INFLATION: It is Rising Like a Hot Air Balloon

Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama

By Ekow Mensah

There are many troubling indicators about the health of the Ghanaian economy.

Some of the indicators are the rising rate of inflation, low agricultural production and productivity and the high per centage of national revenue used in paying salaries and wages for public sector workers.

For the Mahama administration, it would appear that the most troubling indicator may be the rising rate of inflation.

This is because for well over four years, the NDC has boasted about its ability to reduce the rate of inflation.

By the end of last year, the rate of inflation had dropped to a single digit of 9.8 per cent.

The Ghana Statistical Service says that year-on-year inflation has risen from 11.6 per cent in June this year to 11.8 per cent.

The recent computation of the rate of inflation covered about 12 main groups under the Classification of Individual Consumption by Purpose (COICP).

The service said clothing and footwear recorded the highest rate of 18.1 per cent while the communications sub-group recorded the lowest inflation rate of 1.3 per cent.

Miscellaneous goods and services also recorded 17.7 per cent while furnishings, household equipment and routine maintenance registered 17.0 per cent. Housing, water, electricity, gas and other utilities recorded an inflation rate of 16.6 per cent.

So far Government has not given any indication as to how it intends to fight the rising rate of inflation.

There are some commentators however who insists that a rise in inflation is not necessarily bad.

They contend that inflation may be deliberately stimulated to push up growth in the economy.

Editorial

IMPORTANT LESSONS

The trial of Mr. Owusu Afriyie, General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) for contempt of court provides important lessons for all politicians.

First, it has become very clear that nobody is above the law and that even leaders of political parties can be held responsible for their utterances and actions.

It has also emphasised the need to focus on issue-based politics and avoid personal attacks and downright insults.

It was sad to observe the public humiliation of Sir John a party leader and a lawyer of 32 years standing.

In the dock he looked very much like any ordinary school child being chastised for his pranks behind the classroom.

The Insight hopes that all the politicians are learning the important lessons that spring out of the trial of Sir John.

Ghanaians deserve and must get decent leaders whose focus is on the eradication of poverty.

The De Facto Jim Crow Immigration Reforms

A letter to David Cameron

UK Prime Minister David Cameron

Dear Prime Minister,

It’s Time To Discontinue The De Facto Jim Crow Immigration Reforms

Not since when Winston Churchill led the country during the Second World War has a leader occupied No. 10 Downing Street under such tough times. The fact that you are still standing three years after stepping into office is a testament to your mental toughness, wisdom and tact.

One of the burning issues on your in tray when you assumed office was immigration. At the time you assumed office, you inherited a broken immigration system created by the previous government and set about clearing the mess. I presume that you felt that it was not sustainable for Britain to have lax border control and this is not an unreasonable approach to take. After all, if a country does not control and monitor immigration, the country could face the risk of becoming overpopulated, thereby putting pressure on the finite resources available for the citizens of the country. So as you rightly pointed out in a speech, “Immigration has to be properly controlled. Without proper controls, community confidence is sapped, resources are stretched and the benefits that immigration can bring are lost or forgotten.” In order to control immigration, your government set a target of reducing net immigration from 252,000 a year in 2010 to below 100,000 a year by 2015. After this target was set, the government has put in place a number of structures and policies towards achieving its immigration target.

Unfortunately, in trying to achieve this target, the government has adopted the principle of “the end justifies the means”, without giving serious consideration to the linkage between the ends and the means. Your government’s approach to immigration can be summarised as follows: “As long as we achieve our  ‘end’ to significantly reduce net immigration into the country, it doesn’t matter what type of ‘means’ we use. We hope to achieve our ‘end’ BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY.

The problem with this approach is that as long as the means to achieve the ends is bad, the end no matter how good intended will be bad. As Martin Luther King eloquently put it many years ago, “Ends are not cut off from means, because the means represent the ideal in the making, and the end in process, and ultimately you can’t reach good ends through evil means.”  Sir, while your advisers, ministers and the media may tell you that the current immigration reform is fair, just and humane, I have come to tell you like the little boy in Hans Andersen’s fairy tale - The Emperor’s New Clothes, that your government’s immigration reform is unfair, unjust and inhumane. In short, the government’s immigration reform is nothing more than a De Facto Jim Crow Immigration Reform.   Before I explain why I have likened your immigration policies to Jim Crow, let me recap on some of the ‘immoral means’ the government has implemented or is proposing to implement to achieve its ‘moral end’ of reducing net immigration.

