Текст книги "Bureaucratic despair in Russia and global project “Obama”"

Автор книги: (IP of the USSR) Internal Predictor of the USSR

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And pre-election of B. Obama poses a question: What could have happened to force American establishment to deviate from “pedigree” rule, at least as it seems?

In the United Stated, as in Russia, not all of the citizens participate in the elections, including the president. Those who ignore procedures of American pseudo-democracy are people who feel that independently of who will win the election – republicans or democrats – their life will not change to the better.

In 8 years of republican governance the amount of those people (mostly afro-Americans and Latino Americans) have risen significantly. And in general in past 2-3 years usual American optimism in many layers of society has started to change into such a strange feeling to “middle-class American” – pessimism. This must have caught attention of those who really rule the USA and caused the appearance of “successful African American” – B. Obama.

2.1.2. One of the aspects of foreign politics

When on November 5 2008 the news of the election of Barack Hussein Obama for the president of the United States were announced, many TV-reports showed people celebrating on the streets not only in the USA but also Japan, Greece, UK, not even mentioning Kenya, where Obama’s father comes from. No other presidential victory caused such response before. In order to provoke ordinary people to go on the streets celebrating election of one or another candidate in presidential elections in foreign country, even if this country is the most economically and military powerful in the world – such people response takes special “psychological treatment” of the crowd.

Such sort of pro-Obama “psycho-treatment” of masses has not reached Russia and its population took the results of presidential elections rather neutrally. None the less, an unprecedented event took place in Russia: in the course of US presidential election campaign – 25000 of copies of a book were published and hit the stores – that was a book of then candidate, senator Barack Obama “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream”. Interesting that Russian edition of this book has the following line on its cover: A book from a man who can change America and the whole world” (those words “and the whole world” mean that Russia as a part of it is going to be changed as well). To our knowledge, never to this day a book or speeches or a monograph of an American presidential candidate or a president has been published in Russia in thousands of copies. However none of the speeches or publications of competing candidates ( H. Clinton, J. McCain) have been printed in such quantities.

In the USA this book quickly became a best-seller according to “New York Times”, “Los Angeles Times”, “Washington Post”, “San Francisco Chronicle”. In general book answers the question why it was Obama who was chosen by American back-stage to win the elections, although neither now president nor other democrats and republicans could notice the fact of this “back-stage pre-election” for further strengthening in this position based on US “democratic procedures”

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One of the West problems in doing politics after year 2000 consisted in the fact that western leaders looked quite pale comparing to Putin and were not able to produce in public polemics with him on difficult issues between Russia and the West. One of the causes for is in that Putin’s horizon is wider then mental outlook of western politicians and journalists, and his understanding of the world is a lot deeper. Because of this Putin was able to raise discussion and view virtually any question to a level that was unavailable to western politics and journalism because of either their limited worldview or psychological blocks.

That is why to look credible in their political relationship with Russia West needed to fins such politician that would have even wider horizon than Putin in his views on human history and regions, on politics – past, present and prospective– and who would be not a “desk-worm” but a true human with initiative and sincerity (at least when circumstances demand) required to be able to maintain dialog with different people, to understand their opinions and who earns respect to his persona for sounding his opinion on various issues of life in the USA and the world, who would be convincing in maintaining stability of American model of crowd-“elitarism”. And judging by “Audacity of hope” backstage powers of USA found this man in Barack Obama.

Without a doubt, this is just one of many aspect of the answer to the question “Why Obama?”. The other aspects consist in the fact that USA also has problems, partially rooted in local American specifics and partially in globalization, which USA do not manage, as well as any other country cannot manage it.

Barack Obama writes about many of such sort of problems and about some connections. And even if the book is written with support of speech-writers from his team, then not only they were “selling” Obama to the public like dumb puppet, but Obama with their help could express in the book his actual opinion on questions of life in the US and the world, their problems and those ideals that in his view had to come true for the good of people of USA and the whole world. And it was his book and his speeches that inspired and drawn crowds of voters: if none of it made sense to people Barack Obama would have lost the elections.

