The Breaking Time

The Rundown: Crushing protests, rising seas and locking up Polanski

* Protest as National Security Threat The LRAD sonic weapons system made its debut yesterday against a small group of protesters rallying against the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh. Leave it to John Robb to weave that bit of news together with collapsing government legitimacy, increasing paranoia and the militarization of police. An excellent short piece that serves as a reminder of why Global Guerrillas is still essential reading.

* Rising Seas could lead to 'ghost states' The Guardian article mostly deals with island nations like the Maldives and Tuvalu that are threatened with literal physical extinction by rising sea levels. 

It's worth noting however, that as the idea of the nation-state as the default governing method for a given populace has spread, there are a number of "ghost nations" already on the globe, usually with violent effects. Kurdistan, Western Sahara, Kosovo, Somalia and Palestine all provide perfect examples, as do "ghost nations" that have managed to hack their way into existence during the last century (Israel, East Timor, Vietnam). 

* Johann Hari really, really, really doesn't like the fashion industry Just in case you were wondering. Hari can play far too much of the scold sometimes (see his ranting on the Evils of Quentin Tarantino), and in this case I think he focuses on the industry's narrow top too much. But he's got a definite point.

P.S. - He also loathes the Queen Mother. He's got a point there too. Aristocracy in general is worth despising.

* Roman Polanski raped a child Salon's Kate Harding delivers a feminist tour de force in the wake of the famed director's arrest. She re-asserts the original, brutal facts of the case in stark terms and delivers a judgement that's hard to argue with: Polanski may be a amazing artist, he may, on balance, be a good person, but his crime was vile enough that he should pay, no matter the amount of time that has passed.

I was originally of two minds on this case, and I have to admit that Mary Elizabeth Williams makes some compelling points in her rebuttal to Harding. But the sight of similarly notable directors lining up to defend Polanski has pushed me to side with Harding's argument. Pieces like Harding's are a necessary antidote to the idiotic cries of filmerati that Polanski's arrest represents an attack on free speech. If there were extenuating circumstances or illegalities on the prosecution's side, Polanski has had 31 years to bring them up and press his case.

There's a sickening subtext here I've seen trotted out whenever an artist does something reprehensible: that because someone has made compelling works of art, they are immune from justice.

Bullshit. Making pretty pictures or touching songs doesn't lessen the damage one iota when someone beats their spouse, acts like a psycho, shills for fascists or rapes a child. Polanski's made some of my favorite movies: that doesn't matter. Justice shouldn't care, and Roman Polanski should get the book thrown at him.

Open season on CEOs?

From the website of a company called, I kid you not, Versailles Protection Services

Well, something I've predicted for a long, long, long, long time on this site is coming to pass. CEO and executive security spending these days is through the roof:

Companies have been slashing almost every cost imaginable to survive the recession, yet they are spending more than ever to calm CEOs who fear for their personal safety.

Starbucks, which has laid off workers, closed stores and switched from whole to 2 percent milk to save pennies a gallon, bumped its spending to $511,079 last year on the personal and home security of CEO Howard Schultz. FedEx, which quit matching employee 401(k) contributions, spent $595,875 on the security of CEO Fred Smith. Walt Disney spent $645,368 for CEO Robert Iger; Occidental Petroleum spent $575,407 for Ray Irani; and McKesson spent $401,706 for John Hammergren.

Be it paranoia or prudence, corporate spending on CEO safekeeping is escalating in the face of painful cutbacks, and not by a little. The median spending on personal and home security for CEOs at the 100 largest publicly traded companies was $65,348 in 2008, up 123 percent from $29,291 in 2007, according to executive compensation research firm Equilar. Ten companies alone spent a total of $4.6 million on CEO security in 2008, 40 percent more than the 10 biggest spenders of 2007.

Are such fears legitimate -- the money wisely spent with every dollar so scrutinized? Companies say yes in their annual proxy filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, stating that few expenditures are more aligned with the interest of shareholders than safeguarding their corporate leadership. Starbucks says in its proxy that among all perquisites paid to executives, security is "particularly" provided for the company's benefit.

