Late Night Laugh: Making Lemonade
July 11, 2008
Sami Al-Arian led a rally in 1991 in the auditorium of a Chicago high school to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the Palestinian Intifada. The rally featured Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) spiritual leader Abdel-Aziz Odeh and a host of PIJ imagery. In this excerpt, Al-Arian warns against recent peace efforts aimed at ending the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Al-Arian: O brothers and sisters: Have we forgotten? Have we forgotten the Jews and who they are? God, the Glorious and Sublime, warns us of the Israelites, whom he has cursed in the Quran. “Those of the Children of Israel who disbelieved were cursed by David and Jesus, son of Mary; that, on account of their disobedience and their aggression. They used not to forbid one another from committing any of the evils they were committing. Evil is what they did!”
These people – whom God, the Glorious and sublime, had made into monkeys and pigs, had become discontent and angry with, had cursed in this world and in the hereafter, and had imposed a punishment on them in this World until Judgment Day – these people today hold sway over us, our people, our nation, and our future. We want to negotiate with them, to have a dialogue with them, as if we have forgotten who the Jews are, because we have distanced ourselves from our Quran, history, and heritage, and we do not understand our reality.
From Theocracy To Democracy: Hopes for Iran
July 11, 2008
Iranian dissident journalist and author Akbar Ganji recently spoke with Boston Globe Ideas writer Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow about his life, his political activism, and the future of his homeland. His new book, The Road to Democracy in Iran, was published in April of this year by Boston Review Books
You grew up in a neighborhood in Tehran known for being home to many Islamists. What was that like?
The majority of its inhabitants were lower-income workers, but Islamic fundamentalists were not the only group in the neighborhood. Marxists often chose to locate their cells in working-class areas. These neighborhoods also produced young Muslim activists who later joined various Iranian political movements. To assume that such disadvantaged neighborhoods only produced Islamic fundamentalists is an ideological interpretation. The activist youth from my neighborhood mostly subscribe today to Islamic modernist thinking.
As a supporter of the 1979 revolution, what did you expect from it? Did it turn out differently than you thought it would?
The discourse of the 1979 Revolution was about justice, independence, and anti-imperialism. As a consequence of the Cold War and the Third World ideological thinking of this period, the United States was viewed as the source of all the social and political problems facing our society. In those days, social justice meant either the just rule of Ali, the first Shia Imam in the 7th century, or Soviet-style socialism.
The 1979 revolution did not bring about liberty, democracy, or human rights; it did not even fulfill its promise of social justice. The class gap is about the same today, if not worse. The political repression is greater than it was before the revolution. This is because the Pahlavi regime only repressed political opposition, but the Islamic Republic continues to repress the entire spectrum of cultural, social, and political activity.
In my view, the most important achievement of the revolution is that it turned the masses into agents of historical change and highly politicized them. The 1979 revolution demanded political independence and the end of external interference in Iran’s domestic affairs. In this sense Iran has become independent, but globalization processes have made possible many new forms of foreign interference that affect Iran. For example, periodically the Iranian government is forced to open its most sensitive nuclear installations, which are hidden from its own people, to inspections by Western governments. National independence in the old sense of the term does not and cannot exist anymore.
What prompted you to become an investigative journalist?
Values of freedom, democracy, and human rights demand that we struggle against dictators and expose their crimes. The Islamic Republic has assassinated many dissident intellectuals both inside Iran and abroad. Exposing its acts of terror was our moral responsibility.
What is the status today of the reform movement in Iran? Are you optimistic about its prospects?
The confrontation between Iran and the Unites States over nuclear power, terrorism, politics in the Middle East, and Iran’s increasing influence in the region, has greatly overshadowed internal opposition activity. The specter of war, together with the regime’s repressiveness, has pushed aside the struggle for democracy and human rights. Moreover, the regime in Iran uses the pretext of an “impending war” to crack down more severely on its opponents. Resistance under such circumstances is very difficult.
In this way the government of the United States has harmed reformist forces in Iran. When President Bush says that Iranian reformists do not have a better friend than he, his words are both factually inaccurate and practically useless to the reform movement. But they provide a convenient excuse to Iran’s fundamentalist rulers to paint their opponents as “American agents,” and, under the pretext of fighting American intervention, proceed to crush them.
