Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2003 13:54:31 +0100
From: artefact-AT-t-online.de (Michael Eldred)
Subject: FYI: NYTimes.com Article: THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN: Moment of Truth, etc.


Cologne 19-Dec-2003

This NYT commentary below as a small counterweight to ontotheological, a
priori, pre-set explanations. Friedman is a journalist and commentator
who risks an assessment of a situation whose outcome is uncertain. Since
the situation is fluid, he urges that political efforts are made to
achieve a good outcome (in the Greek sense of _eu zaen_, living well).

Human beings are those beings who find themselves in predicaments that
have to be deliberated upon. Aristotle wisely points out:
_oudeis de bouleuetai peri ton mae endechomenon allos echein_ (1139a13)
"No one deliberates on issues that do not admit having it any other
way."
(Standard translation: "deliberation is never exercised about things
that are invariable".)

Social/political practical life is composed of situations that admit to
presence differing outcomes. Practical truth (_alaetheia praktikae_
1139a27) consists in unconcealing the situation in its manifold
predicaments/categories (_katagoriai_), assessing the predicament and
aiming to hit the mean.

Ontotheological political ideology, on the other hand, cannot admit
having it any other way. It moves in the realm of _alaetheia
theoretikae_, theoretical-speculative unconcealing that uncovers what is
_necessary_, i.e. that which does not admit having it any other way
(_mae endechetai allos echein_). To achieve such preset certainty,
ontotheological political ideology requires a vertically structured
causality anchored ultimately in a summum ens, a supreme being.
Everything that happens, i.e. every fact that comes along (_symbainein_)
is not just an accident (_symbebaekos_), but is explained by slotting it
into the pre-set-up causal structure emanating from the supreme being,
that is thus attributed omnipotence. Resistances to this omnipotence are
merely counter-potencies that have been pre-calculated by the ideology
to be overcome.

The narrative made of the 'facts' of history by ontotheological
political ideology is self-affirming of its own preordained security. As
a protective shell, ontotheological ideology offers a cocoon for the
impotent subject who, from inside the cocoon, has always already
precalculated all possible moves of the superpower, and so cannot ever
be fooled, deluded. What the impotent small subject lacks in
political/social power, it makes up for with foreknowing omniscience
that is never lost for an explanation. It is always one step ahead in
its supercynicism that outdoes the cyncism of the preposited omnipotent,
machinating, political subject, the surrogate god. Factical impotence is
compensated by an omnipotence of foreknowing what the supreme subject
will calculate in its exercise of superpower. In this way, the
ontotheological ideologue maintains a phallic superiority even in the
face of the superpower.

But above all in relations with those who regard the realm of politics
as situative and uncertain in outcome and as an interplay of social
powers that may even achieve some good, the ontotheological ideologue
demonstrates an unshakeable superiority and is able to treat _any_
opponent with condescension from a superior height as a deluded subject.
If the ontotheological ideologue imagines any escape from the
preordained ontotheological order of power (the empire, the system, the
machine, etc.) at all, it must be by way of cataclysm that changes the
social order totally, since every last nook and cranny of reality is a
priori infected by the emanation of power from the supreme,
god-surrogate subject.

The main Western paradigm for ontotheological political ideology
resulted from transposing Hegel's metaphysics, which is conceived as
"God thinking before the creation of the world", to the realm of social
reality in which the subject, capital, was attributed the status of
summum ens. This redistribution of ontotheological valencies was
achieved by Marx's metaphysics. Marxism then went one step further in
crude simplification and chose, depending on the political-historical
situation, the top imperial political power as omnipotent machinating
subject (serving a priori the overall interests of the capitalist class,
overcoming frictions, etc.).

Those ensconced in an ontotheological political ideology have secured
their superior foreknowing in advance. As totalizing foreknowers they
are set up pretty in the Gestell with preset ex-planations for every
conceivable predicament.The ex-planations make plain by running from one
entity to the next until finally the machinations of the supreme entity
come into view and are confirmed once again. 

Within this totalizing structure of causality, being itself remains
invisible. The openness of the truth of being itself, that enables and
empowers the presencing of any being, is obliterated. This empowering is
not the exercise of power of one being over another, but the opening of
the timespace of possibility itself: Ermoeglichung. Human beings
situated in such a timespace are exposed in the first place not to
necessity but to possibility, namely, to the possibility of individual
self-casting.

