Third-World-Country-Victims of War and/or Dictator – Page 2

Eastward to Tartary

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The Book of the Week is “Eastward to Tartary, Travels in the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Caucasus” by Robert D. Kaplan, published in 2000. JUST A FEW YEARS PRIOR TO 9/11, the author experienced life in unstable regions of the world. This was an important volume because all the propaganda– er, uh– literature that was penned thereafter, reflects a post-major-historical-event bias of 20/20 hindsight, revisionism, and conspiracy theories (which include all manner of repulsive, libelous fabrications). Not that Kaplan could predict specific historical trajectories for his destinations. For, he noted that individuals (and of course, unexpected natural disasters) can be a disruptive force, and that is why history is not entirely predictable.

The author started his journey in early 1998, and finished in 1999. As is well known, there were lots of ethnic hatreds to go around in the subjects of his itinerary– hatreds that were perpetuated by propaganda. Still are.

Syria had always been a politically unstable territory. It experienced coups in 1949, 1954, 1961, 1966 and 1970. It felt threatened when Israel allied with Turkey in the early 1990’s. After Lebanon’s civil war ended in 1990, Syria controlled Lebanon militarily and financially: to protect itself from Israel, and reap $6 billion annually from Lebanon’s economy. In a small country of three million people, with limited employment opportunities, the Lebanese poor have to look for work outside their country.

After peace was more or less restored, the Lebanese moneyed class and foreign investors gentrified Beirut through construction bonds and bank secrecy. Syrians held the low-paying construction jobs in Beirut. At the end of the 1990’s, Lebanon thus had a $16 billion debt and a bad credit rating.

Another sign that regression was a possibility for Lebanon in the years after the book’s writing, is that it was erecting no war memorials at all. Russia has an excessive number of them and dwells on them too much. As can currently be seen, factors other than remembering-the-past in-order-not-to-repeat-it, must be at work in Russia. “Rather than reform or soul-searching, Lebanon had sunk into collective amnesia and rampant consumerism.” Poor, decadent Lebanon. Although Lebanon suffered from too much ideology, the country of Jordan (which also doesn’t have oil) didn’t fall victim to it because its royal family depended on Bedouins and traders. The latter’s location is a key income-producer from transportation of goods, tourism and pilgrimages.

During and after the USSR breakup, organized crime flourished in Romania and Bulgaria. The latter applied for NATO membership in March 1997. But Russia, which held the purse-strings on Bulgaria’s natural gas pipeline, threatened to terminate its energy supply unless it allowed Russia to take over its organized crime networks.

The author bribed a police officer to board a cargo ship with primitive accommodations, to travel from Baku to Turkmenistan. It took sixteen hours. The common people residing in the latter had a low standard of living and led simple, unhappy lives due to Soviet domination since the Russian Revolution around 1918. In the same region, despite the discovery of oil, the people of Azerbaijan actually saw their standard of living fall, because their Soviet overlords no longer guaranteed them a decent pension. The author’s interviewees favored the NATO bombing of Serbia and social safety nets, as their idea of politics consisted of “might makes right” and feed everyone.

A history professor told the author that the only way Syria and Iraq could develop in a civil manner was if a capitalistic, middle-class military regime was to restore order. Good luck with that.

Read the book to learn much more about various countries’ combinations of political, economic, religious and geographic traits that have largely influenced their progress or regression in history. Along these lines, an American pop song that was released in late 1998 contained timely commentary on the United States. Little has changed since then, but here’s a bit of an update on that song.

IT IS WHAT IT IS
sung to the tune of “You Get What You Give” (the Official Music Video) with apologies to the New Radicals.

One, two, one, two, three, ow!

Gauge the winds.
We got the Dreamers’ crises.
Age of green, back and forth of hist’ry.
So low down, some are still spewing sleaze.

Secrecy, which of course never ends.
Every time, whistleblow’rs buck-the-trend.
The accused-balk, then-they-deny-till-they-die.

But when the axe is falling,
THEY test all their friends, friends.
The means are justified, by the ends.

We’ve got some debts coming due.
There’s no doubt, we’ve got some debts coming due.
Right or Left, this nation’s gonna pull through.
Politics, is a DAMN dirty biz.
Can’t forget, that it is what it is.

ChickENS comin’ home, oh yeah.
Never stops, we’re IN for it now.

2023, we’ll begin our prez-race.
They’re so mean, but we’ll watch a court case.
The-usual-sus-PECTS, will attempt to save face.

But when the axe is falling,
we enGAGE in hostile debate, debate.
We feel our democracy’s dying. Just wait.

America, won’t fall apart.
We’ve got free-dom, and we’ve got art.
We’ll find our way. We always do. Enjoy the view.

There’s no doubt, we’ve got some debts coming due. Aah-aah. Aah-aah.
The truth, will out.
Well, it is what it is.

Health insurance IS improving.
Actions AGainst Trump are moving.
Acts-of-obstruction are easy-proving.
Big LAWS are passed with GOP GROO-ving.

Profiteers pu-shing injections.
More celebs running-in elections. Cringeworthy. You’ll see voter-de-FECtions.
STAY around. There’ll be more insPECtions.

Don’t be alarmed, Right or Left…

To Change the World

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The Book of the Week is “To Change the World, My Years in Cuba” by Margaret Randall, published in 2009. This volume recounted the author’s brief descriptions of different episodes of her life, and some of the reasons she decided to move to Mexico, Cuba, Nicaragua and the United States.

In the 1960’s, the American author wanted to live in a nation that espoused the ideology of Communism, and she thought Cuba might fit the bill. In 1968, as a political activist and journalist, she attended the Cultural Congress of Havana. Beginning that year in Cuba, even in the hotels, there were severe shortages of consumer goods (that Americans took for granted), such as toilet paper.