Given such circumstances, many of the reformist groups have placed their hopes on formal periodic elections in the Islamic Republic of Iran. What these reformists do not realize is that democracy and human rights will never emerge from the ballot box of the Islamic Republic. Other political activists have shifted their focus to civil society. This is the only way forward for us. Discontent is widespread, but people are not organized, and an effective leadership supported by a broad consensus does not exist at the moment.
On May 19, 2005, you started a hunger strike in Evan Prison, where you were serving a sentence for having attended a conference in Berlin described by the government as “anti-Islamic.” Why did you decide to go on a hunger strike? Do you think it was an effective tactic?
A hunger strike is a good tactic in political struggle. Its success, however, depends on the circumstances. Under very harsh circumstances, a prisoner is sometimes forced to use his only weapon, his own life, in order to say “no” to an oppressive autocratic regime. He might sacrifice his life, but others will learn that the struggle continues. The struggle for democracy, freedom, and human rights cannot be reduced to theoretical and intellectual debates. In order to achieve these ideals you have to be actively engaged in realizing them.
In your book, you write that intellectuals have a special responsibility to be politically engaged and struggle for human rights. What is your definition of “intellectual”? Why do you believe intellectuals have this particular obligation?
Ivory tower intellectuals occupy their time with abstract issues and are not engaged with the pain and suffering of people. What is important is reducing pain and human suffering. Public intellectuals are theoretically concerned with the question of truth, and practically they are concerned with reducing pain and human suffering. Is it possible to ignore the widespread poverty, destitution, and social injustice, and merely focus on questions of “truth” in the abstract?
What would you say to those who insist that true Islam is incompatible with Western-style democracy?
Scriptures, just like any other text, are subject to human interpretation. There is no “un-interpreted” religion. From this perspective, there are three types of religious interpretations: fundamentalism, traditionalism, and modernism. Islamic fundamentalism and Islamic traditionalism, just like Jewish and Christian fundamentalism and traditionalism, conflict with democracy and human rights. But modernists have developed interpretations of Islam that are compatible with democracy, human rights, pluralism, secularization, and freedom.
We need reconstructions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam that promote peace; religion should not be turned into a weapon of war and violence. If we suggest that Islam is inherently undemocratic, this is not going to benefit the promotion of peace and democracy around the world. Islam, to the same extent as Christianity and Judaism, opposes modernity and its logical implications and to the same degree can be reconciled with modernity.
One chapter in your book addresses the gender apartheid in Iran. Is sexism an issue that many male activists are concerned with? Are many women involved in the reform movement?
The principle of equality is at the core of democracy. Iranian male intellectuals are very concerned with the question of freedom for women. Women have been very active in the reform movement but they have realized that they need their own independent women’s movement. Democracy is the product of a balance of power between civil society and the state. A strong civil society is one that is socially organized. The various interest and identity groups should be organized and mobilized so that society as a whole will be strong. Iranian women are taking steps in this direction and they are currently trying to organize themselves.
In your book you discuss the importance of gradually fomenting changes in attitudes and culture rather than imposing revolutionary change from above. How do you think this gradual cultural change can be accomplished?
Revolutions are very expensive with little accompanying benefit. Democracy is the product of a democratic culture. In this sense, without a critique of tradition and religion we cannot develop a democratic culture.
In a society such as ours, where the state rules in the name of religion, a critique of religion is tantamount to a critique of the state. During the last three decades we have witnessed important cultural and intellectual transformations, and the ideas of democracy and human rights have greatly expanded. The global spread of the idea of democracy has forced the autocratic government in Iran to call itself a religious democracy. Our culture, traditions, religion, and moral positions should be seriously critiqued and reconstructed anew.
I understand you’ve been in the United States and Canada for several months. What are your impressions of North America?
Whatever humans have built so far is a combination of good and bad things, correct and incorrect, efficient and inefficient institutions. The United States is a very creative society, which has produced and trained great thinkers and it has also attracted great minds to its universities.
At the same time, the class differences in the United States are unbelievable. How can the biggest economy in the world produce so many homeless people, fail to provide health care to its citizens, and tolerate so much violence? The mass media provides very superficial analysis of existing problems and keeps people occupied with issues that do not have a connection with real problems, as if it all were some theatrical performance.
