Kerry is so right with his diagnosis of the Middle East and a vision to transform it.

[beachmom]

First, the problem. The Iraqi Kid has now left Iraq and is living in Jordan. Despite reaching safety, he still is angry about Iraq, and the greater Arab world. (Just a note -- his slur of Jews I believe is merely repeating what is prevalent in the Arab World. I don't think he is particularly anti-semitic, and is in fact making fun of the Arab characterization of Jews, but I just wanted to warn you of the language):

http://ejectiraqikkk.blogspot.com/2006/12/iraqis-biggest-hypocrites.html

The sense of Iraq's unity is a paradoxical, dare I say nonexistent thing, I used to think of myself as someone who loves his country, but slowly I became to understand that this was an illusion, like the slogan "Raise your head, you're an Iraqi." Exactly what Iraq has done, from the day it was created to the day that I am writing this to you, that should make me proud? We are a generation who practiced hurling out terms like 'the victorous, proud, chivalrous Arab nation' while in reality we suffered major defeats, exactly like the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, which was another disastorous loss where the descendandts of Monkey & Pigs, Jews (Arabic trademark phrase) almost captured age-old Isalmic capital Damascus. We heavily borrow from our ancestors glories to gild our miserable defeats, Iraqi Ba'ath propaganda was never absent from a direct reference to the invention of the wheel, the glories of Nebuchedanezzar, or the linking of the Iran-Iraq war to the 7-th century Qadissiya, etc). We as citizens, would greet our president with cheers and kisses and sworn allegiances, only to shed them the minute we are safe inside our homes. This practice has severely damaged all pride, we are a nation of cowards, tyrants, and morons.

Some people point out to people like us, who left Iraq, saying look at these cowards, we are not cowards, we are realists. The love of the 'country' is a hypcrisy formed by years of living under oppression and refusal to admit defeats. There is nothing that my country has done so far, and I am speaking too for all Arab states, that makes me proud of the fact that I am of its citizens. You can see how this is evident by how people are killing for the sake of sect, religion, their areas, their families, but never their country. Some people, mostly Baathists and their sympathesizers, continue their own bullshit about the 'patriotic Iraqi resistance' and how we are fighting for 'Iraq', shut up, you are fighting for the lost thrones you had. There is no such thing as an Iraqi resistance, and there never, ever was. It was al-Qaeda and Baathists all the way, I don't hate Mes'ood Barazani as much as I hate Saddam Hussein, because the first guy is a motherfucker who's at least frank about it, but the latter, Saddam ibn al kahba abu el gawad Hussein, is a hypocrite who can still make people follow him out of mere cowardice to admit how pathetic we all are, continuing an idiotic routine of hypocritic national identification.

He then explains the appeal of Osama bin Laden:

This is why many Arabs support Osama bin Laden, because he is a guy who doesn't bullshit around and actually does something, I think Bin Laden is a big criminal and a great danger on Islam because of that precise fact, he's a person who understands Arabs need to stop hypocrisy with action.

This is about as good an explanation for the al Qaeda phenomenon that I've heard. The Arab people are IMPOTENT to exact change to their lives or to their respective countries. Promises are made but nothing HAPPENS. The Iraq story is yet another BIG IDEA that went NOWHERE. Bush screwed up Iraq really badly, and made things worse, but he was helped along by this Arab . . . low self esteem.

This passage by The Kid is devastating. He completely repudiates his country:

Iraq is particularly a good example of Arab hypocrisy, because all its glories are lies while its people degenrated into morons, some people want Saddam back, you monkeys - at least psychologically, do u want to return to a stable, but paradoixcal state of glorifiying Saddam's farts and belches? Some people said this is because of Saddam, well he's gone now and look what have you done to the country? IT IS YOU. YOURSELVES. this is why we must stop the hypocrisy of identifiying with "Iraq" in its current meaning and be brave enough and say how much of a losers we all are. I do not hate my country, but I don't really care for it that much, I'd love to see it flourishing and stable, but I wouldn't die for it, so it's not enough - the difference is that I'm brave enough to say it. I only love my family, my friends, and recently my area (as a post-effect of the sectarain civil war), but I don't really love my country. In fact, I think it's a big shame that people are dying becuase of such a stupid, hypocritical lie. I would cut my arm and hand it to you on a plate if you can find me a single Iraqi who'd die for his own country. There's just no such thing. Islamism is real, Shiism is real, Iranianism is real, al-Qaeda is real, but al-Ba'ath party is the true example of Iraqi patriotism: fake identifications with a myth of glory that is based upon truer past achievements that we had nothing to do with.

People will die for their individual subgroups, but they will not die for their country, Iraq. Training Iraqis to fight for Iraq is doomed for failure. The Kid is only one voice in Iraq, but I believe he is speaking the truth here.