However the principle “everyone works for his own good to the extent of his own understanding, and for the good of others to the lack of thereof” works even for Obama. And it is obvious from his book – Obama himself is not on the required level of understanding the problems that he said he was ready to tackle. Precisely because of this American “back-stage management” gave him heads up for the elections… In other words Obama’s endorsement as the president of USA just seems as an indicator of growth and development of true democracy in biblical “crowd-elitarisme” of USA.

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Due to the fact that neither Putin nor Medvedev have published such books we can only benchmark both of them on the basis of their public speeches. Such comparison is not in favor of the duo, but in Obama’s: topical spectrum of the book is a lot wider and deeper than subjects that Putin and Medvedev can discuss in their public speeches. In other words Barack Obama in his book goes into depths of the questions that both Putin and Medvedev have to avoid in public.

2.2. Forbidden questions in public politics of USA and Russia

2.2.1. The original sin of statehood

One of the forbidden subjects for public discussion in post-soviet Russia is the issue of its “original sin”. The matter here is that post-soviet statehood of Russian Federation as well as of the rest of post-soviet states on former USSR territory originated despite the will of people of USSA, who during 1991 referendum explicitly declared their desire to maintain the union and continue development of its culture and economy[10].

And consequently current statehood of RF is legislatively illegitimate, which both Putin and Medvedev are bound to understand as both have degrees in law[11].

And the “founding farther” of post-soviet Russia – Boris Nikolaevitch Yeltsin[12], often referred to as EBN by the people – one of the destroyers of the USSR despite the will of its people. But this is not all: liquidation of socialist regime and Soviet power with its own internal forces, dissection of the country, destruction of its military force and creation of the system of economical and ideological dependency of the country on outside world is clearly stated in the Directive of Department of Homeland Security of the USA 20/1 of 08. 18.1948 “The goals of the USA in Russia” [13]. Therefore one cannot help but raise a question of treason of the people of USSR and RF by M. Gorbatchev, A. Yakovlev, B. Yeltsin and number of other politicians of the time (officially is a crime).

And fairly large part of ex-USSR population is convinced that Yeltsin was not at all the leader of democratic movement and founder of democratic (and in future prosperous) Russia. They believe that he was nothing but ambitious carrier bureaucrat of party-apparatus incompetent in any professional field, whose outlook and depth of worldview were clearly insufficient to lead a country not mentioning country in crisis. They are convinced that he was hypocrite and shameless villain who was tricked with ambitions to take the role of the “motherland savior” in order to, behind his back, first execute above mentioned DHS Directive 20/1 from 08.18.1948 and secondly “cut coupons” on the principle “money don’t smell, and if they do – they smell quite nicely”: what was primary objective of every participant of USSR destruction and of building bandit-oligarch’s capitalism in Russia of Yeltsin times – does not matter.

However on the contrary to this historical truth[14] all representatives of Russian “elite” and mostly political “elite” in all their public speeches talk about Yeltsin as a man of exceptional good will, who work hard and honestly, risking his health and life (second presidential campaign continued despite his heart attack) for the good of humanity even though he made a lot of mistakes in the difficult business that he started. However for those mistakes he sincerely apologized in his address to the people of Russia on 12.31.1999, which showed his non-lust for power and an example of democracy. He also found very capable successor, under whose management Russia succeeded to solve many issues of nineties, which boosted his ratings higher than those of Yeltsin himself. And all in all for the total sum of his actions he deserves respect and therefore to preserve his memory his name should be given to many streets, libraries (inc. the Presidential Library in St. Petersburg), scholarships and educational institutions.