In your book you say that Islam faces a choice between following the path of the West, or becoming increasingly weak and failing to address its people’s needs. Does this mean that there’s no path to successful governance other than the Western model?
This is the issue: returning to the premodern era is impossible. Religion, and in this case Islam, if it wants to remain in this world, must be made relevant to the life of a modern person. Modern man will not accept the monopoly of one worldview.
Democracy is the most rational and just form of government created by humans so far. The development of human rights is an important modern human accomplishment. Accepting this fact does not mean we are becoming Westernized. Universal values have no national home. If ideals and ideas are rationally and morally defensible then they should be welcomed. The origins of these ideas are not as important as their contents.
Most Americans do not believe the U.S. government needs more tax revenue and well over half say all tax increases should be subject to voter approval.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 52% of voters say the federal government does not need additional tax revenue for important national programs such as highway repairs and health care reform.
At the same time, 57% think all tax increases should be approved first by voters. Only 30% disagree with this approach. Many states already provide that protection for voters.
For the two presidential candidates, however, the survey’s overall findings appear to suggest that neither has a huge edge on the tax issue. While Republican John McCain has proposed maintaining the Bush tax cuts and cutting in other areas, his Democratic rival Barack Obama has proposed raising taxes on those earning more than $250,000 a year.
A plurality (48%) say they would vote for a candidate who said he would raise taxes only on the rich, while only 37% would vote for a candidate opposed to all tax increases. Sixteen percent (16%) are undecided.
A separate survey found that 51% believe Obama will raise taxes if elected as opposed to 33% who believe that of a President McCain.
In the latest survey, 47% of Democrats say new tax revenues are needed while only 17% of Republicans agree. A whopping 73% of GOP voters say more taxes are not needed and 34% of Democrats agree with them. Fifty-six percent (56%) of unaffiliated voters say the government does not need more tax revenue, but 32% disagree.
Fifty-six percent (56%) of black voters as opposed to 33% of whites say the government needs more tax income.
Voters across virtually all income groups oppose additional taxes.
Voters’ responses also parallel the views of their party’s presidential candidate. Sixty-seven percent (67%) of Republicans favor a candidate who opposes all tax increases, while a virtually identical 66% of Democrats like a candidate who will raise taxes only on the rich.
While 67% of Republicans also think voter approval should be necessary for all tax increases, only 53% of Democrats and 50% of unaffiliated voters agree.
Sixty-four percent (64%) of voters say Americans pay more than 25% of their income in local, state and federal taxes, but only a plurality of 43% think the government should be required to provide a taxpayer with an annual report showing how much he or she has paid.
Goldman Sachs Economic Research Global Economics Paper: Ten Things for India to Achieve its 2050 Potential
July 11, 2008
What do we need to do to achieve our 2050 potential? Who are the leaders we can trust to make sure that potential is realized?
Goldman Sachs Economic Research Global Economics Paper
In recent years, we have published a number of papers pointing to remarkably positive potential growth for India up to 2050
Having the potential and actually achieving it are two separate things. In this paper, we outline ten crucial steps that we believe India must take in order to achieve its full potential. In our latest annual update to our Growth Environment Scores (GES), India scores below the other three BRIC nations, and is currently ranked 110 out of a set of 181 countries assigned GES scores. If India were able to undertake the necessary reforms, it could raise its growth potential by as much as 2.8% per annum, placing it in a very strong position to deliver the impressive growth we outlined in Global Economics Paper No. 152.
We highlight ten key areas where reform is needed. In all likelihood, they are not the only ten, but we consider them to be the most crucial:
1. Improve governance. Without better governance, delivery systems and effective implementation, India will find it difficult to educate its citizens, build its infrastructure, increase agricultural productivity and ensure that the fruits of economic growth are well established.
2. Raise educational achievement. Among more micro factors, raising India’s educational achievement is a major requirement to help achieve the nation’s potential. According to our basic indicators, a vast number of India’s young people receive no (or only the most basic) education. A major effort to boost basic education is needed. A number of initiatives, such as a continued expansion of Pratham and the introduction of Teach First, for example, should be pursued.
3. Increase quality and quantity of universities. At the other end of the spectrum, India should also have a more defined plan to raise the number and the quality of top universities.
