COLUMN
Neocon Intentionality: Nothing
But Malice
By EDWARD E. AYOUB
Release Date: April 12, 2007
© 2007 Macroknow Inc. All Rights Reserved.
On 29-Jan 02, President George W. Bush announced, in his State of the Union
address, that Iraq, Iran, and North Korea constituted an "axis of evil."1 The
expression "axis of evil" was reportedly the product of neocon thinking2. This
short essay investigates the origin, structure, and intentionality of this
thinking.
How Can We Uncover Hidden Intentionality? According to the Jewish
philosopher Edmund Husserl, intentionality consists in the giving of
something-itself, the seizing upon of something-itself as perception and
recollection3. This giving can be determined from the modes of
consciousness that are perceived and recollected. Furthermore, the concept of
intentionality and the concept of evidence are correlative4. Therefore,
the essence of the intentionality associated with "axis of evil" can be extracted from the
empirically measured global consciousness of "evil" itself. The
Macroknow Intellectual Intelligence (MI2) system
measures people's global awareness and attention, including the attention people focus on
desires, aversions (including "evil"), and powers (that advance or frustrate
desires). When correlated with world events, the daily MI2 measurements
quantify people's judgments worldwide.
In the State of the Union, "axis of evil" points back to 9/11 as its primal
antecedent event. This overt reference-back to the evil of terrorism is
only one of a multiplicity of possible references. For example, an examination
of MI2 historical data for the time period from 1-Apr-01 through 11-Sep-01
provides references back to three related global events, all of them implicating
evil on a massive scale: (1) the massive protests against the FTAA Summit in
Quebec City, Canada (18- to 22-Apr-01); (2) the massive protests against the EU
Summit in Gothenburg, Sweden (14- to 16-Jun-01); and (3) the massive protests
against the G8 Summit in Genoa, Italy (15- to 22-Jul-01).
The graphical evidence
presented in this essay (consisting of single, joint, and conditional empirical
probability charts depicting both awareness and attention) shows with clarity that these protests had much to do with two
kinds of evil: (1) the evil of globalization and (2) the evil of the "rule of
law." The charts imply unequivocally that people worldwide opposed
"globalization" and did not trust the "rule of law." For millions of protesters
around the globe, the "rule of law" provides, by design, net advantages to
"upper dogs" at the expense of "under dogs"5; for them, the globalization of such
net advantages would be a monstrous calamity.
The essential structure of neocon intentionality should now be clear:
- The World Crisis of Debt-Based Capitalism. The push for
globalization by the G8 triggered massive protests – and a world crisis. This
crisis could be a formidable threat to debt-based Capitalism. The
magnitude of the crisis can be quantified: the total outstanding debt of
the U.S. (financial and nonfinancial sectors included) was about 29.3 trillion
at yearend 2001; it ballooned to more than 44.5 trillion at yearend 20066. People's consciousness
before 9/11 was too focused on "evil," and "evil" pointed back to
"globalization" and to the "rule of law" (see the
High
Awareness/High Attention charts). Neocon strategy had to reorient
global consciousness away from "globalization" and the "rule of law."
Probabilities of
High Attention Fixed on "Evil" Worldwide Pre/Post 9/11
Probability of High Awareness of Evil, Religion, Truth, and Law
EVENTS
CHART
Probability of High Attention Focused on Evil, Law, Good, and Truth
EVENTS
CHART
Joint Probability of High Attention Focused on Evil AND on Each of Law,
Truth, and Freedom
EVENTS
CHART
Conditional Probability of High Attention Focused on Each of Law, Good,
and Justice GIVEN High Attention Focused on Evil
EVENTS
CHART
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- Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs). A new danger had to be created
and thematized – a new manipulable threat that could never point back to the
"rule of law" in the same way; and would keep the masses in a
constant state of fear. What new danger did the neocons concoct? Weapons of Mass
Destruction (WMDs), that's what. With WMDs, people could be seized upon with
constant mortal fear anywhere anytime.