In January 1969, the author visited again. Billboards sported public service announcements and slogans– similar to those one sees in Asia. The propaganda in the country “…never missed an opportunity to portray the U.S. as a cesspool of drugs and crime.” Cuba’s newspaper “Granma” (not to be confused with “Granta”) printed speeches of party hacks.

However, there was a government-sponsored education initiative to send all kids to school and make the whole populace literate. All the Cuban publishing houses in the 1960’s and 1970’s were Communist-Party-funded and run. But Cubans loved reading and books were affordable. The kinds of books available included Don Quixote, the autobiography of Malcolm X, and Che Guevara’s Bolivian Diary. For some years in the 1960’s, magazines were generally permitted to publish dissenting opinions. But in 1971, one University of Havana journal was shut down (and other publishers were harassed) by the Communist Party for criticizing Cuba’s government.

In late December 1969, the author and her family made the move to Cuba. Christmas gifts were given to her four children via a neighborhood lottery. For, the stores lacked sufficient toys or books for everyone. In the early 1990’s, the Cuban Christmas holiday became a religious celebration only, and children got gifts on International Children’s Day in June instead. The author omitted information on how Cuban Jews were treated at holiday time.

Upon arriving, the author’s family was assigned to live in an apartment, through which they received a booklet entitling them to rationed goods when shopping. After a couple of months, because they were foreigners, they were allowed to move into a spacious but fully-furnished, dilapidated apartment (of a wealthy, pre-Revolutionary former Havana resident). Home-improvement items were difficult to acquire. They had termites and roaches that were difficult to eradicate. And worst of all, women were still expected to do most of the shopping, house-cleaning and childcare.

Whenever word got around among personal social contacts of the family, that certain goods such as lettuce or onions would be sold at the local market, there appeared long queues during business hours. Those waiting in line were older relatives who didn’t work. Each person was allowed a quota of eggs and meat on a regular schedule every one to two weeks. The family also received two packages of cigarettes, which they bartered for goods they wanted.

A lot of domestic violence in Havana was prompted by stresses caused by cramped housing– to which native Cubans were assigned. Even divorced couples were forced to continue to cohabitate due to a housing shortage.

Read the book to learn: why the author eventually moved where she did, more about her work, her family and her beliefs. For her, the ideal of Communism wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. She soon realized that Cuba had a drama queen (in the form of Fidel Castro) for a leader.

Speaking of drama queens, here’s a little song Donald Trump ought to sing at his rallies.

I RANT AND I GET WHAT I WANT

sung to the tune of “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” with apologies to the Rolling Stones.

back-up singers:

[My foes-of-the-day give me conniptions.
I trash them all in my notes.
With my Party I make a connection.
At my feet are, a thousand scapegoats.

Yes, I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
And if you try-me for crimes,
I’ll waste your time.
You-won’t get what-you need.]

My foes-of-the-day give me conniptions.
I trash them all in my notes.
With my Party I make a connection.
At my feet are, a thousand scapegoats.

Yes, I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
And if you try-me for crimes,
I’ll waste your time.
You-won’t get what-you need.

I had to greet my fans at my rally,
and give my fair share of abuse
to Big Tech, the media and Joe Biden.
I delight in my propaganda ruse.

I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
And if you try-me for crimes,
I’ll waste your time.
You-won’t get-what you need.

I had to help my, lawyers at the hearing,
just to say your conflict, won’t-fly with me.
I was exercising my Constitutional rights,
and heroically trying to keep this country free.

You’re out to GET me! How dare you? I’m seeing red.
I sung my song to my loyal base.
Yeah, and they said I won the race-for-prez.

I’m so powerful.

I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
And if you try-me for crimes,
I’ll waste your time.
You-won’t get-what you need.

You-won’t get-what you need.

My foes-of-the-day give me conniptions.
In my arsenal is my Party’s war chest.
My rivals use the art of deception.
My victims know I won’t give it a rest.

I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
I rant and I get what I want.
And if you try-me for crimes,
I’ll waste your time,
I’ll waste your time,
you-won’t get-what you need.

Open Skies – BONUS POST

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The Bonus Book of the Week is “Open Skies, My Life as Afghanistan’s First Female Pilot” by Niloofar Rahmani with Adam Sikes, published in 2021.

Born in December 1991 in Afghanistan, the author deserves major bragging rights. For, she possessed the courage to serve as a liberated female role model (given her culture) by risking her own life and her family members’ lives in serving her beloved homeland. She joined the air force in December 2010. According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index) this was at a time when the Americans and NATO were running the show.

The Taliban and other devout Muslims were less than thrilled that she was the first Afghan female ever to learn to fly a fixed-wing aircraft. Pursuant to the Koran, a female’s priorities were: submissive girlhood, wifehood, motherhood, and womanhood (and usually, the first three were forced on females simultaneously), and taking care of a household; only then, might she work outside the home if her oldest living male relative allowed her to.

The author spent her early childhood in a refugee camp in Pakistan. Anomalously, but fortunately for her, both of her parents believed in educating her and her siblings (mostly sisters), and encouraging them to pursue the career of their choice. The family eventually moved to Kabul. Unsurprisingly, the author’s career choice provoked angry reactions from the male-dominated air force and males in her country. The most fanatical ones began to smear, spy on, and threaten her and her family.

Nevertheless, the author’s parents martyred themselves in so many ways for their children’s futures. Her father continued to encourage the author to keep flying, even when her family was under siege and suffering many hardships due to her focusing on her dream job.