4. Control inflation. Although India has not suffered particularly from dramatic inflation, it is currently experiencing a rise in inflation similar to that seen in a number of emerging economies. We think a formal adoption of Inflation Targeting would be a very sensible move to help India persuade its huge population of the (permanent) benefits of price stability.
5. Introduce a credible fiscal policy. We also believe that India should introduce a more credible medium-term plan for fiscal policy. Targeting low and stable inflation is not easy if fiscal policy is poorly maintained. We think it would be helpful to develop some ‘rules’ for spending over cycles.
6. Liberalise financial markets. To improve further the macro variables within the GES framework, we believe further liberalisation of Indian financial markets is necessary.
7. Increase trade with neighbours. In terms of international trade, India continues to be much less ‘open’ than many of its other large emerging nation colleagues, especially China. Given the significant number of nations with large populations on its borders, we would recommend that India target a major increase in trade with China, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
8. Increase agricultural productivity. Agriculture, especially in these times of rising prices, should be a great opportunity for India. Better specific and defined plans for increasing productivity in agriculture are essential, and could allow India to benefit from the BRIC related global thirst for better quality food.
9. Improve infrastructure. Focus on infrastructure in India is legendary, and tales of woe abound. Improvements are taking place, as any foreign business visitor will be aware, but the need for more is paramount. Without such improvement, development will be limited.
10. Improve Environmental Quality. The final area where greater reforms are needed is the environment. Achieving greater energy efficiencies and boosting the cleanliness of energy and water usage would increase the likelihood of a sustainable stronger growth path for India.
Perhaps not all these ‘action areas’ can be addressed at the same time, but we believe that, in coming years, progress will have to be made in all of them if India is to achieve its very exciting growth potential.
America’s Other Immigration Crisis
July 11, 2008
We are bringing the world’s smartest people to our shores, training them, and then making them leave.
From his early childhood, Sanjay Mavinkurve dreamed of coming to America and making it big. So his parents, who are from India, sent him to boarding school in Cleveland, Ohio when he was 14. He did so well that he gained a scholarship to Harvard, where he completed both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in computer science. In his spare time, he helped conceive the design for Facebook and wrote its first computer code. After graduating, Sanjay joined Google and designed key parts of their mapping software for mobile devices.
Then Sanjay fell in love and had to choose between his heart and the American dream. He was in the United States on a temporary visa and was years away from obtaining permanent resident status. His fiancée had graduated from a top university in Singapore and started work as an investment banker. The only U.S. visa they could obtain for her would not allow her to work, and that would force her to abandon her ambitions. Instead, they decided to abandon America and move to Canada, which welcomed them with open arms.
The U.S. immigration system allows highly educated workers to enter the country for up to six years on a visa called the H-1B. But this visa imposes many restrictions. If these workers want to stay longer and enjoy the same rights as Americans, they need to obtain a permanent resident visa. And then after five years as a permanent resident, they can apply to become naturalized American citizens.
The problem is that there are more than a million skilled workers and their families in the United States who are waiting for these permanent resident visas, but there are hardly any visas available and the backlog is rapidly increasing. So, over the next few years, Sanjay’s story is likely to be repeated many times.
These engineers, scientists, doctors, and researchers entered the country legally to study or to work. They contributed to U.S. economic growth and global competitiveness. Now we’ve set the stage for them to return to countries such as India and China, where the economies are booming and their skills are in great demand. U.S. businesses large and small stand to lose critical talent, and workers who have gained valuable experience and knowledge of American industry will become potential competitors.
My team at Duke University has been researching the impact of globalization on U.S. competitiveness and the sources of the U.S. advantage. We had many surprises in store when we looked at the role of immigrants in the tech sector.
In 1999, AnnaLee Saxenian of the University of California at Berkeley published a groundbreaking report on the economic contributions of skilled immigrants to California’s economy. She found that Chinese and Indian engineers ran a growing share of Silicon Valley companies started during the 1980s and 1990s and that they were at the helm of 24 percent of the technology businesses started from 1980 to 1998. Saxenian concluded that foreign-born scientists and engineers were generating new jobs and wealth for the California economy.