Ever since the government set its target to reduce net immigration, it has come up with a number of ill-advised, ill-intentioned and ill-conceived rhetoric, policies and actions. A number of people in your government have been making inflammatory statements, which only succeed in polarising rather than uniting the country. In many other speeches a number of government officials have tried to link immigrants with benefit fraud, crime and laziness.

Your government is also intent on turning private landlords into agents of the UK Border Agency (UKBA) by making sure that “private landlords check their tenants’ immigration status with consequences for those rogue landlords who fail to do so.” Furthermore, raids are currently being carried out in a number of ethnic diverse areas like Daltson, Stratford and Walthamstow where people of colour are detained based on what the government describes as “specific intelligence.” People of colour or people with non-British accents are being arrested on the buses, trains and on the streets until they can prove their legitimacy to live in Britain. The Home Office has been putting pictures of the arrested immigrants on Twitter. In short the country is gradually metamorphosing from Great Britain to Gestapo Britain.

A couple of days ago, the government implemented an anti-immigration scheme by having a number of vans with the inscription “GO HOME OR FACE ARREST” boldly displayed, plying the six ethnic diverse boroughs of Barnet, Hounslow, Barking and Dagenham, Ealing, Brent and Redbridge. This scheme was widely condemned even by people in the government like Vince Cable who described the government’s approach as “stupid and offensive.” Leaflets and posters telling immigrants to go home have been distributed in a number of boroughs that have a large concentration of non-white people. The government has stated that effective from November 2013, visitors from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nigeria and Ghana will have to pay a £3,000 refundable bond before they can get a visa to visit Britain. According to the government, these countries, which are populated with black and brown people, were selected because they have a high proportion of visa over-stayers in Britain.

In August 2012, the UKBA revoked London Metropolitan University’s Highly Trusted Status for sponsoring international students. As a consequence, the university, which has a high concentration of non-whites, lost the right to recruit international students from outside of the EU. Almost 2,700 students were affected as they had 60 days after the revocation to gain admission into another school otherwise they faced deportation. According to the UKBA, one of the reasons why the status was revoked was because “a significant proportion did not have a good standard of English.” There was a lot of public uproar over the decision and in April 2013, the university was given back its licence for a probationary period.

One may say, “Why compare the government’s immigration reform with Jim Crowism when all the government is doing is to control net immigration?” Others may argue, “There is no basis of comparison to Jim Crow as the government’s policy is fair and not racist.”  If one looks at each of the government’s approach to immigration in isolation, one may arrive at that conclusion, however when one looks at the government’s actions holistically, one begins to see a pattern, which bears the hallmark of Jim Crowism. 

Like Jim Crow, which segregated blacks from whites, the government’s immigration reform also segregates classes of immigrants. Through the government’s reform, it has created two classes of immigrants namely black immigrants and white immigrants; rich immigrants and poor immigrants; upper class immigrants and lower class immigrants; white Western immigrants and white non-Western immigrants. Unlike the white rich and Western immigrants who are treated like human beings, the black, brown and white non-Western immigrants are dehumanised, demonised and ostracised by the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reforms.

Britain plays host to immigrants from the four corners of the world and particularly from her ex-colonies. However, one wonders why the immigration reforms are negatively impacting black, brown and Eastern European immigrants. For instance the introduction of the £3,000 refundable cash bond impacts visitors from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nigeria and Ghana, which are countries populated with black and brown people.  According to the Visit Britain website, the number of visitors to Britain in 2012 from three of these “BLACKlisted” countries were as follows

Country	Number of visitors to Britain in 2012
India	339,000
Nigeria	154,000
Pakistan	73,000

While visitors from some white majority populated countries were as follows

Country	Number of visitors to Britain in 2012
France	3,787,000
Germany	2,967,000
USA	2,840,000
Australia	993,000
Canada	704,000

The above statistics are quite revealing. Visitors from countries that have fewer visitors to Britain are made to post cash bonds while the visitors from countries that have higher number of visitors are free to come to Britain without posting cash bonds - a case of different strokes for different folks. Just like the Jim Crow mantra was “Separate but equal”; the mantra of the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reform seems to be “ALL IMMIGRANTS ARE EQUAL, BUT SOME IMMIGRANTS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.”

