Occupy Wall Street seems to be banking on a general strike it hopes to pull off on May Day. Not a few political observers worry that calling for a massive shut down at this point is premature – and not the same as having the organisational network to pull it off.

Really? Is Occupy so deluded? Are they really that out of touch?

But of course they would be. This is what Norman Finkelstein was referring to when he was talking about cults. (I’ve been meaning to finish my post on Finkelstein’s BDS views. But, like many drafts, it has been waiting for time I can never find!) At least initially, Occupy Wall Street was camped out in the middle of a massive metropolis, and becoming increasingly isolated from it. At some point, after the eviction, there seemed to be forays further afield, by helping people fight foreclosure evictions. But, overall, there was a vast chasm between where they were, ideologically, and where the overwhelming bulk of the American public were — and are.

No matter how many Tumbler posts rightly complained of drowning in debt, OWS’s ideological and activism stances are simply not shared by the masses. No matter how correct their analysis, and how descriptive of the causes of the nation’s afflictions, and even regardless of the rightness of any proposed solutions, the public is simply not where Occupy is. To build a movement, you have to build mass support, and this public is simply not there!

Moving the beached whale of public opinion is what every revolutionary cause struggles with. Often, they simply ignore it; for most intents and purposes, the slow, patient, distasteful chore of building popular support is circumvented. And the reason is simple: not only is the public not there, it is actively averse to the cause.

And, in a context such as contemporary United States, which has no culture of protest or dissent, and has rampant political conformity, anyone with a few brain cells can tell you that there ain’t going to be masses of people pouring onto the streets in protest! Hell, even the public spaces have long been removed–or never constructed!

Hmm! A rather sedate response to what is essentially an image of a glaring, turbaned, hook-nosed darky about to pull a dagger out of his caftan.
Flatten the nose, and change the eyes’ slant, and you’ll have another two-faced Oriental that can never be trusted.

The Yellow Peril and the “Asian hordes” has now become Shias and Sharia. The inscrutable, duplicitous Oriental is now an ayatollah.

On one of Al Jazeera’s few remaining trustworthy sections, Opinions, Hamid Dabashi offers another great article. Faced with the futility of Obama-style hope, he calls for electoral abstention:

So in a bizarre turn of events marking our historic moment, Americans face the same choice of opting not to vote in a sham presidential election in which their choices is between a Gingrich/Romney/Santorum and Obama – the Tweedledum and Tweedledee of American politics – precisely in a year when a vast spectrum of Iranians had decided to refuse to be part of the monumental joke that passes for parliamentary election in March 2012.

Recounting the story of Ali Abdi, the Iranian activist who was part of the movement to boycott the recent Iranian elections, Dabashi concludes:

Come November 2012, Americans ought to join him boycotting yet another exercise in futility

It comes complete with references to Franz Fanon and Guy Debord! He even refers to a “commodification of democracy”; perhaps one day he will conclude that Democracy is shopping.

This is just the latest in a series of people who seem to have slowly come to grips with the nature of the system that they had engaged in. Lawrence Wilkerson’s slow transformation has been visible on The Real News; Ralph Nader‘s, culminating in the title of his book, “Only the Superrich Can Save Us”; and now Hamid Dabashi.

As for Iran, specifically, one can’t help but observe that, in terms of numbers and variety, their presidential elections offer far more than United States’. The main electoral distinction is that their gatekeeper, their barrier to entry, is religion; US’s is money–though perhaps increasingly religion.

¹ Presumably, the supposed meaninglessness of the Iranian presidency did not stop them from using MEMRI’s lies about Ahmaninejad’s speech as a pretext for attacking Iran and feeling their country being existentially threatened. (Middle East Media Research Institute is, of course, another Israel mouthpiece.)

² It seems like Ahmadinejad and Bush had more in common than expected: In 2006, I saw a CBC report in which the reporter, David Halton, questioned whether Bush Junior could be credited for the achievements of his governorship of Texas. The argument was that, according to the Texas constitution, the governor has less power than in any other state.; and that there are five other people with more power than the governor; that, thus, the governor “is, in many respects, something of a figure-head.”

³ This being 2012, I can’t find the Nader quote I am referring to above. However, Ralph Nader’s disillusion is well-documented.

To some people’s perspectives, and whatever else one may say about the various insanities, Al Qaeda clearly got results! After languishing, for decades, in post-colonial limbo, some Africans, I felt, may well get inspired!

And now, with Nigeria, and the Tuareg in Mali, the pattern has been establishing itself. While this may have much to do with Saudi money, there is also a trend that fits my expectations of a decade ago. Will South East Asia be next?

Yes, roll back regulations! At this point in time! Alexis Goldstein, of Occupy the SEC, says:

There used to be…a wall between the research side and the investment banking side. So if I’m an investment bank taking a company public, I’m not allowed to send out a research report telling you why it’s good and why you should participate in the IPO, because that’s a conflict of interest. The JOBS Act tears that wall down.