In times of unpopularity, CEOs can be targets. Last month, the Austrian vacation home of Novartis CEO Daniel Vasella was burned, and police suspect animal-rights extremists. That followed July vandalism when his mother's urn was stolen from a cemetery, where the grave of his sister, who died at age 19, also was desecrated and someone added crosses with the names of Vasella and his wife.

"Given several notable incidents of violence towards executives, it doesn't come as a surprise that companies are taking increased measures," Equilar CEO David Chun says.

Not exactly surprising. I'd venture to say that the popularity of the business class' upper echelons is at an all-time low right now. WIth good reason. It was after all, the culture of risk-taking and false assumptions wholeheartedly embraced by most in their ranks that largely led to the current economic devastation.

Desperate people do desperate things. There's nothing inscrutable about this: if you've worked hard but now lost your job and plummeted from making $50,000 a year to living in a tent city, you're naturally in shock. A certain percentage of said people would then dearly love to exert some feeling of vengeful satisfaction and, when they see the CEO who ran the company into the ground still making millions while they struggle to feed their kids, they become enraged. Some will torch the vacation homes of the privileged, some will try to assault them (we're at the stage where many would doubtless cheer at a CEO getting hit in the face) and a certain even more desperate percentage will try actions that are even worse.

It's human instinct to want to see those who violate our notions of justice pay. That's one reason for the evolution of the modern justice system: a figure outside a personal dispute (the state) dishes out punishment according to clearly established guidelines (laws). This has largely replaced the old tribal vigilantism (think Romeo and Juliette) throughout much of the world. 

In his classic essay Vengeance is Ours, historian Jared Diamond noted that societies with a more tribal method of vengeance have a lower life expectancy, by several decades, mostly due to constant, low-level violence. So it's easy to see why this change is usually considered an improvement. 

That's the theory anyway, and one also pretty deeply ingrained into the culture. Most people will not pursue physical vengeance, even if the justice system isn't dispensing it on those they consider richly deserving.

The word "privilege" literally comes from the Latin for "private law," implying groups or individuals that don't have to play by the rules that apply to the majority. The perception, at least, that the law is for all is essential to the modern justice system that's evolved over the last 500 years.

The more people perceive certain groups as going unpunished by traditional authorities, the more that will begin to fray and eventually break.

Poems for Friday, midnight edition: Reversibility

Photo by Paul Yelland

Last night, over whiskey and history, a good friend pointed out to me that something extremely simple — a meteor or a disease mutating in a microscopic way — could easily wipe out the human species. This is true, of course, before taking into account the countless tragedies that are utterly commonplace to all save those who endure them.

It's very late and I still haven't left the office. It's been one of those days. Yet it's never too late for some Baudelaire, especially in his less exclamation point-prone mode. There's viruses, pollution and tragedy aplenty in this world.

But we ain't dead yet.

ANGEL of gaiety, have you tasted grief?

Shame and remorse and sobs and weary spite,

And the vague terrors of the fearful night

That crush the heart up like a crumpled leaf?

Angel of gaiety, have you tasted grief?

 

Angel of kindness, have you tasted hate?

With hands clenched in the shade and tears of gall,

When Vengeance beats her hellish battle-call,

And makes herself the captain of our fate,

Angel of kindness, have you tasted hate?

 

Angel of health, did you ever know pain,

Which like an exile trails his tired footfalls

The cold length of the white infirmary walls,

With lips compressed, seeking the sun in vain?

Angel of health, did ever you know pain?

 

Angel of beauty, do you wrinkles know?

Know you the fear of age, the torment vile

Of reading secret horror in the smile

Of eyes your eyes have loved since long ago?

Angel of beauty, do you wrinkles know?

 

Angle of happiness, and joy, and light,

Old David would have asked for youth afresh

From the pure touch of your enchanted flesh;

I but implore your prayers to aid my plight,

Angel of happiness, and joy, and light.

What is politics?