A barbaric incident that occurred in March 2015 was just one indicator that in Afghanistan, the tide was turning toward the dark side yet again: a huge flash-mob of outraged, radical Muslim men tortured and killed a devout Muslim woman wrongly accused of burning the Koran.

The victim was set upon because a mullah (a credible, influential religious leader) was her accuser. Just a few of the vicious untruths spread about her were that she was a prostitute, a blasphemer of Islam, and was an agitator sent by the Americans (perceived as the evil occupiers). The author herself was subjected to roughly equivalent, ugly utterances.

Read the book to learn how the author cheated death in this wordy, redundant yet suspenseful volume.

Getting Stoned With Savages

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The Book of the Week is “Getting Stoned With Savages, A Trip Through the Islands of Fiji and Vanuatu” by J. Maarten Troost, published in 2006.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked an extensive list of detailed sources, and an index), Vanuatu is a nation in the South Pacific that includes about eighty islands. It has nine active volcanoes, and mild earthquakes every day. Between November and April, it gets two to three cyclones (called hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean), annually. Malaria is everywhere on its outer islands. Sharks around its coastal waters are yet another danger about which it can boast.

Vanuatu is a haven for tax cheats and money-launderers, and unsurprisingly has a very, very corrupt government. Its colonial past included the usual exploitation of cheap labor in the sugar and mining industries. In modern times, officials might purchase black-market weaponry from China, and might suffer consequences for trying to assemble their own private militia. They might take bribes in exchange for issuing Vanuatu passports, or lend money to unsavory characters like themselves. If Scotland Yard doesn’t put the kibosh on such activities, Vanuatu’s economy might crash.

Anyway, one can therefore guess correctly that its residents consist of: dark-skinned natives who work in the hospitality / tourism industry, members of the diplomatic-community from its former colonial masters (the British and French), Chinese merchants, Vietnamese laborers, missionaries, Western businessmen, and expatriate consultants in international development.

Vanuatu males spend a large proportion of their leisure time partaking of the mild narcotic called kava. Most westerners would recoil at the repugnant, unsanitary way kava is prepared for consumption. But the author took a liking to it. He and his wife lived on the island of Efate. Radio Vanuatu advised them to prepare for a coming cyclone by acquiring extra water and food. “We’d followed this advice closely and bought a bag of cookies.” The author set out to learn the true nature of Vanuatu’s people by traveling around and talking to them. He wanted to know why they practiced cannibalism.

When the couple moved to Fiji (which had a large population of Indians from India) after waiting for violence to die down after a regime-change— the author subscribed to the deluxe cable TV package. Those three channels featured Bollywood, and sports played mostly in Asia, plus cricket and rugby. “Perhaps I had become corrupted by the ceaseless action of rugby sevens, but [American] football now struck me as an artless spectacle performed by obese men in tights.”

Read the book to learn additional historical and cultural information about Vanuatu and Fiji, what transpired when a centipede stung the author’s feet, and learn the reasons why the couple decided to move yet again.

Speaking of regime change, here’s a little ditty about the current U.S. situation.

SAY GOODBYE TO WASHINGTON

sung to the tune of “Say Goodbye to Hollywood” with apologies to Billy Joel.

Biden’s COVID is much better tonight. He’s all right.
He had a trendy, new var-i-ant.
He’s testing out his-’24, propaganda machine.
It’s a scene of negative sentiment.

Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.
Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.

He’s been enduring ugly smears for a while
and the Right blames him for IN-flation.
They think he’s senile and in den-i-al and they DON’T, want him to LEAD our na-tion.

Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.
Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.

Moving ON, is a way, of-life for those political folks, in D.C. whoa, whoa
There’s never e-NOUGH sup-port, to get the things, you want done,
when times-aren’t ea-sy, aren’t ea-ea-sy.

So many leaders come and go in our times,
some we like, some we don’t want back again.
We always ask, what have you done for us LATE-ly?
We’re afraid, the answer’s in-sufficient.

Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.
Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.

Moving ON, is a way, of-life for those political folks, in D.C. whoa, whoa
There’s never e-NOUGH sup-port, to get the things, you want done,
when times-aren’t ea-sy, aren’t ea-ea-sy.

So many leaders come and go in our times,
some we like, some we don’t want back again.
We always ask, what have you done for us LATE-ly?
We’re afraid, the answer’s in-sufficient.

Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.
Say goodbye to Washington.
Say goodbye, Joe Biden.

(Bye!)

The Girls in the Wild Fig Tree / The Last Nomad

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The first Book of the Week is “The Girls in the Wild Fig Tree, How I Fought to Save Myself, My Sister, and Thousands of Girls Worldwide” by Nice Leng’ete, published in 2021.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), the following is still an all-too-common scenario in a poor village in Kenya: “… it is unlikely she will finish her education [meaning– graduating what would be equivalent to grammar school in the United States]. Her father married her [off when she was] young to get a dowry. Her husband wants her home to work and raise the children.” She is fifteen years old and already has two babies.

The author’s passion is to replace the tradition of female genital mutilation (FGM) practiced by certain Kenyan tribes, with Alternative Rites of Passage. For, the culturally entrenched FGM is one major reason females in her society have been so sheltered, limited and resigned to their fate for so long.

The author grew up in a Maasai village in Kenya, near the Tanzanian border. When she was about five years old, her mother took her to witness a FGM ceremony in her community. Maasai culture dictated that when girls showed signs of puberty, they underwent the ceremony. “The cut” (of the clitoris) was extremely painful, and the presence of complications such as infection or hemorrhage could lead to chronic medical problems or even death. There were no drugs administered.

