a position to offer and alternative to government and how do they respond? They offer a facsimile of Nu-Labour.

Speaking of Nu-Labour, they had a couple of attempts at change over this year. First up was the aftermath of the Local Elections, when Charlie The Safety Elephant was ditched and John Prescott crippled his party by knobbing his secretary. But nothing really changed – Clarke was replaced by an even more egregious cunt and Prescott was allowed to keep his job, but with the added bonus that he has been stripped of all of his duties. He is being paid for doing fuck all. But there was that wonderful moment over the summer where Labour appeared to go into meltdown – it actually looked like they might ditch Blair and, because of his naked and unseemly ambition during the leadership crisis, Brown might have blown his chances of succeeding Blair. But what was the end result after the dust had settled? Blair still in power, Brown still the presumptive heir to the throne. How disappointing. How dull.

The Lib Dems also had a moment of meltdown at the beginning of the year – with Kennedy finally admitting he was a drunk and resigning under pressure. With Oaten dropping out in the face of an eye-brow raising scandal and the Hughes campaign shooting itself in the foot, it actually looked like the Lib Dems might choose a radical candidate for leader. But no, it was not to be. They went with Ming “The Merciful” Campbell – a man with “Caretaker Leader” written all over him. And Ming’s most memorable moment to date? Being upstaged by Kennedy at the party conference.

Across the pond both houses of Congress went to the Democrats for the first time since 1994. And Bush offered Donny Rumsfeld, the incoherent idiot, up as a sacrificial lamb. But as I warned at the time, not a lot will actually change. Not least because they could lose control of the Senate. Change will come to the US, probably in 2008. But it hasn’t really happened this year.

Over in that massively stable region that is Middle East there was the usual unrest that happens over and over again, but with nothing being resolved. After Ariel Sharon collapsed into what must be brain death, Ehud Olmert took over as leader of Israel. And what happened? An inconclusive war with Lebanon, a Presidential sex scandal, and dire poll ratings. Israel remains as vulnerable and dependent on the US as ever.

Iraq sentenced their famous dictator to death, in what was utterly inevitable since they found him in his little hole. Even when Saddam is finally pushed off this mortal coil with a noose around his neck, nothing will change in Iraq. In fact, the biggest change for Iraq would be purely a semantic one, when the coalition of the willing finally admits that Iraq is mired in a civil war.

The utterly barmy and utterly terrifying Ahmadinejad remains in power in Iran and, despite some losses in the polls and ongoing international pressure, seems intent on becoming a nuclear power. The end result being Iran is not popular with the West. Which is pretty much how things have been since… oooo… 1979.

Speaking of powers looking to go nuclear, North Korea made a bold claim to have made a nuclear weapon. Which led to a couple of terrifying days until it became clear that Kim Jung-Il may well be a big fat liar. North Korea remains isolated from the world and mired in a destructive haze of self-deception so again - where is the change?

So my hope for next year? That some of the potential for change is actually realised. Starting with a new Prime Minister in this country…

It's the end of the world as we know it...

...And I feel fine.

North Korea, the very definition of a rogue state, has nuclear weapons. Which, given I have seen Threads and The War Game (both of which deal with the aftermath of a nuclear attack), can be no good thing.

Still, you've got to smile. Seriously, let's look at the comedy value of this. And that mainly comes in the form of North Korea's statement. I know it was meant to be taken seriously, but the levels of self deception and utter nonsense make me smile.

"...at a stirring time when all the people of the country are making a great leap forward in the building of a great, prosperous, powerful socialist nation."

Stirring? Try scary. Or terrifying. And I am not sure how building a device that could wipe out North Korea (which, let's face it, does not have a great track record when it comes to storing weapons) constitutes a great leap forward.

"It marks a historic event as it greatly encouraged and pleased the KPA (Korean People's Army) and people that have wished to have powerful self-reliant defence capability."

I'd imagine that if you asked a North Korean what he thought he probably would be encouraged and pleased. Mainly because if he dissented, he would be imprisoned, tortured and executed. However if you asked them how they felt and they were free to talk, they might reveal that they would be more "encouraged and pleased" if the government spent money on food for the population rather than Weapons of Mass Destruction that may attract the unwanted attentions of the UK.

"It will contribute to defending the peace and stability on the Korean peninsula and in the area around it."

Brilliant, just brilliant. Pure, unadulterated comedy genius. The nuclear test risks not just the Korean Peninsula, but the stability of the world. This could be the event that pushes us towards nuclear conflict. To claim that is has something to do with peace is beyond irony, almost beyond satire.