Turkish politicians brawl on the floor of parliament. Photo by Burhan Ozbilici, AP

A surprising amount of our communication about politics takes place in metaphor, analogy and assumption. These can be surprisingly powerful — and confining — setting the terms of discussion in ways we're rarely aware of. Whether you view politics as a revolution, a slow tinkering process or a noble stand against decadence, that image is going to influence what actions you think are acceptable and what goals you pursue. It will shape who you dislike, who you trust and what you believe should be done to them. Those images and group identity, more than actual policy, are often the prime drivers of political activity.

Yesterday, I put out a call over Twitter for readers to send in their short (eight words or less) political metaphors and analogies. I'll repeat that request here, and add in some classical thoughts on the matter. Send 'em on and I'll put 'em up.

"Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards."

-Max Weber

"This is how change happens, though. It is a relay race."

-Alice Walker

"I've always said that in politics, your enemies can't hurt you, but your friends will kill you."

-Ann Richards

"Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies."

-Groucho Marx

"The sad duty of politics is to establish justice in a sinful world."

-Jimmy Carter

"Politics is the art of the possible."

-Otto Von Bismarck

"Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable."

-John Kenneth Galbraith

"Politics is war by other means."

-Carl Von Clausewitz

"Politics is who gets what, when and how."

-Harold Lasswell

"All politics is local."

-Tip O'Neill

"The finest form of free entertainment ever invented."

-Molly Ivins

"Poetry is about grief. Politics is about the grievance."

-Robert Frost

"The art of reconciling aspirations."

-Bruce Sterling, in the novel Distraction

"Being nibbled to death by cats."

-J. Michael Straczynski, from Babylon 5

"Morals: lubricant for the machinery of social justice."

-Wolven

"People only lose if the interests continue spreading $"

-ashvillein

Lastly, even though it's not really a metaphor, these are both pieces of sage advice:

"All of us who are concerned for peace and the triumph of reason and justice must be keenly aware how small an influence reason and honest good will exert upon events in the political field."

-Albert Einstein

"The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."

-Plato

(A tip o' the hat to Cat Vincent for the Sterling and Straczynski quotes)

Ghost ships: Of looming hulks and future pirates

The lights of the ghost fleet off the coast of Malaysia

About 50 miles from Singapore, the world's largest navy is gathering. It flies no single flag. The fleet's only allegiance is to getting its hulls filled with cargo. 

The ships are commercial, stranded by the economic upheaval of the past year. On skeleton crews, they wait for business to pick back up. And wait.

The Daily Mail has the story:

Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers - all should be steaming fully laden between China, Britain, Europe and the US, stocking camera shops, PC Worlds and Argos depots ahead of the retail pandemonium of 2009. But their water has been stolen.

They are a powerful and tangible representation of the hurricanes that have been wrought by the global economic crisis; an iron curtain drawn along the coastline of the southern edge of Malaysia's rural Johor state, 50 miles east of Singapore harbour.

 

Map of part of the fleet, with ship names. Full version here.

Well shit, that can't be good. The ships are along a sleepy stretch of Malaysian coast, but they're a stone's throw from the world's busiest port. So far, the fleet is standing still, and seems regarded as a symptom of more dire economic issues than a problem in itself. 

That could change, however. Right now, the skeleton crews seem terrified of piracy. That is one danger, yes, as their ships would make particularly ripe pickings. The fleet is also an environmental disaster waiting to happen, if frustrated crews just abandon the oil tankers and massive cargo ships.

Of course, they could also turn to piracy themselves.

It would take some coordination and a culture shift (most of the crews are from a merchant background, not naturally prone to violence), but desperate times do desperate things. Even a portion of the fleet could seriously impede Singapore's shipping if they were positioned just right. 

That mercantile city-state has a particularly good, well-equipped navy, and it would doubtless have allies, but the sheer numbers would be hard to overcome. Boarding and seizing that many ships would be risky. Sinking them would also be a catastrophic blow to shipping operations, making the nearby waters less navigable. 

This scenario may be unlikely, but it's not impossible. There are a lot of desperate people in that fleet and I'd bet that some of their plans might be turning to a darker cast right now.

On a related note, this is a reminder of how, despite the march of technology, something as old-fashioned as boats hauling cargo on water remains absolutely vital to the world economy. We often think of goods as just arriving in their places by magic, but there's a vastly complex network behind every single item. When those begin to break, something big's about to happen.