We decided to update and expand her study and focus on engineering and technology firms started in the United States from 1995 to 2005. Over a period of two years, we surveyed thousands of companies and interviewed hundreds of company founders.
We found that the trend Saxenian documented had become a nationwide phenomenon. In over 25 percent of tech companies founded in the United States from 1995 to 2005, the chief executive or lead technologist was foreign-born. In 2005, these companies generated $52 billion in revenue and employed 450,000 workers. In some industries, such as semiconductors, the numbers were much higher—immigrants founded 35 percent of start-ups. In Silicon Valley, the percentage of immigrant-founded start-ups had increased to 52 percent.
When we looked into the backgrounds of these immigrant founders, we found that they tended to be highly educated—96 percent held bachelor’s degrees and 74 percent held a graduate or postgraduate degree. And 75 percent of these degrees were in fields related to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
The vast majority of these company founders didn’t come to the United States as entrepreneurs—52 percent came to study, 40 percent came to work, and 6 percent came for family reasons. Only 1.6 percent came to start companies in America. They found that the United States provided a fertile environment for entrepreneurship.
Even though these founders didn’t come to the United States with the intent, they typically started their companies around 13 years after arriving in the country.
…In 2006, foreign nationals residing in the United States were named as inventors or co-inventors in an astounding 26 percent of patent applications filed in the United States. This increased from 8 percent in 1998. Some U.S. corporations had foreign nationals contribute to a majority of their patent applications—such as Qualcomm at 72 percent, Merck at 65 percent, GE at 64 percent, and Cisco at 60 percent. Over 40 percent of the international patent applications filed by the U.S. government had foreign authors.
In 1998, 11 percent of these global patent applications had a Chinese inventor or co-inventor. By 2006 this percentage had increased to almost 17 percent. The contribution of Indians increased from 9 percent to 14 percent in the same period. To put these numbers into perspective, it is worth noting that Indians and Chinese both constitute less than 1 percent of the U.S. population, and census data show that 82 percent of Indian immigrants arrived in the United States after 1980.
But our concern was that these were foreign nationals and there was no certainty that they would stay and become U.S. citizens. These foreign-national inventors were also not from the same immigrant group that was founding high-tech companies—those were permanent residents or naturalized citizens. These inventors were likely to be Ph.D. researchers on student visas and employees of U.S. corporations on temporary visas like the H-1B, as Sanjay Mavinkurve was.
The question was: Why was the number of foreign-national inventors increasing so dramatically—337 percent over 8 years?
To answer this, we had to develop our own methodology to estimate the population of skilled immigrants from which such inventors may originate.
Iran’s Occupied Territories
July 11, 2008
From The Henry Jackson Society:
Iran’s Occupied Territories
By Daniel Brett, 16th April 2008
Executive Summary
1. Iran’s treatment of the Ahwazi Arabs exposes the hypocrisy of its position on the Palestinians and Lebanon, proving that it does not have the best interests of Arabs at heart. This month, the Iranian regime cut off drinking water supplies to Arab villages along the Shatt al-Arab, apparently as collective punishment against ethnic Arab unrest and in order to terrorise them off their lands.
2. Due to its geographical location and the scale of its oil resources, the Ahwazi Arab homeland is one of the most strategically important regions in the Middle East and what happens there has important national, regional and international repercussions.
3. Iran intends to ethnically cleanse the restive indigenous population from its border region to strengthen its hold on Baghdad and the rest of the Middle East; the persecution of Ahwazi Arabs is intimately bound up with Iran’s imperialist project in the region.
4. Chauvinistic nationalism within the Iranian opposition along with fear among Arab states of upsetting an aggressive militaristic regime in Tehran means that Ahwazi Arabs can only rely on international support for their human rights and political freedoms.
5. Ahwazi Arabs want to be free of ethnic persecution and political oppression and be part of an Iran that embraces cultural diversity and political devolution.“Collective punishment” is a term used often used to describe Israel’s retaliation against Hamas terrorist attacks. Tehran is the first government to talk in the strongest possible terms of the actions of the Israeli government. The Iranian regime’s claim to represent the interests of Arabs better than the Arab League is belied by the brutal persecution of indigenous Ahwazi Arabs living within its own territory, which have been under direct rule from Tehran since the end of self-government in 1925.