Opinions of those who stick to negative assessment of Yeltsin’s personality and his work are not discussed in Russian public politics, as if those opinions do not exist at all, or as if those are obvious nonsense and lies, as if there never was DHS’s Directive 20/1 of 08.18.1948, executed in its major propositions with active involvement of Yeltsin, who allegedly returned the country to the main route of the development after 70 years of deception and evil actions of Soviet forces.

The worst that Putin could allow himself to say in public speeches was admitting that fall of the USSR was the greatest tragedy for many people and for which he was reproached by whole liberal community both in Russia and abroad. In all other cases Putin publicly acknowledged his adherence to the following version: “Boris Yeltsin is the founding farther of democratic Russia and an outstanding politician whose grateful memory should be kept for centuries”, although as an employee of Special Agencies Putin is bound to know about DHS’s Directive 20/1 of 08.18.1948 and many other facts that do not conform to the cult liberal myth about establishment of post-soviet states on former USSR territory. And neither Putin nor any other public politician or journalist bothered to look into algorithmic of that catastrophe, using facts that do not fit into sweet-liberal version of Russian history.

United States of America also have an “original sin” of their own: USA started as slave-ship state and functioned in those conditions for not less than hundred of years before legislative abolishment of slavery as a result of the North victory over the South during civil was of 1861-1865.

It is well known that slaves were massively imported from Africa, they were black and even founding furthers who wrote American Constitution and Bill of Rights themselves owned slaves. Now black people in America (in the majority descendants of slaves) are called African-Americans[15] and legislatively have the same rights as any white citizen of the US. But American historical past has such nature that US future is in many ways dependent on the question of whether or not their society can overcome “original sin” of American statehood, elaborating a common and uniting approach to the historic past of their country, which will be a sound foundation for building future America, free from flaws of the past and present one.

Barack Obama, who himself is not a descendent from African slaves (his farther immigrated from Kenia and his mother is Caucasian) freely deliberates on the problem of “original sin” of American statehood, focusing on the task of freeing society from its burden, in the way that he understands it. He is ready to dialogue with his opponents, but only if the talk is to the point, and not in some “abstract humanism” style deadly to people; and he does not hold grudge towards founding fathers of the US, who, although owned slaves, could however express ideals that can be supported by many millions, if not billions of people around the world. Barack Obama writes:

«I recognize the risks of talking this way, In an era of globalization and dizzying technological change, cutthroat politics and unremitting culture wars we don’t even seem to possess a shared language with which to discuss our ideals much less the tools to arrive to at some rough consensus about how, as a nation, we can work together to bring those ideals about. Most of us are wise to the ways of admen, pollsters, speechwriters and pundits. We know how high flying words can be deployed in the service of cynical aims, and how the noblest sentiments can be subverted in the name of power, expedience, greed, or intolerance. Even the standard high school history textbook notes the degree, to which, from its very inception, the reality of American life have strayed from its myths.” (p.8).

And never the less he insist on the truthfulness of ideals and necessity of bringing them about, despite all the mistakes and abuse of the past and despite the actions of those who make mistakes and abuse their power in present.

And this is precisely the key idea of the book, that gives an impression that Obama is not a talkative hypocrite, but sincere activist with good intentions, and then one can understand those Americans who trusted him with presidential power.

“ “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness“

Those simple words are our starting point as Americans; they describe not only the foundation of our government but the substance of out common creed. Not every American may be able to recite them; few, if asked, could trace the genesis of the Declaration of Independence to its roots in eighteenth-century liberal and republican thought. But the essential idea behind the Declaration – that we are born into this world free, all of us; that each of us arrives with a bindle of rights that can’t be taken away by any person or any state without just cause; that through our own agency we can, and must, make of our lives what we will – is one that every American understands. It orients us, sets our course each and every day.