The Green Sea: Iran's not through

Photo from Tehran 24's excellent roundup

The Green Revolution, so the conventional wisdom went, had passed. After almost a solid month of upheaval, it seemed as if the Khamenei/Ahmadinejad faction in Iran's government had managed to brutally suppress the democratic uprising. The internet memes had died down.

I had my doubts. Revolutions don't happen overnight, and certainly not on a media-friendly timeline. Despite the show trials and crackdowns, many of the leaders and protesters remained free. I figured (hoped, even) that a great deal was going on behind the scenes, that the regime had lost most of its legitimacy (the lifeblood of any power structure) and as soon as there was an opening, it would be proven that this far from over.

Along comes Friday. Qods Day, an event the regime, for political reasons, couldn't very well cancel. Still, there were dire warnings that protests would be dealt with very harshly.

It didn't work. The crowds were massive, angry and uncowed. They wore green.

A useful roundup of the day reveals the slogans are getting more militant (not surprising after the crackdown) and the response from the Basij militia more violent, even going so far as to attack former President Mohammad Khatami (the crowd drove them off).

Right now it's hard to tell what this all means. We over here in the West like our dramas neat and telegenic; the reality is anything but. It's unlikely that the current regime will be swept out of power by the street demonstrations, vital as they are. What will probably end up playing the decisive role are behind the scenes fractures within the regime and the war of attrition being fought in the streets. From where we sit it's impossible to really know a damn thing about either.

This is still excellent news for any supporter of the basic freedoms the Green Movement has united behind. The long game here is not in the ruling faction's favor. The military has remained largely neutral, leaving them to rely on the Basij militia. Further, they seem incapable of totally crushing the opposition, but unwilling to cut a deal or try to co-opt it in another way. So this is going to go on for a long, long time. Public holiday? Protests. Show trial? Protests. Forty day mourning mark for a Green martyr? Protests. 

Each one is going to keep the anger dialed up, and each crackdown will possibly bring new converts. RIght now the regime's tactics are right out of the Shah's playbook. They would do well to remember his fate.

Gov 2.0 Finale: Lessons' shadows

It's now just over a week since Gov 2.0 wrapped. This piece has been delayed, first by travel, then by some nasty illness and the work load that awaited me upon my return. My apologies for the gap, dear readers. Here are my final reflections and thoughts.

Photo by Alex Dunne

"How can we be a nation of laws if the law is behind a cash register?"

On Thursday morning I rose out of my seat, applauding loudly, shortly after those words were spoken. Then I stand, along with the entire Gov 2.0 crowd. There are shouts and cheers. One of them, at least, was mine.

Open government pioneer Carl Malamud had just sounded a clarion call, which is a term I don't use lightly. In a surprisingly low-key tone, he had delivered a short speech that drew on the history of America's democracy (the better parts, at least) channeled to a concrete goal: tearing down the wall that limits full access to the law to the legal profession and universities.

Here was what I had hoped to see from the conference: grand ideals translated into practical action in an area that often gets ignored. An area where the use of modern technology could prove a great boon.

That our elected leaders —good, bad or ugly— come extensively from the legal class is an oft-overlooked fact that affects our current perspective on government in many ways. Oddly for this era, many legal cases and opinions are still behind a wall, confined to expensive services. Breaking this information out would be huge. 

As Malamud wrapped up, I could see the good that could be done with millions of minds picking over the sudden flood of revealed laws: exposing loopholes, making them easily searchable and looking for ways to topple outdated precedents. The exclusive legal priesthood would quiver with rage, but fuck 'em.

The law is for all? Maybe not quite yet, but it would be a good start.

Malamud's talk was one of the high points of the conference. The Gov 2.0 summit was exhilarating: there were good ideas and plenty, usually delivered rapid-fire by very bright people doing their damndest to bring a shining future into being. I can be cynical. I can cut. I do both because I believe that experience must direct the fire of ideas for them to have any meaning. But there was something in the air.