- U.S. Power Serving Israel's interests. Many neocons are pro Zionists7. An exegesis of a Zionist conspiracy would go like
this. Both Iraq and Iran are foes of Israel; therefore, they could be used as
scapegoats. More specifically, they could be accused of possessing or developing WMDs – then punished for the sins, inequities, and transgressions of Israel. A
U.S. attack directed at Iraq, for example, could help Israel in a multiplicity
of ways. Here are three: (1) Iraq's wealth could be plundered; (2) Islamic
countries could be destabilized and weakened for decades; and, ironically, (3) attention
could be diverted away from the fact that Israel possesses between 100 and 200 nuclear
weapons8 (WMDs and the rockets to deliver them to Moscow, Berlin, and Tehran). A
U.S. attack on Iraq or Iran would mark the triumph of
Azazel, the demon of
Jewish mythology9-10.
- Oil. Finally, why would the neocon strategy include North Korea in
the "axis of evil"? What does North Korea have to do with Iraq or Iran?
Simple. The inclusion of North Korea points indirectly back to yet another danger – the
"yellow peril," or is it "yellow terror."11 The
intentionality of the invasion of Iraq or Iran would be to guarantee the United States
a new instrument
for controlling the flow of Middle East oil to China and India, two giants that would soon
flex their military-industrial muscles.
Neocon strategy is bound to fail. For millions of people, neocon intentionality
is nothing but
pure malice.
Dr. Edward E. Ayoub
Toronto
April 12, 2007
First Published in the
History section of Much Mind
on 12-Apr-07.
References
1
President Delivers State of the Union Address. The White House,
29-Jan-02.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/01/20020129-11.html.
2 See, for example, the following
articles.
Timothy Noah. David Frum's "Axis of Evil." Authorial vanity strikes the Bush White
House. Slate, 5-Feb-02.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2061695.
3 Edmund Husserl. Formal and Transcendental Logic. Translated by
Dorian Cairns. The Hague, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969, at 157-159.
4 Ibid., at 160.
5 For research corroborating substantial biases in the judicial systems
in the U.S. and Canada, see the following articles.
- S. Wheeler et al. Do the 'Haves' Come Out Ahead? Winning and Losing
in State Supreme Courts, 1870-1970. Law and Society Review, 21
(3), 1987, pp. 403-445 (U.S. State Supreme Courts decisions, 1970-1970). (Table
7, p. 428.)
- Peter McCormick. Canada's Courts. Peter McCormick, 1994.
Toronto, ON: James Lorimer & Company Ltd., Publishers, 1994, p. 160. (Table
10.2: Party Capability Analysis -- Net Advantage: U.S. Courts. Figures
calculated from data in S. Wheeler et al. (1987) and D.R. Songer and R.S.
Sheehan (1992).)
- Ibid., p. 157. (Table 10:1: Success Rates, by Litigant
Category, Reported Provincial Appeal Court Decisions, 1920-1990.)
6
Z.1
Flow of Funds
Accounts of the United States, 8-Mar-07.
Board of Governors of the
Federal Reserve System.
[D3. Debt Outstanding by Sector.]
http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/current/z1r-2.pdf.
7
Patrick J. Buchanan, former presidential candidate, wrote in The American
Conservative: "We charge that a cabal of polemicists and public officials
seek to ensnare our country in a series of wars that are not in America's
interests. We charge them with colluding with Israel to ignite those wars
. . . What these neoconservatives seek is to conscript American blood to
make the world safe for Israel." See
Patrick J. Buchanan. Whose War? A neoconservative
clique seeks to ensnare our country in a series of wars that are not in
America’s interest.
The American Conservative, 24-Mar-03.
http://www.amconmag.com/03_24_03/cover.html. See also The American
Cause,
http://www.theamericancause.org/; and
Neoconservatism, Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoconservatism.
8 S. Aftergood and H. M. Kristensen. Nuclear Weapons - Israel.
Federation of American Scientists (FAS), 8-Jan-07.
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/.
9 Atonement ritual. Leviticus 16:8, 10, 26.
10 Azazel. Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azazel.
11 See Yellow Peril. Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_peril.
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