Indeed, the value of individual freedom is so deeply ingrained in us that we tend to take it for granted. It is easy to forget that at the time of our nation’s founding this idea was entirely radical in its implications, as radical as Martin Luther’s posting on the church door. It is an idea that some portion of the world still rejects – and for which an even larger portion of humanity finds scant evidence in their daily lives.” (p.53)

Of course every nation has their own [16] and at times there are too many of them due to the particularities of historical development of events, but generally the majority of people will full heartedly agree with the above quoted words of Declaration of independence of the USA, because they would prefer to live in such society which will make those words reality.

However the problem is in the fact that the majority, including Americans, does not know how to bring those ideals about…

And therefore entire history of the USA is a consequence of their original sin: a gap, often abyss, between undoubtedly humanistic declarations and practical politics.

A bit further in the book Barack Obama looks in more details into Constitution of the USA and its role in life of the country throughout its entire history (obviously, talking about Constitution in a manner detached from life with its many realistic factors is nonsense):

In sum, the Constitution envisions a road map by which we marry passion to reason, the ideal of individual freedom to the demands of community. And the amazing thing is that it’s worked. Through the early days of the Union, through depressions and world wars, through the multiple transformations of the economy and Western expansion and the arrival of millions of immigrants to our shores, our democracy has not only survived but has thrived. It has been tested, of course, during times of was and fear, and it will no doubt be tested again in the future.

But only once has the conversation broken down completely, and that was over the one subject the Founders refused to talk about.

The Declaration of Independence may have been, in the words of historian Joseph Ellis, “a transformative moment in the world history, when all laws and human relationships dependent on coercion would be wept away forever”. But that spirit of liberty didn’t extend, in the minds of the Founders, to the slaves, who worked their fields, made their beds, and nursed their children.

The Constitution’s exquisite machinery would secure the rights of citizens; those deemed members of America’s political community. But it provided no protection to those outside to constitutional circle – the Native American whose treaties proved worthless before the court of the conqueror, or the black man Dred Scott, who would walk into the Supreme Court a free man and leave a slave.

(…)

There’s a school of thought that sees the Founding Fathers only as hypocrites and the Constitution only as a betrayal of the grand ideals set forth by the Declaration of Independence; that agrees with early abolitionists that the Great Compromise between North and South was a pact with the Devil. Others, representing the safer, more conventional wisdom, will insist that all the constitutional compromise on slavery – the omission of abolitionist sentiments from the original draft of the Declaration, the Three-fifths clause, the self-imposed gag rule that the Twenty-fourth Congress would place on all debate regarding the issue of slavery, the very structure of federalism and the Senate – was necessary, if unfortunate, requirement for the formation of the Union; that in their silence, the Founders only sought to postpone what they were certain would be slavery’s ultimate demise; that this single lapse cannot detract from the genius of the Constitution, which permitted the space for abolitionists to rally and the debate to proceed, and provided the framework by which, after the Civil Was had been fought the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments[17] could be passed, and the Union finally perfected.

How can I, an American with the blood of Africa coursing though my veins, choose sides in such dispute? I can’t. I love America too much, am too invested in what this country has become, too committed to its institutions, its beauty and even its ugliness, to focus entirely on the circumstances of its birth. But neither can I brush aside the magnitude of the injustice done, or erase the ghosts of generations past, or ignore the open wound, the aching spirit that ails this country still.” (P.95-97)

In short, his position on the matter of the relationship between present and past is similar to the one of Russian historian V.O. Klutchevski: “We need to know the past not because it has happened, but because on its way out it could not hide its consequences”, which means that unacceptable consequences of the past must be eliminated.

Further on B. Obama concentrates on history of fight against slavery and names those – slaves, free, simple people, and state officials – who sacrificed their lives to the noble task of slavery elimination, and concludes:

“The blood of slaves reminds us that our pragmatism can sometimes be moral cowardice. Lincoln, and those buried at Gettysburg, reminds us that we should pursue our own absolute truths only if we acknowledge that there may be a terrible price to pay” (p. 98).

He also pays attention to the crimes of USA statehood towards both its own people and population of other countries, which throughout American history were a great many. And he clearly expresses his opinion getting to the heart of the matter.