There was also enough naivete and hubris to fill an oil tanker. There's much that can be done here; and many, many obstacles in the way.

Back

My apologies for the unexpectedly long absence, everyone. I ended up drawn into battle with some nasty illness, Visigoths and the Newark Airport. Regular posting, including a wrap-up of the Gov 2.0 conference, will resume shortly.

Thanks for your patience,

David Forbes

P.S.- In the meantime, did you know about the Benny Hillifizer? You should. It allows you, the people, to add Yakety Sax to anything. Truly we live in a wondrous and amazing world.

It's Not There

I first wrote this piece several years ago, after a trip to Ground Zero. It still sums up everything I have to say about 9/11.

My first visit to New York was years ago. I went as a gangly kid, smack dab in the middle of high school. It was a United Methodist Church trip. I was awkward, with that seething discomfort in one's own skin that's the hallmark of any adolescence. Many of the things I have become now were just seeds then, waiting to come into form.

While there, we visited the World Trade Center. I remember the elevator ride first. Long. On one side of me were two well dressed, burly Hasidic gentlemen, laughing. To the other a group of Asian businessmen, speaking in their own language. What they thought of the young group of wide-eyed Southern teenagers behind them, I do not know.

The view from the top was magnificent. It was before dusk, the lights had just started to come on. Spread out almost into infinity, the buildings were so vast and beautiful. I could see everything: the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building -- everything.

It hit me right then: this was a miracle. Here spread before me were thousands upon thousands of peoples, ambitions, cultures, thoughts, foods, languages. All of it. And it worked.

It was chaotic, dirty and sprawling, occasionally even violent, but it worked. Despite all the critiques of humanity's venal nature all this managed to exist without rending itself apart.

Waves of immigrants, political turmoil, a civil war and the weight of three centuries had pushed onto it. New York was still standing there, strong as ever.

When I returned, it wasn't what was there that struck me, it was what wasn't. Just a space. Even if I had been an alien visitor, I still would have known that something just wasn't right, that there should be something there instead of a massive, gaping hole and a few ragged shards of twisted metal.

It was too quiet. On a personal level, it is still hard for me to comprehend. The old view I remembered so fondly, the one that made me realize how breathtakingly huge the world was, is gone. Those Hasidic gentlemen beside me in the elevator may well be ash by now. The steel I trod on? Torn into nothing.

The world has heard about 9/11 nearly non-stop for the last few years. The event still leaves marks; pulls up old, raw emotions. I knew what was coming when I decided the visit Ground Zero and it's still hard for me to take in.

All the memories are tinged with a sadness, not just for the event itself, but for what has come after. How such an tragedy, almost so vast and terrible it defies comprehension, has become something invoked by fat cowards to justify torture, lies, greed and fanaticism.

In a better world, we would have the leaders we deserve. In a better world Osama bin Laden's head would be on a pike and George W. Bush would have been a washed-up political failure. In a better world the nation that miraculously came to be would have taken an awful tragedy as a reason to rise from the ashes, not a fear to cower from. In a better world we would not have forgotten who our true enemies were.

But we live in this one. Bin Laden still lives and we have thrown fuel on his fires instead of snuffing them out. George W. Bush was President for eight long years. Some days it seems that the same country that survived through so much is intent on undoing everything it has gained.

But New York still survives and so can we. What was torn down can be rebuilt, and one human can undo what another has done. There is a new age and a new generation in the workings.

The miracle I witnessed from atop the World Trade Center has gone nowhere and it waits to spring forth again, today or tomorrow.

Gov 2.0: Brilliant maps and blind spots

It's the first day of the Gov 2.0 conference; up on the giant screen in a darkened room, I see a California wildfire unfold in real time. Mapping technology has advanced this far and the demonstrators are eager to demonstrate how they can overlay the maps, rapid-fire to show the gathered attendees a new vision of the world.

Fascinating stuff, and not just due to my map fetish. Maps are powerful things: they affect how we influence the world, and what information we have to grapple with it. It isn't hard to see this capability changing how government interacts with the world, especially in increasingly large metropoli that must balance environmental, demographic and development concerns all at once.