Selah.

The stop and search raids currently taking place in areas that have large concentrations of non-whites or white non-Westerners bears the hallmark of an amalgamation of Jim Crowism and the Pass Laws implemented in South Africa. During the Apartheid regime, the Pass Law Act was passed to restrict the movements of non-white people in certain parts of South Africa.  Non-whites were required to carry passbooks with them in certain areas and could be arrested if they failed to produce the passbook. While there are no laws requiring non-whites to carry passbooks in Britain, what we now have in place is a de facto pass law. The recent raids in black populated parts of Britain has created an atmosphere of fear in the black community and the people feel that they have to carry their passports with them wherever they go so as to avoid being arrested for failing to prove their legitimacy to stay in the country. Already, blacks and Asians are disproportionately stopped and searched by the police relative to their white counterparts and this de facto pass law will only increase the frequency of the searching of blacks and Asians. It would be interesting to find out why raids are carried out in the areas of large concentrations of non-white such as Daltson, Peckham and Stratford while areas with little concentrations of black people go unraided.

Like Jim Crow laws, which succeeded in driving blacks out of the southern states of the USA, the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reform seems to be intended to drive the black, brown and white non-Western immigrants out of Britain back to their home countries as evidenced by the message displayed on the so-called racist van i.e.  “GO HOME OR FACE ARREST.” Just as Jim Crow laws prevented blacks from going to certain places such as restaurants, hotels, toilets, playgrounds and schools, the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration policies are preventing some black immigrants from entering buses and train stations for fear of being detained. Even the schools are impacted by the de facto Jim Crow immigration reform as evidenced by the revocation of the Highly Trusted Status of London Metropolitan University, a school populated by majority non-whites and non-westerners, partly because some of its students did not “have a good standard of English”.

While Jim Crow laws discriminated against an unpopular minority in the USA, the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reforms discriminates against an unpopular minority in Britain i.e. the black, brown and white non-Western immigrants. One does not have to be a rocket scientist to see that there is a hierarchy of immigrants in this country. At the top of the pyramid are the Western immigrants from countries like Germany, France, Australia, USA and Canada while at the bottom of the pyramid, are the immigrants from countries ranging from Nigeria, India, Pakistan to Romania, Bulgaria and Poland.

During the Jim Crow era, Americans were accustomed to seeing signposts with inscriptions such as “Colored Waiting Room”, “Public Swimming Pool – White Only”, and “Imperial Laundry Co - We Wash For White People Only”.  In 21st century Britain, the black, brown and white non-Western immigrants now see more subtle signs such as “GO HOME OR FACE ARREST”, “Text HOME to 78070”, “106 ARRESTS LAST WEEK IN YOUR AREA.” I am sure that a number of older Afro-Caribbean’s will look at these signboards with nostalgia remembering the signs that first greeted them when they landed from the MV Empire Windrush ship - “NO IRISH, NO BLACKS, NO DOGS.”

Selah.

While to suggest that these recent immigration reforms are in response to UK Independent Party (UKIP) eating into your parties electoral base is speculative and unverifiable, however what is known is that the government is fixing this broken immigration system without consideration given to the humanity of the immigrants who are targeted.  Jesus once said, “For what shall it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul.” I can imagine the Master sitting on his majestic throne telling the British government, “For what shall it profit a government to gain some votes and lose its soul over a pottage of de facto Jim Crowism”. Prime Minister, I am concerned that three years into your reign, your government has lost its soul. In the quest for winning the hearts and mind of voters, it has embarked on a campaign of oppression, repression and suppression against the marginalised segments of society. Even though the disabled, the immigrants, the homeless, the unemployed, the aged and the youth did not cause the recent financial crisis, they have been negatively targeted by many of the government’s policies while the major culprits of the crisis are walking free on the streets of Britain smiling all the way to the bank. As each month goes by, the government’s immigration policies become harsher on the vulnerable segment of society.