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In relation to the whole problematic mentioned in Obama’s book, he expresses a right – from managerial education point of view – position:

It does not matter how the managed object (managed system) has come to one or the other situation

It only matters to what extent this situation is adequately identified and its problematic is being diagnosed, what future goals are set, and what ways towards achieving those goals are suggested.

The goals themselves are unchangeable – bringing to life ideals, expressed in the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Bill of Rights, which includes the totality of: 1) objective ideals, 2) real goal-setting in politics, which is provided by objective and subjective factors of historical specifics, and 3) means to achieve the goals. The second and third, as history shows, can be deceiving, and keeping in mind possibility of mistakes, it is necessary to act in the direction of revealing and bringing those ideals about. To illustrate such example Obama brings up A. Lincoln:

“ I like to believe that for Lincoln, (…) it was a matter of maintaining within himself the balance between two contradictory ides – that we must talk and reach for common understandings, precisely because all of us are imperfect and can never act with the certainty that God is on our side; and yet at times we must act nonetheless, as if we are certain, protected from error only by providence.” (p. 98).

That last phrase would have been a more precise expression of the reality of life is it sounded like that: “we must act in the way for the providence to protect us from error”. But independently from the way you put it in words, this morally-ethical principle is in itself very well grounded in reality, provided that the subject will follow it sincerely, because God is not indifferent to what is happening on Earth, and religion – dialog with God through one’s inner world and flow of life circumstances.

From the systematic position of such sort of principles B. Obama concentrates not only on problematic of life of American society: possibility of personal growth and self-realization in given historical and cultural circumstances, real and desired policy of American statehood in relation to these circumstances; internal and external policies and other questions. He looks at those issues in in their mutual correlation, in specifics, not avoiding the facts, that are unpleasant for nice myths about USA, and thus confirming the principle mentioned in the beginning of his book:

“I believe in free speech, whether politically correct or politically incorrect…” (p. 10)

2.2.2. Fairness in the life of society:

political ethics – mercenary or work

And another un-politically correct subjects in Russionia – theme of justice in the life of society, “elite’s” approach to “simple people” and of people’s approach to “elite”.

But before showing how the subject of social justice is given in “The Audacity of Truth” and in the public speeches of Russian political “elite”, we’ll focus on some specificities of socio-political life of the USA and Russia, that characterize each of the countries.

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In general, comparing US life with ideals mentioned in the Declaration of Independence and in the Bill of Rights, than undoubtedly, the USA are progressing in the task of turning their cult ideals to life; racial inequality they have already overcome de jure, and are working on overcoming it de facto; many other problems were solved as well.

And the source of this progress is – public discussion of the real divergence between declared ideals and real life, which, although it is often clouded by lengthy speeches of the participants and although the truth often gets lost in those speeches, still is a notable part of socio-political life of the United States, and Obama’s book is very clear example of that. Of course in the US, as in any other country, there is also a non-public discussions of the issue, which in many ways form country’s politics and business actions, but this part is forced to react on the public part of the process.

But along with such progress the USA created many problems both locally and globally, and in the historically defined shape, they became a problem to the rest of the world, that need a solution. One of the main reasons for this is that in the public and non-public politics even as free speech is a cult – free thinking in the US is still limited by their specific culture, which is why US in their demands on the role of the global leader and a wheel of progress are constantly faced with objections, which can be responded to only by force, following wisdom of the unrighteous: “Out force will be the true law, because powerlessness proves to be useless” (The wisdom of Solomon 2:11) – but not many people in the States know these words, because “The wisdom of Solomon” is excluded from the Canon and is not in the standard Bible.