But the cut, even in the absence of physical complications, signaled the next steps of arranged marriage, childbearing and servitude for the rest of a girl’s life, usually beginning in her early teen years. Even when a girl’s mother wanted to honor her daughter’s wish to finish school and have a different lifestyle, she had no power to persuade her husband or any other male relatives to allow that to happen. The males ruled the roost.

Read the book to learn how the author escaped her almost certain dismal fate, and how she is helping other females to do the same, without their having to endure all the traumas she did.

The second Book of the Week is “The Last Nomad, Coming of Age in the Somali Desert, by Shugri Said Salh, published in 2021.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), the author’s Muslim family was somewhat anomalous, in that her father was a multi-lingual scholar who believed in education for both genders, and her grandmother was an authoritative figure. The author was born around 1974. Her culture also still practiced female genital mutilation.

The sprawling family’s tribe was nomadic– they herded camels and goats, and seasonally migrated around the desert in Somalia, looking for water. Their religion allowed polygamy among the men. The author’s father’s biological children numbered 23 among 7 wives, 5 of whom he divorced; the author’s mother gave birth to 10 children before she passed away of malaria when the the author was six years old.

In 1988, Somalia’s government and tribes devolved into civil war. “Killing, looting, destruction, and chaos was now our norm.” The people had a complicated system of relationships in which they took care of their own family and tribe, and if their brains were poisoned by war, they became hostile to all others.

The author’s sister possessed a key survival skill– thorough knowledge of her family’s lineage so that, when questioned, she knew which tribal name to utter to quell sociopathic, armed-and-dangerous child-soldiers in the streets. When the family finally fled Mogadishu in 1991, their black-market connections allowed them to obtain provisions that kept them alive– fuel for a truck, food and ammunition. However, they braved many other life-threatening dangers, including atrocities (committed by people), harm from lions, poisonous snakes and baboons, disease and dehydration; not to mention lice and scabies.

The author and several relatives were able to cross the border and stay in Kenya temporarily. Even so, law enforcement officers in Nairobi were corrupt– arresting refugees and hitting them up for bribes just before they knew the refugees were due to legally leave the country.

Read the book to learn much, much more about the author’s checkered story.

Fighting Back – BONUS POST

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The Bonus Book of the Week is “Fighting Back, a Memoir of Jewish Resistance in WWII” by Harold Werner, published in 1992. This slim volume contained a detailed, suspenseful account of one man’s survival story.

Born the oldest of six siblings in 1918 in eastern Poland, the author was a Jew typical for his generation. He spoke Yiddish and Polish. He spent his childhood in Gorzkow, a small farming village where his fellow religionists at an early age took up a trade such as tailoring, blacksmithing, shoemaking, or carpentering. They bartered with the non-Jews, who were farmers. The villagers spent their leisure time playing soccer or ping-pong, attending movies, or opera, or boating.

Poland declared independence in 1918, after the Americans and French helped them defeat the Bolsheviks. As is well known, after the death of the dictator Joseph Pildsudski in May 1935, the reigning right-wing National Democratic party, also known as Endecia or Endek, especially scapegoated and violently oppressed Poland’s Jews.

When the Germans attacked Poland in September 1939, they indiscriminately bombed residential buildings in Warsaw; in one of which was the author’s knitting machines– with which he had previously more or less, made a living, making winter sweaters. The following month, he, some of his family, and other people he knew, fled Warsaw on foot eastward to then-Russian-occupied territory.

The author thus began a years-long ordeal, suffering extreme physical hardship– alternately hiding from and, with his fellow Resistance fighters– sabotaging the war efforts of the Nazis in Poland and eastern Ukraine. He joined a group of partisans called Army Ludowa.

Even when the Polish Jews who had survived the war by evacuating or hiding thought their lives were no longer threatened, they still had nothing to live for. The author lamented, “…Jews had no homes to return to and no families to go back to … our mission was to fight, take revenge, destroy the enemy.” The ones who had stayed at the war’s beginning were killed in bombings or shootings in their expropriated homes, or in deportations to the death camp called Sobibor or killed in the Wlodawa ghetto.

All through history, Poles had always had a reputation for anti-Semitism. But the war had stirred up a frenzy of hatred that the Jews of the Polish Resistance felt against the sociopathic, sadistic Nazis and their collaborators– which included German and Polish security and law officers and tattling villagers.

Read the book to learn of how the author lived before his life was turned upside-down, the acts of kindness certain people displayed, the hatreds of others, and the numerous times he cheated death during his wartime experiences.

Speaking of a frenzy of hatred, here’s a question for the 2024 presidential candidates. As is well known, the campaign forecast is: extremely cloudy with 100% chance of shock and outrage.

DO YOU REALLY WANT TO RULE THE WORLD?

sung to the tune of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” (the studio version) with apologies to Tears For Fears.

Welcome to some strife.
Your party’s got your back.
Even while you Tweet, morons and nut-cases track your every action, you won’t get no satisfaction.
Do you really want to rule the world?

It’s your time to shine,
but you must STAY the course,
feeding the grapeVINE.

If you CAN, preserve our freedoms and our pleasures,
without bullying or extreme measures,
we will LET you rule the world.

There’s no place where the SMEARS
won’t find you.
Dodging scandals while the media comes sniffing around.
When they do, your lawyers will be right behind you.

So sad that money rules you.
Social-media approval fools you.
Do you really want to rule the world?

We can’t stand this national division.
Charisma will gain you White House admission.
Do you really want to rule the world?

ACTUALLY dispense with the lies and the greed, please.
We’re fed up with the hypocrisy and sleaze.
Do you really want to rule the world?

We need freedoms and our pleasures,
without bullying or extreme measures.
Do you really want to rule the world?

Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds

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The Book of the Week is “Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds, A Refugee’s Search for Home” by Mondiant Dogon with Jenna Krajeski, published in 2021.

Born in February 1992, the author began his childhood on a cattle ranch in Bikenke, a village in Rwanda. His family was of the Bagogwe tribe, a subcategory of Tutsi. His ancestors had migrated between Rwanda and Zaire (aka Congo; the author was unclear as to which current country– “Democratic Republic of Congo” or “Republic of the Congo”– he and his family lived in and when; so the area will hereinafter be referred to as Congo.).

In the mid-1990’s, the genocide in Rwanda forced the family to flee their Congo home mostly on foot with little more than the clothes on their backs. They had previously lived harmoniously side-by-side with their Hutu neighbors in the Congo. But contagious hatred reared its ugly head. The family hid in a cave, at a school, in the woods and other places prior to trying to stay alive at less dangerous places (i.e., refugee camps).

By spring 1996, the family had finally made its way to a refugee camp in Rwanda, where the Red Cross provided humanitarian assistance. The author and others lived in a tent city on grounds formed by the eruption of the volcano, Nyiragongo. A refugee was shot by a sniper, so the UN moved them to another camp, guarded by the Rwandan Patriotic Army. That did not end well either, as child-soldiers in the terrorist group called Interahamwe killed hundreds of Tutsis with machetes.

In the next several years, the refugees were moved from one camp to another, as life-threatening dangers (mostly from human violence) presented themselves around every corner. They nearly starved to death many, many times, and suffered from malnutrition all the time.

Nevertheless, the author, at eight years old, was finally able to start first grade at school. According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), there were no: chalkboard, desks, pens and books. He passionately took to learning, anyway. At recess time, he and his friends also played soccer with a makeshift ball– made with whatever material was at hand. The refugees continued to eat only tiny portions of beans and corn every two or three days.

In 2001, Kabila, the new dictator of the Democratic Republic of Congo, wanted to give the (false) impression that peace had been restored in his country, so he had officials from Kivu go to the region’s refugee camps, including those in Rwanda, and propagandize that refugees could come home and live as they had prior to the unrest.

However, unaware of the full extent of Congo’s then-civil war, the author, his brother and father endured a stressful, multi-day journey via on foot and bus to see whether conditions were sufficiently safe for their family to return to their pre-war property. They were unable to reach their home, but in a village many miles away, the father found work from a Hutu employer who showed no tribal hatreds. For a change. The author resumed attending school and achieved fluency in Swahili, giving him a survival skill when he was confronted by haters. Bullets flew around outside the school from all different rebel groups in Kivu.

Read the book to learn: of the numerous times the author cheated death; the many hardships he suffered; and how he parlayed his passion for school into various positive developments, including receiving recognition from a philanthropist who helped him rise above discrimination against his refugee status.

Americanized / The Dilbert Future – BONUS POST

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The first Bonus Book of the Week is “Americanized, Rebel Without A Green Card” by Sara Saedi, originally published in 2018.

According to this slim volume (which appeared credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), the author’s family had a difficult time getting permission to live permanently in the United States, after fleeing the Iranian Revolution in the early 1980’s.

The author, born in 1980, provided a host of details on her family’s immigration ordeal, and her own life’s trials and tribulations (mostly First-World problems). Incidentally, she unwittingly wrote a line that would have subjected her to cancel-culture [In 1992]:

“…I’d personally reached peak frustration levels at our country’s complex and seemingly arbitrary immigration laws. I wanted to get on the first flight to Washington, DC, and storm the Capitol, but I didn’t, because any form of criminal activity would get me deported.”

Read the book to learn more.

The second Bonus Book of the Week is “The Dilbert Future, Thriving on Stupidity in the 21st Century” by Scott Adams, published in 1997.

The author discussed his predictions, obviously at the book’s writing. One of them was particularly accurate:

“As dense as they [the children] might be, they will eventually notice that adults have spent all the money, spread disease, and turned the planet into a smoky, filthy ball of death. We’re raising an entire generation of dumb, pissed-off kids who know where the handguns are kept.”

(!!!)

Read the book to learn more of the author’s insights.

Sand and Blood

[Please note: The word “Featured” on the left side above was NOT inserted by this blogger, but apparently was inserted by WordPress, and it cannot be removed. NO post in this blog is sponsored.]

The Book of the Week is “Sand and Blood, America’s Stealth War on the Mexico Border” by John Carlos Frey, published in 2019. This investigative journalist did his homework. He actually practiced what was known in the 1970’s as New Journalism, experiencing for himself what migrants go through. He hired a people-smuggler, and his account was factual and professional. He did NOT throw a pity-party, did NOT spout the kind of daily, tiresome, self-absorbed minutiae of American reality-shows on the idiot box.

The author pointed out that the major focus of U.S. military action is currently at the Mexico border (rather than in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Central America, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Balkans, Syria, etc., etc., etc.). The twentieth century saw a large increase in demand for farm workers in the southwestern states to provide food for the nation. Between 1942 and 1964, a federal law called the Mexican Farm Labor Agreement allowed Mexican migrants to enter the U.S. to work. They were provided with housing but were ill-treated and exploited. For the next couple of decades, the country was distracted by various military actions around the world.

Finally, in 1986, president Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which conditionally (regardless of smears and lies in sound-bites on the idiot box; as an aside– undocumented immigrants have never been allowed to get welfare services, Social Security or Medicare without identity papers) let illegals earn permanent U.S. residency and eventually, citizenship.

In 1991, president George H.W. Bush signed a bill with a new immigration goal: to use the American military to target drug-smugglers, so Border Patrol could focus on catching illegal-border-crossers.