The government’s immigration reforms are becoming so harsh that even the UKIP is saying, “Spot checks and being demanded to show your papers by officialdom are not the British way of doing things.”  Even though the YouGov poll states that 61% of the public don’t think that the 'Go home, or face arrest' vans for illegal immigrants are racist, a responsible government should not make decisions that impacts lives based on YouGov polls or the number of positive comments in some tabloids or the number of “likes” on Facebook.  Martin Luther King got it right when he said, “Ultimately, a genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.”

The government’s de facto Jim Crow reforms have a number of implications, some of which are already happening and others which may happen in the future if it continues at this pace. The reforms are fueling the racial tension in the country thereby resulting in a rise in racial intolerance. The inflammatory rhetoric coming from a number of government officials often sends a wrong signal to closet racists and open racists that they have government approval to carry out racial crimes. One should therefore not be surprised at the high incidence of race insults on the football pitch, TV screens and on the trains in recent years.

In addition, the current immigration reform is polarising the British society. In 2012, the government published its Integration Strategy in which the government hoped that millions of individuals would come together around common values, aspirations and interests. Sir, with these de facto Jim Crow immigration reforms in place, black and brown people no longer feel part of this society. The reforms are also creating room for suspicion and when people of one race are suspicious of people of the other race, how can the society be effectively integrated?

When landlords are pressurised to become agents of the UKBA or when citizens are told to report “suspected illegal immigrants to our Border Agency through the Crimestoppers phoneline or through the Border Agency website” this promotes a polarised society. Why? The word “suspected illegal immigrant” is very subjective. Anyone who does not fit the profile of a “true Brit” is likely to fall under the “suspected illegal immigrant” label. So when a lady has an Eastern European accent, she is likely to be tagged a “suspected illegal immigrant”; when a person does not look like a Caucasian, he is likely to be tagged a “suspected illegal immigrant.” Sir, unlike other immigrants in this country, the black and brown immigrants stand out because of their skin colour in a majority white populated country. They cannot hide under the shade of white skin tone that prevails in this country. Thus they become the main target of the adverse effects of the de facto Jim Crow Immigration reforms and so it is no surprise that they are being arrested, searched, by the police, asked to go home in the train, refused employment and accommodation because they look like “suspected illegal immigrant.”

Moreover, the immigration reform risks jeopardising the British economy. It is a known fact that economic power is shifting from the West to the East and South. Most of the fastest growing economies of the world are populated with brown, black and yellow people. If leaders in countries like India, Nigeria and China feel that Britain is hostile to their citizens, they may divert the businesses, investments and trades which could jump start the British economy to other countries that are more open and friendly. Also, many bright students who would have otherwise studied in Britain may choose to study in other countries such as the USA, Canada or Australia thereby depriving Britain of future scientists and entrepreneurs. Furthermore, as these students become the leaders of tomorrow, they will not have any ties with Britain and future investments could flow to other countries instead.

In addition, Britain needs to realise that she does not have a monopoly of immigrants coming into her country. Remember that there are Brits in different parts of the world. There is a possibility that some of these countries that are impacted by the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reform could retaliate. For instance, what would happen to the British expatriates working in the Nigerian oil sector if the Nigerian government decides to revoke the visa status of British workers in the oil sector or if the Thailand or Ghanaian Governments embark on say an anti immigration scheme whereby they have a billboard with the message “WE’VE HAD ENOUGH PEDOPHILES IN THIS COUNTRY. GO BACK TO BRITAIN OR FACE ARREST”?

Sir, the government’s de facto Jim Crow immigration reform bears some semblance to some of the stages identified by Greg Stanton in his 1996 paper titled “The Eight Stages of Genocide”. The first stage that Mr. Stanton of Genocide Watch describes is the classification stage, in which people are divided into the categories of “them” and “us”. This can be seen in the subtle classification of immigrants into black and white immigrants, rich and poor immigrants; western and non-Western immigrants in which the white, rich and western immigrants are classified as "US" while the black, brown, poor and white non-Western immigrants are classified as "THEM."