Russia is indeed not America. For the centuries of it’s historical past (starting at least from the “Words of Law and Prosperity” of Kiev’s metropolitan bishop Illarion, dated 1037-1050) its socio-political life is characterized by:

In public politics the desired is often taken for the real

In public politics the subject of power abuse and other problems are often left unspoken, as if they do not exist

And when problems become critical, and force to be openly discussed, then

Discussion of them is often far from the point (e.g. mass media discussion of the global financial crisis during the tenth meeting of “United Russia”)

Or the discussion is substituted for by official declarations like “yes, there are some problems, but our father-tsar has already taken measures to solve then, and they might be already solved and the messengers have not yet reported on that…” (e.g. mass media coverage of the Tchernobul catastrophe and the first few days of rescue operation of the “Kursk” submarine sunk by NATO).

And when some of the events move to the past, then an official myth is created, which in its content can be very far from the actual reality (e.g. official version of the establishment of post-soviet statehood of the RF or the official story on the “Kursk” submarine).

And overcoming development problems in Rus’ is taking place based on the non-public “underground-couloirs politics”, to which both the power and the opposition are equally adherent. In Rus’ everything is secretive, but nothing is secret, although along with non-secretive truth society has and spreads many rumors: that’s why everybody “knows” that Alexandr I officially publicly died in 1825 in Taganrog and was buried in Peretburg side by side with other emperors…. After what he spent few more decades incognito living as in Siberia, where he died very old.

And if in Rus’ official declarations the power says that

Everything is fine, that they have achieved some goals in life and that many problems have been solved

At the same time many people do not see any proved of that in their everyday life

– then the powers, on the background of public, knowingly hypocritical declarations of loyalty by unbelieving and despising it people, faces politically amateur actions of the people – as un-public as the actual politics.

All of it happens because direct appeals to the power on the issues and ways of solving them, are ignored by it, because those issues do not fit in the format of public policy of the state.

The question is in:

How much time will it take the state power to commit suicide by not being able to handle the problems ignored by it?

And how much time after that will it take the underground opposition to become legitimate de-facto state power?

In such circumstances de jure legitimacy of power – is a question that means little to both sides – to power and its social opposition.

The key reason for such difference in public and non-public approaches of socio-political lifes in Rus’ and in the USA is because:

Russian “elite” is shameless anti-nation egoistic corporation that only wants the people to admit that they are rednecks in whose presence the “elite” does not have to explain itself.

Whether ‘elite’ takes this position consciously or unconsciously does not matter – it would have been just as comfortable in cast society: you belong to one group and therefore you have the right, if not –you don’t have the right, and all your talents and advantages worth nothing. It is almost impossible and very rare to work one’s way from the bottom to the top/ “elite’, because all the space in it has already been taken by representatives on historically formed “elite clans”, some of which manage to keep their status despite revolutions and counter-revolutions (e.g. clan of Mikhalkov). With the change of ‘elite’ after catastrophes, the process starts again (e.g. Yeltsin came from deep country, but where are his kids now – highly elite, but for what concrete talents or work? And besides Yelstin there were many other officials, whose children were ‘eliterized’..)

And in the U.S. "elite", with all its flaws , prefers that people beleived that the "elite" responsible to him and is working in the general public interest, being an «avant-garde» of the people in their socio-historical development.

And ‘elite’ occupies this position as a corporation, knowingly or unconsciously – does not matter. In the American "elite" there is also a hereditarily-clan core (in particular it is widely known by its representatives such as Kennedy, Mc Cain, senior and junior Bush, Rockefeller, Ford), but a lot of those who withdrew from the American common people or the middle class (the most widely known, General Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice,– At different times were both U.S. Secretary of State; even B. Obama – elected president: all are black and would not have been able to make their career, have they been born at least 50 years earlier).And the influx of new mass flows of people into US "elite" has been going on throughout U.S. history in every generation, resulting in that "elite" of the US is more clever and more capable than hereditarily clans isolated from the rest of society "elites" of other countries, including Russia, and corporate discipline and lack of freedom (this is explained further in the case of B.Obama) in the USA "elite" are different.