Friday 29th of March 2024

the works under the skin of democracy...

summitsummit

The virtual summit for democracy organised from Washington is a gigantic qui-pro-quo. Many commentators have noted that it does not aim to promote a political regime, but to ideologically consolidate the military alliance behind the United States; a development that prepares new wars. Thierry Meyssan shows that, far from being hypocritical, Washington is on the contrary very clear in its objective. It is his partners who bear the blame by pretending to ignore that the words he uses do not have the same meaning for them.

 

SUMMIT FOR «DEMOCRACY»


There are no "common values" between Europeans and the US


by Thierry Meyssan

 

The President of the United States, Joe Biden, has organised a virtual summit for democracy on December 9 and 10, 2021 [1]. It is clear that his objective was not only to improve democracies, but also and above all to divide the world into two: on the one hand, "democracies" that must be supported, and on the other, "authoritarian regimes" that must be fought. Russia and China were the first to be targeted, and they immediately challenged Washington’s hypocrisy and explained their philosophy of democracy [2].

We would like to examine the credibility of the US claim to be the "beacon of democracy", or in biblical terms, the "light that shines on the hill", from a Western perspective, rather than summarising the Russian and Chinese criticism. The Russian conception of democracy is exactly the same as that of other continental European states. China’s is very different. We will not deal with it here.

Our point is to show that, despite Nato propaganda, there are no "common values" between the US and continental Europe. They are two fundamentally different cultures, even if the EU elites are no longer culturally European, but largely ’Americanised’.

 

The US organised a Democracy Summit, not for all states, but only for its obedient allies.REMARKS ON FORM

First of all, if the purpose of the summit was to "improve current democracies", it would not have been chaired from the White House, but from the United Nations. All nations could have participated, including those that are clearly not democracies, but are trying to become one.

Secondly, if the United States were the "beacon of democracy", it would not be presiding over this summit and handing out good and bad points, but would be participating on an equal footing with the other guests.

Instead, in its very form, this summit manifests ’American exceptionalism’ [3], i.e. the religious belief that the US is a power apart, ’like no other’, ’blessed by God to enlighten the world’.

HUGE MISCONCEPTIONS

At the outset of the summit, President Biden acknowledged that no country is truly democratic; that it is an ideal towards which everyone strives. He said that in practice everyone could see setbacks (such as the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021) that were probably due to the arrival of a new generation. And that it was therefore necessary to put our hearts back into the work and to resolve these ’democratic setbacks’. However, this fine speech permits above all to give the impression of a consensus and to avoid clarifying the debate.

Everyone agrees that an excellent definition of democracy was given by President Abraham Lincoln: "Government of the people, by the people and for the people". But Lincoln never wanted to recognise ’popular sovereignty’. This ideal has never been attempted in the United States. Lincoln’s political action consisted first of promoting the privilege of the sole federal president to set tariffs (which was the cause of the Civil War), and then of abolishing slavery (which was the means to win that war). This is why, in American culture today, the word "democracy" is understood to mean only "political equality".

Similarly, the term ’civil rights’ does not refer to ’citizens’ rights’ at all, but to the absence of racial discrimination in accessing these rights. By extension, today the term is applied to discrimination against all minorities.

This misunderstanding has a long history. The journalist Thomas Paine, whose pamphlet Common Sense (1776) sparked the American Revolutionary War, was enthusiastic about the French Revolution. He wrote a violent pamphlet to explain the difference between the irreconcilable views of the United States, the United Kingdom and France on the Rights of Man (1792). It was the most widely read work in France during the Revolution. It earned him honorary French citizenship and election to the Convention. The Anglo-Saxons mean by the expression "human rights" the right of people not to suffer from the Reason of State and by extension from any form of state violence. On the contrary, France adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen; a programme that makes every citizen an actor in national political life and therefore protects him or her from the abuse of power.

Not only are we not all talking about the same thing when we talk about ’democracy’, but also when we talk about ’human rights’.

The United States has, admittedly, a superiority in its definition of freedom of expression. For them, this freedom must be total, so that all ideas can be expressed and the debate can choose the best one. In contrast, Latin countries do not recognise this freedom for the ideas of the defeated. Thus they criminalise the expression of Nazi racialism. By extension, since 1990, they have also banned the expression of all Nazi ideas that led to convictions at the Nuremberg trials. One thing leading to another, they now prohibit the mass murder of enemies using gas chambers like the SS Einsatzgruppen, as well as disputing that this procedure was also used in some concentration camps.