The second stage is the symbolisation stage. This occurs when the people who have been classified as “them” are given names and symbols associated with the classification. Government officials and the media have given illegal immigrants various labels such as "criminals", "benefit cheats", "lazy",” dishonest”, "untidy" and "immoral". Mr. Stanton describes the third stage as dehumanisation, in which “one group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of it are equated with animals, vermin, insects or diseases”. The emerging pattern of the treatment of illegal immigrants especially the Romanians suggests that this stage is in full force.

The fourth stage is organisation. The stopping, searching and detaining of suspected illegal immigrants based on "specific intelligence" is evidence that this stage is on going. The polarisation stage, which is the fifth stage, occurs when the propaganda machine is put in force to reinforce prejudice and hate. Very often, laws are implemented to help achieve this aim. This stage is evident in Britain, not only from the utterances of some government officials, but also from the de facto Jim Crow immigration reform.

The sixth stage is the preparation stage. In this stage, victims are identified and separated. According to Mr. Stanton, the victims are “often segregated into ghettoes, deported into concentration camps or confined to a famine-struck region and starved”. While illegal immigrants in Britain have not been sent to concentration camps or famine-struck regions, they are being identified and segregated in addition to being harassed by UK Border Agency officials and the police based on their colour, accent or because of a tip off based on "specific intelligence." While I believe that your government is not intent on committing genocide on illegal immigrants, I believe it is important for you to reflect on these stages, as the ill-treatment of immigrants in Britain appears to be increasing exponentially, starting first with inflammatory rhetoric, proceeding to harsh laws and progressing to deportation and incarceration. Hopefully it will not reach the extermination or incineration stage.

Selah.

As a result of your government’s approach to immigration, the rest of the world is beginning to see Britain as a patient suffering from Schizophrenia. With one side of her mouth, Britain tells the world that she is open to foreign investment, foreign businessmen and foreign students and with the other side of her mouth she tells the world that Britain does not welcome foreigners. One cannot tell the Indians to open up to British businesses in February 2013 and then tell the Indians in Britain to GO HOME OR FACE ARREST in July 2013. It is time that you call your advisers and ministers to order and come up with a well thought, reasonable and humane immigration policy rather than implementing policies that court controversy, polarise society and dehumanise people.

In conclusion, I would like to clarify what I am saying and what I am not saying regarding the government’s immigration reforms. I am not saying that Britain does not have a broken immigration problem; I am not saying that anyone who attempts to fix Britain's broken immigration is a racist; I am not saying that some immigrants are not milking the system and taking advantage of Britain's broken immigration system.

What I am saying is that segregating immigrants on the basis of race, accent or financial status is immoral and a crime against humanity; What I am saying is that not ALL immigrants are milking the system; What I am saying is that the government's current approach to fixing Britain's broken immigration system is polarising the society, which leads to no good.

Selah.

Ahmed Olayinka Sule, CFA

suleaos@gmail.com

http://www.scribd.com/Alatenumo/documents

http://about.me/ahmedsule

cc

Rt. Hon Nick Clegg
Rt. Hon Ed Miliband

Rt. Hon Theresa May

Rt. Hon Mark Harper
Members of Parliament

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon

Operation Black Vote

Human Rights Watch

Fidel and Maduro  Meet

Fidel Castro and Venezuela President Maduro

The historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro Ruz, received compañero Nicolás Maduro Moros, President of the sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela on the evening of July 26. Also participating in the visit were members of the Venezuelan delegation which attended the national commemoration in Santiago de Cuba of the Moncada assault which occurred there six decades ago.

During the friendly encounter, Fidel and Maduro recalled with profound emotion the legacy of President Hugo Chávez Frías, who would have celebrated his 59th birthday a few hours later, on July 28. In particular, they discussed current challenges of the new stage of struggle.

In the conversation Fidel and Maduro discussed the world food situation, climate change and the preservation of peace, as well as addressing issues related to collaboration between the two countries

Maduro reiterated his sincere gratitude to Cuba for its solidarity and revolutionary example.

Queen in depleted uranium trade?