There was a whirlwind of ideas, so many it's hard to know where to begin.

Clay Shirky managed to balance optimism with practicality, noting that people never do what's expected of them, and that there are dangers in an organization—government, newspaper or otherwise—losing control completely, just as there are in it keeping too tight a grip. Carol Dumaine, of the Energy Department's intelligence arm, gave a much-needed bitter blast about the coming upheavals of climate change. MindTel's David Warner talked about combining maps with intelligence and reconstruction work in Afghanistan (he's been there 10 times). Those last two were refreshingly practical. 

There was also an interesting note of controversy when Rep. John Culbertson (R-TX) took the stage. Culbertson, a hard-line conservative, got to technology early and often. He called the health care reform bill "trash" and said, in a nutshell, that more transparency and openness would make officials more accountable (to conservative opinion). Shortly after Dumaine had soberly warned of the dangers of climate change, here was Culbertson, praising the Tea Parties and proclaiming proudly that he represented the oil and gas companies. It was, perhaps, a wake up call to the audience, many of whom seem to have disagreed with him: new tech and more transparency might benefit causes besides your own.

The media panels were excellent, especially the roundtable assessing "new, new journalism." The Seattle-PI's Monica Guzman stole that last one hands down. As someone at the ground level of the transition between old media and new, she was well equipped to talk about her own quest to keep the values of a free press alive in a very different world. The news industry is booming, she asserted, if we look at evolving neighborhood blogs and community journalists.

During lunch, a longtime business computer specialist talked over Caesar salad and chicken about "the potential for evil. Imagine what the Russians could do if they chose to throw $500 million at using these open networks to really screw things up. You can do good or evil with computers. The social network's going to stay the same."

There's far more to talk about—like the roiling conversations on Twitter, or understanding Islam through Second Life—and I'm missing a lot. Much of it I'll have to come back to in the coming days and weeks. But there's limited time before today's conference swings into full effect and a larger realization has emerged that I want to devote some time to before leaping back into the fray.

As I approached the Grand Hyatt, there was a woman clad in an orange bodysuit, complete with shiny boots. She was accompanied by a team of fresh-faced youngsters, handing out cards for Aquilent. I recognized the plastered-on "I've done this pitch 5 million times" look from my own days in retail. At the same time, a hotel employee was taking a free moment behind a grand stone pillar, doing push-ups.

Walking to the hotel this morning, I saw a homeless man's newspaper nest, molded against a bench, still bearing the imprint of the night before. 

This is a world that seemed far removed from the grand ideas inside.

At the conference itself, there was a dearth of women onstage. Out of the first day's 35 speakers, 7 were women. One was a co-presenter, two were Gov 2.0 expo award winners, Guzman was part of a panel, Dumaine got five minutes, so did Bev Godwin. The only speaker that got anything approaching a major presentation was the White House's Beth Noveck. This didn't go unnoticed: it became a major talking point in the ongoing Twitter discussion (broadcast up on the main screen, thankfully). Plenty, however, didn't see what the fuss was. I even saw the word "whining" thrown around a few times.

I don't think there's any malevolence or prejudice here, just blindness and a sad reflection on the state of Gov, be it Beta, 1.0 or 2.0. Most government department heads and high-ranking types are men, symptomatic of a bigger problem of isolation and power that seems to be beyond Gov 2.0's realm of discussion. I understand this, but the lack of diversity was telling, and it affected the ideas brought to the table as well: I would have killed for a ground-level community organizer to take the stage for 10 minutes.

The business world was also out in force: breakfast by Hewlitt-Packard, lunch by Microsoft, reception by Booz Allen Hamilton. I don't even want to hazard a guess at the annual income of the average attendee.

The problem with this blind spot is that, for most of the people here, government is already working quite well. Listening, I didn't hear talk about police brutality or the high cost of education. Looking around, I didn't see the glaze of working 18-hour days on little food. I didn't see the fear that comes with the driving uncertainty of living paycheck to paycheck. I saw precious few scars.

I saw a lot of good ideas, but I saw a worldview that remains blinkered, tragically so. It's going to be damned hard to build a better government without the input of those who need it most.