Freedom of religion is also a contentious issue. The United States sees it as an absolute, not recognising the right to refuse any religion. In contrast, Europeans speak of freedom of conscience, which includes all other forms of spirituality, including atheism. This difference has enormous practical consequences, with some non-continental European countries granting individual rights only through membership of a faith community. The United States, founded by a Puritan sect, has become a sectarian paradise. In fact, it is not possible for a follower to turn against his or her church if it abuses or manipulates him or her, whereas in Europe it is a legal means to fight against abuses of authority committed in a religious context.

Note that there is a corollary to the difference in human rights thinking. In the United States, given the experience of the British dictatorship of King George III and the US Constitution which organises a monarchy without a king or nobility, the People must maintain an armed force to protect themselves from possible abuses of power. This is why the trade in weapons of war is free in the country, while it is seditious in continental Europe.

 

Emperor Biden teaches his concept of "democracy" and "human rights" to his vassals.A NOTE ON SUBSTANCE

Let us come to the heart of the matter. While admitting to being imperfect, the United States claims to be the "beacon of democracy". But is it a democracy?

If we take this word in its American sense of ’political equality’, we have to admit that this is not the case at all. There are huge political disparities, especially between whites and blacks, which are constantly reported in the press. President Biden has a huge task ahead of him. We have already explained that his approach to this issue, far from solving it, is actually making it worse [4].

If we take ’democracy’ to mean ’popular sovereignty’ everywhere else, then we must recognise that the US Constitution is not democratic at all; that the US has never been a democracy. The Constitution grants sovereignty to state governors and to them alone. Elections by universal suffrage may exist at the state level, but are optional at the federal level. Everyone remembers the election of President George W. Bush in 2000 when the US Supreme Court refused to recount the ballots in Florida on the grounds that it did not care about ascertaining the will of the Florida voters because the governor of that state (the brother of the alleged winner) had decided.

Let us remember equally that political parties in the United States are not citizens’ associations as in Russia, but are institutions of the federated states as was the single party in the Soviet Union. Thus the primary elections, which allow the selection of a party’s candidate, are not organised by the political parties themselves, but by the federal states that finance them.

Given that the United States is not a ’democracy’ in the common sense, but an oligarchy, that it fights only for ’civil rights’, it is natural that abroad it fights against ’popular sovereignty’ through coups d’état, ’coloured revolutions’ and wars. In doing so, their values are diametrically opposed to those of continental Europeans, including Russia.

However, American thinking has a positive consequence. Fighting for civil rights means fighting against certain forms of corruption. Washington considers it perfectly normal to secretly pay salaries to foreign politicians and finance their election campaigns. The State Department draws up lists of personalities to support with a good conscience and does not understand that these leaders are considered corrupt in their countries. In contrast, the United States fights kleptocracy, i.e. the theft of public assets by foreign leaders (not by US leaders who are exempt from their crimes by virtue of ’American exceptionalism’). In doing so, they sometimes help "democracy" in the continental European sense.

 

 

 

 

Thierry Meyssan

 

Translation

 

Roger Lagassé

 

 

FREE JULIAN ASSANGE NOW √√√√√√⁄⁄⁄!!

 

understanding the works...

It’s not enough to preach ‘Western values’. Australia should instead try to understand those who don’t agree with us.

 

By Cavan Hogue — a former diplomat who has worked in Asia, Europe and the Americas as well as at the UN. He also worked at ANU and Macquarie universities.

 

 

Western approaches to the world are based on certain premises which are not shared by everyone else but which we believe should be. Let us look at some of the views which largely underlie how Australia looks at the world.

Democracy

Democracy is the one true universal political system. This is a moral judgment and one which some claim is the end of evolution. It is preached with the kind of missionary zeal that earlier generations showed in converting the heathen to Christianity. We do not wish to accept that democracy is just as much a matter of faith as belief in Christianity, Islam, communism or any other religion or ideology. However, there is no scientific proof that it is any different. Both democracies and autocracies have been successful and have been failures.

Some claim that democracy promotes economic development or even that it is necessary but there is no evidence to support this view. Two of the most dramatic economic miracles are Meiji Japan and China under Deng. We also tend to practise it more in the breach than the fact. President Joe Biden’s spokesman recently said that it was a vital part of US policy to spread and support democracy. The most superficial glance at US history would suggest he should have added, ”unless it conflicts with perceived American commercial or strategic interests”.