This week, Iran cut off drinking water supply to Arab villages along the left bank of the Shatt al-Arab, causing social unrest and fears of an outbreak of disease in the indigenous population. Ahwazi Arabs are the most deprived and persecuted ethnic group in the Middle East, with human development indicators at an African level and far below those of the Palestinians. This ethno-national group has been subjected to forced relocation, land confiscation, cultural repression, state terrorism, mass executions and economic disadvantage, despite their land being the one of the most oil-rich regions in the world. In all, at least 300,000 hectares of Arab land has been stolen by Tehran since 1979. By way of comparison, in almost 40 years of occupation of the West Bank, the Israelis are estimated to have confiscated some 394,000 hectares of Palestinian land. Being deprived of drinking water is simply the latest atrocity committed against this persecuted ethnic group.
Although the area has many large rivers, such as the Karoon and the Karkeh as well as the Shatt al-Arab, water has become salinated by intensive sugar cane production and polluted by the petrochemical industries, making the water undrinkable, particularly at the mouth of the Karoon where it feeds into the Shatt al-Arab. In the late 1990s, riots broke out in the oil town of Abadan, which lies on the Shatt Al-Arab, over the lack of clean drinking water. The security forces killed dozens Ahwazi Arabs in the water riots. The government eventually responded to the problem by supplying drinking water in tanks that served villages and towns in the affected areas. The halt in drinking water supply is likely to lead to outbreaks of water-born diseases such as cholera and typhoid, in a region which has more oil than Kuwait and the UAE combined. It will also incite yet more Ahwazi Arab unrest.
The intention behind the action is two-fold: to punish and intimidate the restive Arab population and to drive them off their traditional lands in order to strengthen the regime’s military presence in the region and bolster the economic interests of a predatory religious elite. Ahwazi Arabs are being punished for armed attacks on bus convoys operated by the Rahiyan-e-Nur, a section of the hardline volunteer paramilitary force the Bassij which is responsible for visits to the Iran-Iraq War battlefields. The Bassij are hated by the Ahwazi Arabs, largely because the Bassijis are deployed to murder any Arab opponents of the regime.
Forced relocation is also thought to be part of a long-term plan to force indigenous Arabs from their villages to expand the Arvand Free Zone, a military-industrial complex being developed along the Shatt al-Arab. Arabs living on Minoo Island, south of Abadan, have already faced state intimidation and expulsion. Most Ahwazi Arabs believe this is in line with the government’s ethnic cleansing programme, which was outlined in a letter written by the then vice-president Ali Abtahi and leaked to the press in April 2005.Ultimately, control over the Shatt al-Arab – achieved by settling a loyal non-indigenous population on traditional Arab land – will give Iran a stranglehold over Baghdad and therefore the entire Middle East. The ethnic cleansing of Ahwazi Arabs is nothing less than a prelude to the extension of Iran’s Empire and a projection of the principle of Velayat-e-Faqih, rule by Shi’ite religious jurisprudence headed by Iran’s Supreme Leader. The presence of a large, dispossessed and restless Arab population along the border is simply the last hurdle for Iran’s plan to expand its sphere of influence. What better tactic than to drive them out with disease and starvation?
The issue of Ahwazi Arabs is therefore crucial to security in the Middle East. Yet, Ahwazi Arabs can neither rely on their Iranian compatriots nor their Arab brothers for support. Iranian “opposition” movements have often indicated that they would stand beside the current regime against Ahwazi Arabs to prevent what they see as the destruction of their country by an “alien” race, even when Ahwazis themselves do not advocate secession. Ahwazi Arabs also have few friends in the Arab world. As they are predominantly Shi’ite, Ahwazis elicit little sympathy from their Sunni Arab brothers. Moreover, many governments in the region are careful not to upset the militaristic and aggressive power lying to their north, viewing the Ahwazi issue as a struggle that could cause them unnecessary problems were they to be involved.
If the Iranian regime is to be prevented from driving the Ahwazi Arabs literally off the map, then it’s vital that their predicament be placed firmly on the ‘political map’ here in the West as well as the Arab world. International solidarity is essential to ending Ahwazi Arabs’ persecution and arguably more important than the Palestinian issue in order to secure regional political stability, particularly in Iraq.