British Queen Elizabeth

British anti-war campaign group the Stop the War Coalition has in a video claimed that Britain’s Queen Elizabeth is one of the richest women on earth and much of her profits are from arms trade including the notorious depleted uranium trade.

The video apparently created by anti-monarchy activists and published on YouTube says the British monarch has managed to increase her wealth from £300 million early in her 60-year reign to £17 billion at present thanks to investments in arms firms that produce uranium used in depleted uranium (DU) shells, including Rio Tinto Zinc. 

DU shells are notorious for their ability to pierce armor and kill targets due to their deadly radioactive features. 

The video cites the American nuclear radiation expert Jay M. Gould as saying in his 1996 book titled “The Enemy Within: the High Cost of Living Near Nuclear Reactors” that the British royal family, especially the Queen herself, privately own investments in uranium holding worth some £4 billion through Rio Tinto Zinc. 

The mining company, originally named Rio Tinto Mines, was allegedly created for the British Royal family in the late 1950’s by Ronald Walter Rowland, the Queen’s “buccaneer”. 

The video argues that the Queen and other royals have been investing in the death trade of depleted uranium globally with little ethical concerns for the consequences of their profiteering. 

DU weapons were first used by the US military during the first Persian Gulf War against Iraq in 1991. 

The US Defense Ministry estimated that between 315 and 350 tons of DU bombs, shells and bullets were fired during the conflict.

There are allegations that American and British troops used more than five times as many such weapons as the total number used in the 1991 war in Iraq. 

The US has confirmed the use of depleted uranium in both wars but refuses to disclose the scale of the use. 

Iraq has seen a sharp rise in the number of children with leukemia and genetic malformation in the decades after the First Persian Gulf War that are attributed to the use of DU weapons. 

Postscript to Saddam's downfall  

President Saddam Hussein

By Kamal Wadhwa

America was once again knocking on the doors of the Muslim world through its occupation of hapless and helpless Iraq except that the reasons for that ghastly and continuing carnage made no sense even if the paramountcy of America's national interest was duly acknowledged by all those who did the thinking for the Arab and Muslim world and its teeming millions.

Not many people knew that Saddam was a trained lawyer and that his claim over Kuwait was based on sound legal grounds. Kuwait had always been an integral part of Iraq under British rule. It was separated from Iraq by Great Britain because huge oil reserves were discovered under the sand and seabed.

Moreover, even after Kuwait was carved out of Iraq, the new Kuwaiti Assembly overwhelmingly voted for union with Iraq in 1938.

Saddam was by no means comparable to Nasser; therefore his downfall and eventual execution elicited no howls of outrage or outpourings of national grief amongst Iraqis or even the rest of the Arab world. Now he is merely another footnote in Iraqi history quite forgotten within a span of a decade and few years since America's invasion of that ill-starred country.

Despite all personal flaws and weaknesses, Saddam had managed to keep Iraq together for decades with a modicum of economic stability and its corollary, political peace, Can America's handpicked regime in Iraq do the same for any extended period of time after the last of the Marines are gone?

America's stated objective: To make Iraq safe for democracy - had all the aura and appeal of missionary zeal and missive though no one could quite identify the crude considerations that lay beneath it.

Was it the access and control over Kuwaiti oil that was the lynchpin of America's military strategy in the two Gulf wars? Or was the objective- strike at the only stable Arab power that had the gall to defy America - and thereby destroy the last remaining symbol of Arab sovereignty, nationalism and ethnic pride?

Since most of the other Arab states had been badly co-opted and compromised by America, Arabs have been the laughing stock and the butt of jokes from Washington to Vienna. Paradoxically, it was always America - not Uncle Sam - that had pride of place in Arab hearts with its ideas of democracy, free enterprise and individualism.

Alas, that dispensation is a dead letter today as is America's ideological appeal traditionally enshrined in the personalities of George Washington and Abe Lincoln.

The Shah is gone - and with him the tolerant and humane face of Persian Islam that was so open and receptive to Western ideas of modernity and secularism. Now America must grapple with another personality- the seemingly barbaric face of jehadi Islam as represented by the dead hoary Osama Bin Laden and his surviving Afghan cohorts - the Taliban.

America may also be forced to confront the nightmarish prospect of pitting its power and purpose against the Muslim masses from Brunei to Birmingham and the poisonous terrorism that springs from there. 