So now that the sheer hopelessness of the region is there for all to see, let's look at what Kerry said in his Real Security speech back in December 2005:

http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=1340

The real war on terror is an even bigger challenge. It is a war that has drawn us smack into the middle of an internal struggle in the Islamic World. It is fundamentally a war within Islam for the heart and soul of Islam, stretching from Morocco East to Indonesia. -It leads, ultimately, to a struggle for the transformation of the Greater Middle East into a region that is no longer isolated from the global economy, no longer dependent on despotism for stability, no longer fearful of freedom, and no longer content to feed restive and rising populations of unemployed young people a diet of illusions, excuses, and dead end government jobs.

As the 2004 Arab Human Development Report tells us, “By 21st century standards, Arab countries have not met the Arab people’s aspirations for development, security and liberation … Indeed, there is a near-complete consensus that there is a serious failing in the Arab world …located specifically in the political sphere.” And in addition, in regions where the mosque remains the only respected alternative to the autocratic state structures, there is no credible secular alternative. So we are caught in a cauldron of religious struggle where today there is no center of moral authority that forcefully condemns those who murder in the name of Islam.

In the long run–and we’re in this for the long run-the war on terror cannot be won without the successful transformation of the Greater Middle East, and especially its Arab core. And our strategy must do what it takes to increase the internal demand for change in that region.

That means we are in a war of ideas and ideologies–but ultimately a war that must be fought and won within the Islamic world.

That means we have a huge stake in finding partners in the Arab world who are willing not only to support the transformation of the Middle East, but to reestablish the broad and unchallenged moral authority needed to isolate and defeat terrorists.

And ultimately, that means we must liberate ourselves and the Middle East itself from the tyranny of dependence on petroleum, which has frustrated every impulse towards modernization of the region, while giving its regimes the resources to hold onto power.

We have to understand that the hostility to America and to our values that feeds the jihadist threat is the product of many decades of repressed debate within the Middle East. We’ve become the convenient excuse for the failures of the rulers, and the convenient target for the frustrations of the ruled.

And frankly, we’ve made that possible by signaling Arab regimes we don’t much care what they do so long as they keep the oil flowing and the prices low. That attitude must not only end; it must be reversed. Energy independence is not just a domestic priority for our country. It’s also essential to our national security, because our reliance on their oil limits our ability to move them towards needed reforms and props up decaying and sometimes corrupt regimes, including those that support terrorist groups. Any long-term strategy for winning the war on terror must therefore include a determined effort to reduce our dependence on petroleum. So many opportunities to do that are staring us in the face, but none have been seized with the urgency our security demands.

And these efforts have to be international in nature, linked to the rapid emergence of new energy technologies, in order to ensure that growing economies like China and India don’t just replace us as the enablers of Middle East autocrats.

So this is the long range mission in the war on terror: one, make sure the right side wins the war of ideas within the Islamic world; two, build up diversified economies and civil society; and, three, end the empire of oil. These three challenges make it abundantly clear this is not a war the United States should fight alone.

And that’s the basic insight the President and his administration have yet to fully grasp and translate into policies Americans can fully understand.

Nothing makes that clearer than their policy in Iraq, where our mismanaged occupation has inadvertently created a new front in the war on terror.

Senator Kerry has nailed the problem exactly. As I read The Kid's post, it was so obvious that an entire lost generation is sitting in the Middle East desperately looking for something to believe in. A purpose to live. And religion is the only place to go. There are no secular institutions to note of for people to think about what they want their country and society to look like. No outlet to dream big dreams. And so, Osama bin Laden has taken advantage of this vaccuum, and created a "dream" of sorts -- and it amounts to little more than "sticking it to The Man", which at this time, happens to be the United States of America. They don't hate us for our freedom, they hate us for our success. And if they were able to build countries, societies, and economies that made them proud (but to be clear, this is not just about material success but wholesale societal success), they would be less willing to throw it all away and pick up arms to slaughter either the outside world or each other.

Senator Kerry has laid out a plan that MUST be implemented and must be endorsed by a large portion of the world. People of the Middle East are crying out for change and something to live for -- most of the work to achieve that must be done on their own. But the developed world can help out by first doing no harm and secondly, offering help to faciliate the transformative process. Right now in Iraq, America is doing everything for the Iraqi people in terms of security. But it's not enough. Not only are there not enough troops, even if they secured the whole country, it would be temporary in nature if the Iraqis themselves weren't part of that solution. All of this goes to the old adage: "Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. Teach him how to fish and he'll eat forever."

I cannot promise that Iraq will end well. But Kerry's vision may be able to take route in one of the more peaceful, yet still troubled countries like, for instance, Jordan. It is our only hope for this region to come to terms with its past, and start dreaming of its future.

[beachmom]

1. What the heck -- I put it in GD:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x2856592


But since it took a little time to write and involved ideas, I'm sure it will die a quick death!!!