In December 1993, president Bill Clinton signed NAFTA, which caused more poverty in Mexico. It is not rocket science to infer that more poverty will lead to stronger motivation in more migrants to seek a better life in a land that is conveniently nearby. In 1996, Clinton helped enact a law that denied any and all immigrants due process if they were convicted of an aggravated felony (i.e., entering the U.S. illegally).

In 1994, California governor Pete Wilson was reelected on the scapegoating-illegals-ticket via the passage of Proposition 187. Up until that year, the childhood residence of the author of the book, in the Tijuana River Valley, just north of the Mexico border– was a demilitarized zone in which Mexicans and Americans could freely (at no-cost and with no harassment) enjoy beautiful nature on either side of the border. By the mid-1990’s, the border was a war zone. For, a U.S. Marines and Green-Berets task force was on the job.

After 9/11, the War on Terror was in full swing, yet the initiative caught zero terrorists who had illegally crossed the border. Bloated bureaucracy soon followed, with the burgeoning of the multiple new sheriffs in town: Homeland Security– the boss of INS, Border Patrol, ICE and Customs and Border Protection. By 2005, the border-protection budget had soared to $40.2 billion. That could have paid for a lot of social and education programs instead. Unsurprisingly, the whole border security apparatus became a Self-Regulatory-Organization (translation: fox guarding the hen house).

An infrastructure, security, aircraft, data-processing and spying extravaganza ensued, what with military contractors jumping on the gravy train in winning business from the U.S. government, as the contractors made the following political donations in 2012 (which included but were not limited to):

Barack Obama: $127,000 from Lockheed Martin and about $191,000 from Boeing;

Senator Charles Schumer: $49,500 from Lockheed Martin; and

Senator Lindsey Graham: $16,500 from Boeing.

That said, every politician begins his or her career with such high hopes and idealistic goals. As one of the most powerful men in the world, the American president begins his first term planning to do a big project or perhaps a bunch of them on the same issue– that brings health, education or social benefits to the American people– for which he will be remembered, he hopes, forever.

However, in recent decades especially, with so many factors out of his control, such as

term-limits;
the lack of time to review proposed and existing policies, legislation and issues– which increases the power of special-interest groups’ financial influence on all elected officials at all levels of government. And those officials’ behavior and votes can affect his popularity;
vicious political enemies; and
previous failed attempts at the same programs that just happened to lose their propaganda wars, etc.,

he ends up playing cheerleader for his agenda in between countering smears and lies against him for every little thing.

Here is a brief rundown of the “legacy lottery” of sorts of the last sixtyish years– accomplishments the president and his supporters argued were beneficial to society– for which each president became best known; the programs that were started or were amended on his watch that endure to this day (a few failures bear mentioning), though they have waxed and waned reputation-wise and funding-wise, through the decades.

PLEASE NOTE: viewing or reading one source of historical info is never sufficient for providing an accurate picture of anyone or any event (not even one book.) This blogger suggests reading at least tens of books (if possible) on one era or events detailed in personal accounts or about one person with historical backdrop, that are clearly labeled non-fiction. Even then, there is propagandizing. The following should be supplemented with further readings.

JFK-Peace Corps (ironic, because young Americans are serving other countries), EEOC. A lot happened in less than three years; though he did inherit oodles of family-power and money.
Lyndon B. Johnson– Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act of 1965, Medicare, Medicaid, Project Head Start; five years crowded with incident.
Richard Nixon-First Term: EPA, Clean Air Act of 1970. Was always angry, resentful and vengeful for NOT inheriting immense family-power and money. Second Term: Insisted he was not a crook!
Gerald Ford-??? Too short a tenure to do much on short notice, and didn’t inherit huge family-power and money.
Jimmy Carter-Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (Superfund program)– almost completely gutted in recent years; his administration was taken hostage in various ways.
Ronald Reagan-First Term: Renewed Voting Rights Act and made MLK Day a federal holiday, but only under grass-roots political pressure from civil rights groups. Second Term: Enriched profiteers in the criminal justice industry by signing a drug-enforcement bill, but did raise awareness of the high costs of drug and alcohol-related problems.
George H.W. Bush-Passed the Americans with Disabilities Act, and an amendment to the Clean Air Act and yet, oil-profiteered for himself; this was one cause of his propaganda-war loss on his reelection bid.
Bill Clinton-First Term: Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993; tried to implement a national-healthcare plan, which turned out to be a dress rehearsal; grade “A” for effort. Second Term: Signed some laws that helped children and families with healthcare, foster care and adoption, but he lost the propaganda war historically.
George W. Bush-First Term: Unfortunately succeeded in passing the No Child Left Behind Act– but did raise awareness of the high costs of running education like a business. Enriched medical-industry profiteers by partially privatizing Medicare in a massive overhaul. Second Term: proposed privatizing Social Security, and proposed immigration reform while advocating for more funding for beefing up military presence at the Mexican border (igniting all sorts of controversies), but it was his entire disaster, military-conflict, and oil profiteering-oriented tenure that caused him to lose his propaganda war historically, big-time.
Barack Obama–First Term: While putting out fires of his immediate predecessor, signed an amendment to an anti-hate-crime law and repealed DADT. Signed the Affordable Care Act, whose way was paved for him in the mid-1990’s; tenuous win thus far and needs lots of modifications– but a major feat. And need it be said? Didn’t inherit family hegemony and ginormous wealth. Second Term: Signed an amendment to the Affordable Care Act.
Donald Trump-Proposed building a Mexican-border wall! No one knows its current status. Did wonders for profiteers (his family and cronies) in health, labor and the environment by signing numerous Executive Orders. Inherited massive family-power and money.
Joseph Biden-Spent his first year putting out fires of his immediate predecessor. He’s a transition president like Ford, and also didn’t inherit superlative family-power and money.