All the best for Xmas, dear agonizers on the agora,
Michael

-------- Original Message --------
Betreff: NYTimes.com Article: Op-Ed Columnist: Moment of Truth
Datum: Fri, 19 Dec 2003 06:08:18 -0500 (EST)
Von: artefact-AT-t-online.de
Rückantwort: artefact-AT-t-online.de
An: artefact-AT-t-online.de

This article from NYTimes.com 
has been sent to you by artefact-AT-t-online.de.


\----------------------------------------------------------/

Op-Ed Columnist: Moment of Truth

December 18, 2003
 By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN 

ISTANBUL - Of all the fascinating reactions to Saddam
Hussein's capture, the one that intrigues me most is the
French decision to suddenly offer some debt forgiveness for
Iraq. Why now? I believe it's an 11th-hour attempt by the
French government to scramble onto the right side of
history. 

I believe the French president, Jacques Chirac, knows
something in his heart: in the run-up to the Iraq war,
George Bush and Tony Blair stretched the truth about
Saddam's weapons of mass destruction - but they were not
alone. Mr. Chirac also stretched the truth about his
willingness to join a U.N.-led coalition against Iraq if
Saddam was given more time and still didn't comply with
U.N. weapons inspections. I don't believe Mr. Chirac ever
intended to go to war against Saddam, under any
circumstances. So history will record that all three of
these leaders were probably stretching the truth - but with
one big difference: George Bush and Tony Blair were
stretching the truth in order to risk their own political
careers to get rid of a really terrible dictator. And
Jacques Chirac was stretching the truth to advance his own
political career by protecting a really terrible dictator. 

Something tells me that the picture of Saddam looking like
some crazed werewolf may have shocked even Mr. Chirac and
his foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin: yes, boys,
this is the creep you were protecting. History will also
record that while the U.S. and Britain chose to be Saddam's
prosecutors, France chose to be his defense lawyer. So, no,
it doesn't surprise me that the French are now offering
conscience money in the form of Iraqi debt relief.
Something tells me Mssrs. Chirac and de Villepin were just
assuming Iraq would end in failure, but with Saddam's
capture they've decided they'd better put a few chips on
success. 

But we and the Iraqis are also going to have to step up
more ourselves - otherwise the French could still have the
last laugh. No question, the capture of Saddam merits
celebration in and of itself, not only because this
terrible man will be brought to justice, but also because
it really does improve the chances for a decent outcome in
Iraq. But while Saddam's removal is necessary for that
decent outcome, it is not sufficient. 

We have entered a moment of truth in Iraq. With Saddam now
gone, there are no more excuses for the political drift
there. We are now going to get the answer to the big
question I had before the war: Is Iraq the way it is
because Saddam was the way he was? Or was Saddam the way he
was because Iraq is the way it is - ungovernable except by
an iron fist? 

We have to give Iraqis every chance to prove it is the
first, not the second. For starters, I hope we don't hear
any more chants from Iraqis of "Death to Saddam." He's now
as good as dead. It's time for Iraqis to stop telling us
whom they want to die. Now we have to hear how they want to
live and whom they want to live with. The Godfather is
dead. But what will be his legacy? Is there a good Iraqi
national family that can and wants to live together, or
will there just be more little godfathers competing with
one another? From my own visits, I think the good family
scenario for Iraq is very possible, if we can provide
security - but only Iraqis can tell us for sure by how they
behave. 

The way to determine whether Iraqis are willing to form the
good family is how they use and understand their newfound
freedom. The reason Iraqi politics has not jelled up to now
is not only because of Saddam's lingering shadow. It is
because each of the major blocs - the Kurds, Sunnis and
Shiites - has been pushing maximalist demands for what it
thinks is its rightful place in shaping and running a new
Iraq. The Iraqi ship of state has broken up on these rocks
many times before. 

By risking their own political careers, George Bush and
Tony Blair have, indeed, given Iraqis the gift of freedom.
But it is not the freedom to simply shout about what they
oppose. That is anarchy. Freedom is about limits,
compromise and accepting responsibility. Freedom is the
opportunity to assert your interests and the obligation to
hear and compromise with the interests of others. 

How well Iraqis absorb that kind of freedom will determine
whether the capture of Saddam is the high point of this
drama - and it's all downhill from here - or just a
necessary first chapter in the most revolutionary
democracy-building project ever undertaken in the Arab
world.   

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/18/opinion/18FRIE.html?ex=1072832098&ei=1&en=2f5fe171819a4989


---------------------------------

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company



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