Didn’t the same thing happen with respect to mortgages and the ratings agencies? Have they learnt nothing?

It is really quite unbelievable, isn’t it! But the machine does what it does. Its drive is inexorable. Even if it means that it will drive itself off the cliff, it will! I have been meaning to write a post about the fundamental algorithms which drive a system, and the futility of change that does not recognize such root causes; but I can never find the time to dig into the draft.

Where was it that I saw an essentially similar sentiment expressed, recently, about Capitalism? It was either on Max Keiser’s show, with Chris Cook, or on the same episode of Chris Hayes’.

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This IBGYBG (I’ll Be Gone, You’ll Be Gone) segment, with Karen Ho, touched on some of the fundamental algorithms idea which I was refering to. They are slowly coming to grips with the consequences of major shifts decided decades ago! Watching believers in the system strip away, slowly, the layers of the system they believe in, is like the slo’ mo’ of a car speeding towards a wall.

A few years ago I read that Manson wanted to shift focus to film, perhaps away from music. I’ve been meaning to find out more; I certainly have not come across anything.

Here, the great Max Keiser is taken aback when his blaming of the oil industry, for the push for war on Iran, is rejected by a very informative Chris Cook. The former oil-market regulator points at falling demand, and the fact that most oil companies are mainly in the business of processing the oil. He calls them “service providers”, suggesting that they are being hurt by the current situation.

[M]ost oil companies, these days, more or less, actually act more like service providers: finding the stuff, and distributing the stuff, and trading the stuff. Sure they make money with high oil prices, but, don’t forget Max, they don’t want to kill the goose that lays the golden egg. You know, American demand for gasolene has been falling rapidly….That’s the reason why Petroplus, with five, you know, European refineries, has shut almost all of them! OK? Because the demand is falling off a cliff! And what does that do, to crude oil demand, do you think?

As an aside, Chris Cook also mentions that Saudi Arabia’s remaining capacity is a great secret.

Israel has been in Iraqi Kurdistan for at least a decade. As for Georgia and Azerbaijan, Iran may have made some counter-moves: if I remember, it sought cooperation with them recently.
Both Israel and Iran try to find allies where they can; Israel, though, has far more candy to offer, including access to a superpower. While Mr Giraldi is informative and correct, as always, I expect that there is an element of psy-ops here, too–if not more mundane causes.

Now, via Lobe Log’s Hawks on Iran posts, I have come across Mark Perry echoing a similar focus on Israel’s moves in the Caspian region. His information refutes my vague recollections, outlined above. However, the piece is not sufficiently dissimilar from other examples of psy-ops.

The fact is that Israel is, naturally, active wherever it can. And, as a huge manufacturer and seller of armaments, (and weaponry with, shall we say, a strong American flavour!) it has plenty of customers. Furthermore, since it views itself as being situated in a hostile region, it seeks any cracks it can find. Put these together, and it would be no surprise to find it in places such as Georgia and Azerbaijan. Anyone remembering the Cold War would recall its various shady associations back then.

As for Azerbaijan’s perspective, the sheer absurdity of the article’s suggestion fits similar nonsense littering Western media! The notion is that Azerbaijan would let itself be the smoke of the fired gun, the return-address of the missile. Is Azerbaijan a rational actor? Apparently not in the minds of pundits and journalists deeply immersed in the system of Western media.

And one can’t help but comment on Israel’s conduct. With its alliance with Apartheid South Africa; all sorts of despots, dictators and murderers the world over; Christian Zionists and other groups and countries who either hate or fear Jews, Moshe Dyan et al. condemned their descendants to a damning plight!

I can’t get past the opening premise of this article! For years (decades?) the Saudis have been destroying Islamic historical buildings. Their Salafi/Wahabi insanity has led them to destroy houses and such related to Mohammad, their prophet! (They consider their preservation to be idolatry!) The madness is not confined to Christianity , so I don’t think you people should tangent away at this!

I will tell you something. We in Iraq know about proxy wars. We had a very strong proxy war of ourselves here. It was literally Iran and Saudi fighting, using Iraqis as supporters of each. Yes, this can happen. It is happening in Syria, as I said before.
Saudi is somewhat a little paranoid about the Shia expansion and are terribly afraid of the support that Iran is giving to Shiite all over the world, and terribly afraid of the success that it is having. Of course, the most obvious success is the success in Iraq. To have Iran also succeed in Syria so that there will be a Shiite Iraq, a Shiite Syria, and a very strong Shiite stronghold in Lebanon, all of them on its borders, for it is very, very difficult to conceive. So it will go, I think, to very far limits in order to prevent something like this happening. How far it is willing to go—it is willing to go very far. It is willing to spend a lot of money in order to make it very difficult for Iran to have a foothold in Syria, believe me.

Explains a lot. Saudi Arabia’s role in Syria, and Saudi Arabia’s role in Iraq. It is worse than Israel’s!