Unwittingly America has locked horns with Arab pride and much of the Muslim world that has not been co-opted by Washington's largesse and strong-arm tactics. Behind the seeming disarray in the Arab world caused by Iraq's successive defeat in the Gulf wars runs a permanent thread of resentment against America's power and purpose as it affects the Islamic world in general and the Middle East in particular. 

And with the diminishing of space within the Arab world brought about by the flood of Western goods and ideas invading their once protected markets and ideological enclaves, there is a perception that the effusive Arab and Muslim welcome to America and Americans cannot continue even though Mubarak, Gaddafi and other Arab leaders pretended to the contrary.

There was and is real hostility in the Green Crescent against Uncle Sam and his depredations against Muslim Iraq through its handpicked regime in the new Iraq. The little modernity and liberalism that the Arab world had attained through decades of experience with home-grown socialism is now in danger of being rolled back and capped with another kind of Islam that is totally unpalatable and uncharitable to America and its ragtag coalition of Britons, Australians and other Westerners.

America stands solitary and alone - especially now with the adoption of the doctrine of exceptionalism that affirms its superiority in the comity of nations and arrogates to itself the right to act as a global police power.

Daily America was persuaded to believe that the Arab and Muslim world are its permanent friends by the motley crew of allies and friends who flocked to and were fed in the White House with promises of moolahand munitions in order to find happier hunting grounds back home.

The sagas of King Hussein and General Musharraf are too well documented elsewhere to merit mention here. Suffice to say that everyone got a crumb or a dollop from the White House. So great was the embarrassment felt by these guests at the prospect of going home empty-handed!

The very self-worth and self-esteem of these leaders was indissolubly linked to being appointed, anointed and rewarded by the White House in order to get that iota of legitimacy in the eyes of those who truly mattered in their own countries. These people - certainly not the rank and file of the Arab and Muslim masses - valued American friendship because it resulted in concrete and tangible gains. 

The basic, fundamental and underlying flaw in America's foreign policy is the failure to appreciate and accept that the Arab and the rest of the Muslim world cannot be shaped to fit in with America's concept of democracy. Much of the American and European superstructure of democracy is built on a sound economic system; hence the reason for its continuing appeal and success.

On the other hand, the reality of life, especially in its economic aspect, is so bitter and sordid in the Arab world that America is seen as a gilded nation whose vision of the good life is simply eons away and attainable only after several rebirths and reincarnations. That is why the cruel dichotomy between America and the Arab nations - indeed with the rest of the Muslim world!

In the Arab and Muslim world it is almost impossible to rise to any ideal of the good life because the economic means to attain that life simply do not exist. Much of the Arab world outside the West is mired in inertia, languor and apathy because the chronic hunger present there does not allow otherwise.

Indeed, highly motivated criminals can rouse the masses to embark on any great enterprise by simply feeding them properly - something that no elected government has been able to do so far!

The irrational appeal of Osama Bin Laden and his Taliban supporters had found a fertile and receptive ground in the Muslim imagination precisely because the American occupation of Iraq had driven that country into a deeper deprivation than was its usual lot.

Where restraint and compassion were expected of the Great America - violence, mayhem and discord have been sown to compound the misery of the Iraqi people.

That is why the entire Muslim world, barring its Westernized leaders and elites, stands united against America - the Great Satan!     

    

Sensible Arab and other Muslim leaders who were sensitive to the Western liberal pulse had desperately tried from time to time to arrive at some democratic arrangement within their own countries.

The Shah's offer of a constitutional monarchy in Iran, Marshall Ayub Khan's basic democracy in Pakistan and Sukarno's guided democracy in Indonesia were some notable concessions made by these leaders to the very great demand for democracy made by the West.

However, these leaders could not garner support for their regimes from the West even though they were radical departures from previous institutions and great improvements as well! 

Hence the resultant lopsided confrontation between America and the Arab world over the former's handling of post-Saddam Iraq. Nothing more would have more pleased the Muslim masses of the Green Crescent than to see America retreat into isolationism behind its own ocean boundaries and thereby end the sufferings of the people of Iraq.