All of the above presidents have had to make serious ethical compromises in order to try to secure their legacies; pursuant to the amount of power wielded over them by the opposition-party during their time in office. Those who won the “profiteering lottery” favored money over people without a second thought. And, ALL of them felt they needed to do politically expedient military spending, or else their impact on history might suffer.

Incidentally, one turning point in the history of the McCarthy Era occurred when the Republican U.S. senator from Wisconsin, criticized the military. After that, it was downhill for him. One turning point in the history of the Trump administration occurred when the Republican U.S. president from New York State, criticized the military. After that, it was a faster downfall for him.

Anyway, notwithstanding the humungous amount of taxpayer money diverted to militarization of the border, “A weakening [U.S.] economy helped slow migration more than fences did.”

Read the book to learn: about Boeing’s epic fail; why certain areas have no deterrents to migrants; why the government can’t even say how ineffective its militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border has been; how migrants risk their lives; about the smuggling cartels; about a Native American reservation and a church near the border; about how frustrating the U.S. border’s complaint-processing system is; and much more about recent conditions / deaths at the border.

The Life and Times of the Shah

[Please note: The word “Featured” on the left side above was NOT inserted by this blogger, but apparently was inserted by WordPress, and it cannot be removed. NO post in this blog is sponsored.]

The Book of the Week is “The Life and Times of the Shah” by Gholam Reza Afkhami, published in 2009. This tome (whose roughly chronological contents were organized by political issues, which made it redundant in spots) provided a history of two leaders known as “shah” or king, of Iran, and global context, beginning with the father, Reza Khan, born in a village near the Caspian sea in 1877. Iran’s first Constitution was written in 1907.

A 1919 agreement signed between Persia (which became known as Iran in 1935) and Great Britain basically stated that the former was to become a colony of the latter. Reza Khan and his fellow Iranian government officials chafed under the agreement and refused to sign it. Iran’s soldiers were resentful that Britain’s military arrogantly came to train them. Nevertheless, the Iranians did approve of Britain’s taking control of northern Iran, a region of Cossacks (anti-Bolshevik Russians).

In October 1919, Mohammad Reza (the shah-to-be) was born. February 1921 saw his father survive a failed coup, declare martial law and arrest tens of members of the old-line Iranian aristocracy. In the 1920’s, there was a shuffling around of governmental cabinet members, and no real improvement in the country’s affairs. Diverse tribes with their various rivalries populated Iran’s different regions. But Reza Khan was a social democrat and a nationalist– the people should take pride in being Iranian, irrespective of tribe or religion. He believed in: the English system of law, compulsory education, land reform and separation of church and state.

In December 1925, the leadership committee in Iran, called the Majlis, named Reza Khan king of Iran, or shah. His son was named crown prince, and at twelve years of age, was sent to boarding school in Switzerland. By 1933, the shah was fed up with foreign powers’ exploitation of Iran’s oil. He signed an agreement giving Iran more control, although Iran lacked the expertise and resources for maximizing profits from all things oil-related. Even so, the years 1938 to 1941 saw Iran profit handsomely due to Britain’s straitened circumstances in its dire need for fuel. However, Reza Khan had to tread lightly with all parties (the Allies and Axis nations) because any party could take over Iran.

In September 1941, after a series of untoward events, under British pressure, shah Reza Khan went into exile in Mauritius and eventually South Africa, transferring power to his son. In 1942, in exchange for declaring war on Germany, Iran became a candidate for membership in the then-proposed United Nations. Meanwhile, there was domestic unrest in connection with a newly formed Iranian political party called the Tudeh, which was neither Communist nor revolutionary, at least initially.

By the end of WWII, the Soviets were entrenched in the Tudeh party, and occupied the northern region of Iran, eager to acquire the oil in Azerbaijan. The Iranians had regained control by summer 1947, but martial law had to be declared. Again. For, against the wishes of ordinary Iranians, their government had signed an oil agreement with the Soviets.

After a few more years of international shenanigans and posturing, and violent domestic gyrations, in March 1951, Iran nationalized its oil industry. The British believed this action was going to hinder the modernization of Iran. Nevertheless, by summer, Iran had formed its own oil company, snubbing Britain’s oil company– which was co-owned with Iran and had been in Iran’s industry-oligopoly for decades. In October 1952, Iran broke off diplomatic relations with the British.

American president Dwight Eisenhower was concerned that Iran would cave in to Soviet influence. Also in 1952, Iranian citizens were expressing their displeasure with their government’s actions, through street protests and rioting. Political opponents of Iran’s prime minister were arrested. The shah didn’t want to be deposed, so he dismissed the prime minister, and held a people’s referendum on whether to dissolve the Majlis. Although voters were physically harassed, dissolution won out, thanks to a secret CIA operation dubbed TPAJAX. Alpha males (the kind who later fancied themselves as James Bond) in the American and British intelligence services claimed credit for the regime alterations. The shah and his queen flew to Baghdad (a place friendly to Iranians at the time) for a tabloid distraction– er, uh, diplomatic visit– until things calmed down. Unresolved oil issues prompted Iran to resume diplomatic relations with Britain in December 1953. In August 1954, an oil consortium was formed.

In the mid-1950’s, Iran’s economy began to improve due to various factors, including U.S. aid, oil profits, and anti-Communist regional alliances of Iran’s neighbors. As a world leader, the shah considered his job to be head of human resources of his government’s top leaders, pursuant to Iran’s Constitution. He looked at the two-party system of the United States, and liked what he saw. However, in summer 1958, in the shah’s view, “We did not have the security guarantees that NATO enjoyed” so Iran signed a non-aggression pact with the Soviets. But in March 1959, it signed a bilateral defense treaty with the United States.

