With wars waged abroad, purportedly for spreading democracy, it’s time to face some uncomfortable truths. People are awake, and aware, that the U.S. and the West doesn’t give a fig about democracy. They care about puppets—people in state power who are answerable to them, and fear democracy more than terrorism. That’s because almost everywhere they have planted or supported their puppets, the subject peoples are up in arms in fierce protest against them. From Karzai in Afghanistan, Signora in Lebanon, Al-Maliki in Iraq, and beyond, people are rising up against these shills for Western corporate interests. Protests from Kabul to Pakistan are raging against America’s alleged allies, who rule by brutality, barbarity, and torture. There are several reasons for this state of affairs, but perhaps it all bubbles down to two: Abu Ghraib, and the Iraq invasion occupation. American performance on the ground, their treatment of Iraqis, the chaos that has seized the country like a fever, has fueled protests far beyond the borders of Iraq, blowing around the world like a borderless wind. The war in Iraq, and all of its consequences, has caused the U.S. to be one of the most feared and most hated nations on earth.
Beyond the rhetoric of democracy lies the gloved hand of international business, or in a more commonly used term, globalization. Globalization is far more than the newest expression of an old economic theory, capitalism. It is the force that requires the installation of puppets throughout the Middle East. The reason? Oil. Do you really think that Americans suddenly care about Arab suffering? A quick glance at the pain of the Palestinians will answer that question. Indeed, life under America’s allies in the region ain’t no cup of tea. In Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, or in Iraq, democratic activists have faced the brutality of their regime’s police on the streets, and the sneer of their torturers in the dungeons beneath the streets. The response of America is little more than a stony silence, or an academic listing in the State Department’s annual report. The message couldn’t be clearer. We’ll talk about democracy, but that’s it.
The U.S. didn’t march to Iraq to bring democracy, to spread freedom, or anything even remotely like it. It didn’t go there to stop the oppression of Iraqis. It didn’t go there because Saddam Hussein was, “a bad guy.” It went there to make sure that access to the most precious commodity left on earth, oil, was there. And it figured as a superpower, it was its imperial due. Every nation in the world knows this. Billions of people all around the world know this. The tragedy is that there are still a few Americans who claim to believe in this madness. If there really was democracy, America’s closest allies would be out of a job, at the very least, or hanging from the spires of their presidential palace. If there really were democracies, either in the U.S. or Britain, the most unpopular governments in generations wouldn’t still be in power. From death row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
These commentaries are produced by Noel Hanrahan for Prison Radio.