Human rights

Western society has developed a theory of human rights based on Christian ideas of natural justice which were adopted and adapted by the European Enlightenment and set out now in UN documents. These are said to be universal values, but are they? Western countries focus on the political rights set out in the documents but pay little attention to the economic rights which are of more interest to the poor of other countries. Presumably this is because taking economic rights seriously might involve sacrifices whereas lecturing others on political rights is safe. Interpretation of the right to life, for example, is a further complication as the debate over abortion and the imposition of the death penalty illustrate.

Critics of the UN document point out that many of the original signatories of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights were in breach of it when they signed, e.g., UK, US, France, the Netherlands and Australia. This laid the basis for others up to this day to use a similar defence about time, place, circumstances and interpretation. Some countries have also used a variation on Sir Thomas More’s: “I am the King’s good servant but God’s first”. Believers in any of the three Abrahamic religions must surely put God’s word before any human documents.

The counter argument to these criticisms is that these are ideals to which we should all aspire even if we sometimes fall by the wayside. Perhaps, but this again is a moral judgment based on faith. It is up to the missionaries to convert unbelievers. Failure to uphold these ideals by democracies do not necessarily invalidate the ideals but such failures do make it harder to persuade others of the value of democracy. Speeches on Australian foreign policy tend to the bombastic and often demand the right to run our country as we see fit while denying the right of others to run their countries as they see fit. We assume that there is something wrong with a country that chooses not to be democratic as we practice it even if a majority of its people prefer it that way.

A further complication is the problem of defining democracy. When did the US become a democracy? For many years slaves and women didn’t get the vote so, like Athenian democracy, it was more like an oligarchy. Australia was a democracy when the White Australia Policy ruled because a majority supported it, just as a majority supported not allowing Indigenous Australians to vote and other forms of persecution.

When the majority treats minorities badly is this democratic? It must be more than just votes otherwise if 51 per cent vote in a free and fair election to shoot the other 49 per cent this is a democracy. Some now talk about flawed democracies. Biden’s invitation list for his conference of democracies made a mockery of the concept when he invited countries that would not meet the pub test and left out countries that were more democratic than many of the invitees. There appeared to be a confusion between democracy and supporting American pre-eminence.

However, Biden has made some interesting comments about the need to convince others of the value of democracy. His language sounds rather like the Christian missionaries of yore who preached the Gospel but accepted it was up to them to convert the unbelievers.

The behaviour of democratic countries towards the poor and weak in the recent past has not been forgotten by most people outside the West. It is not enough to preach to the unbelievers when the preachers are giving democracy a bad name. It is interesting that so many Australians are demanding strong leadership from our politicians. Should our elected representatives be leaders or followers? Democracy is a much abused and often unclear word.

Perhaps Australians should rely less on slogans and try to understand the point of view of people who don’t agree with us. Perhaps we might also lecture a bit less and listen a bit more? We might also keep in mind that Henry Kissinger said that America doesn’t have friends, it only has interests? Henry obviously didn’t understand mateship!

 

Read more:

https://johnmenadue.com/what-lies-behind-our-slogans-and-lecturing-of-other-countries/

 

 

Hey! Henry Kissinger is an AMERICAN ! he's correct on "America doesn’t have friends, it only has interests..."

 

 

READ FROM TOP.

 

 

FREE JULIAN ASSANGE NOW √√√√√√⁄⁄⁄!!

 

charadic liberalism...

The global liberal elites’ tendency to conflate liberalism with democracy was well on display last week during the first “Summit for Democracy.”

The virtual event, hosted by President Joe Biden’s White House, saw about 100 countries participate, and featured speeches and panels from politicians, diplomats, activists, and journalists. The purpose of the summit, which Biden promised to host on the campaign trail, was ostensibly to strategize with other nations on how to revitalize trust in democracy and its capacity to create human flourishing. However, the summit predictably devolved into moralizing speeches that misconstrued liberalism for democracy. Proper democracies, these liberal internationalists would have you believe, are only those that permit or approve of the most liberal excesses. Those who oppose such excesses, like force-feeding children gender or sexual ideology, are instantly castigated as authoritarian regimes.

 

Biden opened up the summit with his own remarks, delivered alongside Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Anti-democratic autocrats, Biden said, “seek to advance their own power, export and expand their influence around the world and justify the repressive policies and practices as a more efficient way to address today’s challenges…by increasing the dissatisfaction of people all around the world with democratic governments that they feel are failing to deliver for their needs.”

Combating autocratic efforts to undermine global confidence in the ability for democratic governments to adequately respond to modern problems, Biden said, is “the defining challenge of our time.”