After clearing various hurdles, Iranian women got the right to vote in January 1963. However, the shah failed to see a future power struggle he would have with the ayatollah Khomeini, whom he had arrested and exiled (to the unwise location of Paris) in June 1963. As is well known, Khomeini wanted to make Iran a theocracy. In autumn 1964, Iran signed a controversial piece of paper with the United States in connection with court jurisdiction and adjudication of crime-cases of U.S. military personnel and U.S. embassy workers in Tehran.

Khomeini and his followers were livid at America’s double standards and the fact that the shah was an American puppet. Too, in the next several years, for various reasons, Iran’s energy needs couldn’t be entirely satisfied by oil and gas, so it was looking into nuclear power plants. By the mid-1970’s, Iran had become a storage dump for nuclear waste.

By summer 1975, the shah was starting to get too big for his britches, even though he had brought certain aspects of democracy to Iran. His government was on its way to one-party rule. His new political movement would be governed by three major sources which contradicted each other: Iran’s Constitution, the Shah-People Revolution, and the imperial order. That last one conflicted with whether the shah was the ultimate authority over the governing of his country (in later years, there was a conflict also with the authority of Iran’s top military leader), but he was a king, indefinitely.

The United Kingdom is also a Constitutional monarchy, BUT the head of the royal family is merely a figurehead, while the prime minister and government bodies have all the power to, and do, all the work of governing the country. Those bodies can be forced to resign pursuant to a vote of no-confidence– between formally scheduled election days, which increases uncertainty in the system and for the people governed.

In the United States, the First Family is not supposed to be a royal family. Its system does have problems, but uncertainty due to resignations en masse is not one of them. The two major parties keep each other’s power in check. The president is always a member of one or the other.

Anyway, by spring 1977, the international community was pressuring Iran to curb its human rights abuses. Oops. It was already too late. The shah was unable to see the writing on the wall: that Khomeini was a threat to his power (even from Paris!); and that he was giving mixed signals by declaring martial law but at the same time, failing to train Iran’s law enforcement officers to control crowds and instructing them to refrain from firing on street protesters to quell violence in Iran’s major cities. So there appeared to be chaos and anarchy. Not to mention revolution.

Khomeini’s propaganda had been inflaming the masses for years. One tabloid item in spring 1979 from the government of the Bahamas revealed that the shah kept a large quantity of money in Swiss bank accounts. Unsurprisingly, the shah and his queen went into exile. In the next year or so, protesters angrily surrounded every residence in the world where they were temporarily tolerated.

In the shah’s absence, Iran’s military was rudderless because its members had always practiced blind obedience to the shah. Besides, Iran’s law enforcement and security personnel had always thought of themselves as ordinary Iranians, so they didn’t want to harm people like themselves.

Read the book to learn about: how, in the regime’s last several years, the U.S. mishandled Iranian foreign policy and misjudged Khomeini; plus much, much more. Here’s a little ditty that explains how Americans can keep our country from becoming a Constitutional monarchy (or theocracy), like that of Iran’s:

VOTE

sung to the tune of “Vogue” with apologies to Madonna.

SHOP around.
Election time is in the offing.
Find out where YOU need to go.
(shop around)

You elect the people who’ll help you improve,
the LIFE that-you-know.
(life-that-you-know)

You can get ACtive in politics,
or just research candidATES today.

I know a time when you can make the change.
It’s called election day
and you can make-the-losers pay.

So c’mon, vote.
Feel your power-as-an-American.
hey hey hey
C’mon, vote.
Not all nations HAVE what we have.
(you know you can do it)

All you need is your own registration.
So use it. You count, rich or poor.
(both rich and poor)
It’s democracy. Show-you-believe-in-the-process.
More VO-ters open the door.
(open up the door)

It makes no difference if you’re Left or Right,
if you’re pro-this or pro-that.
Free and fair elections ensure sta-bi-li-ty.
You’re a civics star,
yes that’s what you are.
(you know it)

C’mon, vote.
Feel your power-as-an-American.
hey hey hey
C’mon, vote.
Not all nations HAVE what we have.
(you know you can do it)

Leaders need to govern well,
not just deny and cover up.
Soul is in society.
That’s where we feel so LIStened to.
Learn from mistakes, keep us safe.
Get things DONE-on-the Congress floors.

Vote.
Feel your power-as-an-American.
hey hey hey
C’mon, vote.
Not all nations HAVE what we have.
(you know you can do it, do it, do it)

(vote vote)
(Leaders need to govern)
(as Amer-i-cans)
(vote)
(Leaders need to govern)
(not all nations)

Adolf Hitler, Juan Peron, Milosevic and Marcos
Kim Il-sung, Saddam Hussein
got 99-percent-of-votes-in-their-name.
“The people love me” they did gloat.

Others seized power, you should note:
Joseph Stalin, Pinochet,
Khomeini, Papa-Duvalier.
They had weapons, they used force.
Mao-Tse-Tung had no remorse.

Gaddafi, Franco, Castro too.
Kim Jong-un, is anything new?

Leaders with an attitude,
some of whom the U.S. wooed.
Don’t put up with bad government.
Take a position.
You can make a dent.

(vote vote vote vote)
(vote vote)
(oooh, you’ve got to)
Feel your power-as-an-American.
(oooh, you’ve got to do it)
Not all nations HAVE what we have.
(oooh, you’ve got to)
Vote. Vote. Vote. Vote.