The president also announced a number of government initiatives that seek to bolster liberalism around the world. Biden committed $224 million next year to ensure “transparent governance” around the world by directing funds to fight corruption, protect press freedoms, ensure free and fair elections, and support democratic reformers in hostile nations. The Biden administration also seems to want to export its National Strategy on Gender Equality and Equity to other nations, as it aims to use various other aid mechanisms to strengthen women and the LGBTQ+ community across the globe.

To the untrained ear, Biden’s remarks were relatively inoffensive. Like many of his speeches as of late, Biden stumbled through the words that appeared on the teleprompter, but seemingly managed to deliver them with the sincerity that has made him a mainstay in Washington for the last half-century. That left it to Kamala Harris, his impolitic vice president, to not only say the quiet part out loud, but yell it from the mountain tops during her summit speech.

Some of Harris’s lines were copied, nearly verbatim, from the president’s address earlier that morning, but others doubled down on the insistence that a properly constructed democracy is one that “protects the rights of people with disabilities, the rights of people of color, the rights of indigenous peoples, LGBTQI+ rights, and women’s rights.” It forwards “reproductive rights,” which Harris added, “are at grave risk here in the United States.”

Democracy, as Biden, Harris, and other speakers would have you believe, is more than just popular participation in a polity’s political process. It’s the continual expansion and exportation of abortion on demand, critical race theory, and loosely-defined racial equity; it is pervasive wokeness in private and public life. To these elites, democracy is both an intrinsic good, and also good only insofar as it achieves their radically autonomous ends. Democracy is a unique cultural process, while simultaneously “know[ing] no borders” and “speak[ing] every language,” as Harris said in her remarks.

Our global leaders’ fundamental misunderstanding of democracy was well on display even before they participated in the summit, illustrated by their decision to invite certain countries and disinvite others.

Russia and China, both predictably and perhaps reasonably, were left off the list. But so was Hungary, the oft discussed conservative nation currently headed by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz Party. Orbán’s Hungary has received increasing amounts of praise from social conservative intellectuals on the right, such as Patrick Deneen, The American Conservative‘s Rod Dreher, and Tucker Carlson, which in turn has ratcheted up the western media’s efforts to smear Orbán and his government as authoritarian. 

Of course, Hungary’s national interests do not square perfectly with that of the United States. The small land-locked country of about 10 million has grown closer to both China and Russia, which somewhat concerns some of Hungary’s strongest defenders in the United States. TAC Senior Editor Dreher told this reporter that the “U.S. is not wrong to be concerned about” Hungary’s warming relations with Russia and China, but it was a predictable consequence of the respective establishments in Washington and Brussels alienating Hungary from the community of Western nations. 

However, it was not because Orbán’s Hungary has deepened its relationship with the summit’s two main antagonists that it was not extended an invitation. If that was the case, then Germany, who recently struck a massive investment deal with China and wants to see NordStream 2 pipeline completed, wouldn’t have received an invitation either. Nor would Peru, South Africa, Italy, or any other country that has joined China’s Belt and Road Initiative

The Biden administration chose not to invite Hungary because of its disdain for the Fidesz Party’s efforts to enact what Orbán has called “illiberal democracy.” During the 2020 election cycle, Biden went so far as to call Orbán a “totalitarian” and a “thug”; however, “Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government was democratically elected, and is facing a very tough re-election campaign in the spring,” Dreher said. “Do real authoritarians allow themselves to face voter referendums?”

Again, the list of summit attendees is quite telling. Freedom House’s Global Freedom Score gave Hungary a score of 69 out of 100, granting it the designation of “partly free.” But also in attendance at the summit was a delegation from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which Freedom House says is “not free” based on its score of just 20 out of 100. As was Columbia, Mexico, Kosovo, Nigeria, Zambia, the Philippines, and many other countries who scored lower than Hungary on Freedom House’s rankings.

“Hungary is a normal country like any other, but it is governed by a man of the Right who is willing to use the power that voters gave him to advance conservative policy goals,” Dreher said. “If a democratically elected government rejects the full panoply of LGBT rights, or rejects the crude racialism of the progressive Left, or spurns any part of the establishment’s woke ideology, the regime’s propagandists trash them as non-democratic.”

In the end, the Biden administration’s Summit for Democracy showed that global elites will unabashedly continue their efforts to make democracy a Trojan Horse for liberalism. But Hungary may still provide the political right in America and elsewhere with the hope that this project will still prove the charade it has always been.

 

 

READ MORE:

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-summit-for-democracy-charade/

 

 

READ FROM TOP.

 

 

FREE JULIAN ASSANGE NOW √√√√√√⁄⁄⁄!!