Nefarious Intentions

The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress was dictated…[because] Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending… that the good of the people was the object. Abraham Lincoln, 1848

Undoubtedly there are many people in the U.S. whose perspectives are guided in some part by a belief in an impending or future apocalypse. However, the answer to the question of what role these people play in guiding U.S. foreign policy is, very little. To observe why this is so one must first understand that there is a huge gulf between the people who share apocalyptic beliefs (the true believers) and the elites (the non-believers) that claim to share their vision.

Probably no one understood the concept of elites “pretending’ that the good of the people was the object” better than Abraham Lincoln when secessionists successfully sold to the people the issue of states’ rights wrapped around the narrow economic interests of the elite, resulting in the attempted secession of the southern states. Today, we observe that apocalyptic Evangelicals display disproportionate political power due in part to the highly contentious and partisan nature of contemporary politics. It is for this reason that politicians, especially those on the “Right,” pander to the motivations of these voters. These politicians backed by special interest are in many ways no different from the leading secessionists of Lincoln’s day. Apocalyptic views of the voting population of Evangelicals are being manipulated by politicians in inconspicuously cunning ways for the same ends that have directed U.S. foreign policy since the Monroe Doctrine.

What guides U.S. Foreign Policy?

In a nutshell, U.S. foreign policy is and has been directed by a “will-to-power” a need to discharge its strength, to dominate and to spread its values and culture for the purpose of controlling markets and global resources on behalf of U.S. corporations and special interests, especially the domination of scarce resources in foreign lands. This policy is and has been carried out around the globe by asserting its military and political dominance while the true intentions of feeding the narrow political and corporate special interests are cleverly masked by language that is well understood by those portions of the population whose support is required for its success. Where the U.S. has not been able to successfully convince foreign populations of its hegemonic supremacy, the U.S. destroys, disparages and/or isolates the target country and/or its leadership. Often the language used to justify these ends are found in values that the U.S. people hold dear, such as “freedom” and “democracy” and examples of the hypocrisy of these policies are evident throughout contemporary U.S. history

Israel as an Example

Those putting forth the theory that religious apocalyptic perspectives instruct U.S. foreign policy often attempt to use blind support for Israel as a case-in-point example, but for our purposes the principle of Occam’s razor or the simplest solution tends to be the best, is still the most instructive. There is no question that there are many supporters of Israel in the U.S. but is it more likely that this support exists due to the belief by some that it will hasten the apocalypse or is it more likely that the policy exists because the military-industrial complex, which holds tremendous sway in international politics (especially the U.S.), benefits enormously from the welfare subsidies that the U.S. government doles out to Israel, who in turn redirects those subsidies back to U.S. manufacturers of weapons? Many of those who see apocalyptic thinking influencing U.S. foreign policy fail to recognize that the U.S. is “the world’s leading arms exporting nation” (Aslam) which typically provides financial support for arms to unstable, undemocratic, brutal regimes who are actively involved in war, conflicts or human rights abuses and that have no historical ties to the biblical apocalypse.

Much of these theoretical religious apocalyptic musings are sophomoric in that they attempt to draw logical conclusions from misleading assumptions. For instance, Aziz and Berlet’s paper “Culture, Religion, Apocalypse, and Middle East Foreign Policy” tries to sell us their theory by touting the widespread sales of fictional apocalyptic books and public opinion polls, such as the CNN national poll in which 14% of people were found to believe that the first Gulf War was the beginning of Armageddon. By following the same line of reasoning should we conclude that U.S. foreign policy is more heavily influenced by reincarnated astrologers when we observe that a Harris poll of the same year showed that 31% of Americans believed in astrology and 27% in reincarnation? Certainly not, and just as these assumptions hold no weight their author’s theories fundamental problem is that they cannot accurately predict past or future patterns of U.S. foreign policy behavior.

Gary North in “The Foreign Policy of 20 Million Would-Be Immortals” concludes that “fundamentalists send money to Jewish organizations’ to speed up the process” of the apocalypse but he neglects to address the conditions that allow for the crimes of Israel to go unpunished, such as the widespread fear of the consequences of being labeled an anti-Semite when one publicly documents the terrorism, crimes against humanity and widespread breaking of international law by the Israelis during their obstinate occupation of Palestinian land. North also fails to address how the U.S. government’s support for Israel is not unprecedented, as support for brutal regimes seems to be the U.S. government’s apple pie, with example after example found throughout U.S. history and around the world i.e. Pinochet, Suharto, Noriega, Batista, Franco, Hitler and yes, Saddam Hussein.

Maybe the U.S. government’s unprecedented financial support is due to it finding its governmental soul-mate in Israel, which also talks about “freedom” and “democracy,” but only practices it when it serves the narrow self-interests of the elite and only when it doesn’t involve a Palestinian? Or is it likely that the military-industrial complex is such a strong U.S. political force that neither party questions allocations of taxpayer’s money for the purposes of purchasing U.S. manufactured weapons? Or maybe U.S. support for Israel persists because a vicious and self-perpetuating information vacuum has been created whereby mass media outlets are too afraid of reporting the actions of Israel and because of this blackout the American public never learns the reality so that they react strongly when Israel is justifiably condemned? Maybe neither of these theories are correct but they undoubtedly have a greater influence on U.S. foreign policy than does the apocalyptic perspectives of a few insignificant “true believers” who are merely seen as a means to an end by U.S. elites.

Iraq

No analysis of apocalyptic perspectives would be complete without a brief mentioning of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, after all, much of this discussion would not be taking place without it. While it may seem to some that the invasion and occupation of Iraq is the culmination of apocalyptic perspectives embodied in George W. Bush, again the principle of Occam’s razor is most elucidating. Is it more likely that Iraq was invaded to expedite the apocalypse or is it closer to the truth to posit that George W. Bush considered what it would mean for the U.S. to control Iraq’s vast oil resources and the fact that a war would insure that not only would he would remain President for another term but also help the cause of his party in the mid-term elections, not to mention all the campaign contributors and benefactors of the Republican Party who would be paid back in private contracts for first destroying Iraq and then cleaning up, rebuilding and securing the country? The fact is that the invasion of Iraq more closely resembles violent undertakings of previous administrations to secure resources and markets such as securing

“Mexico, especially Tampico‘ for American oil interests in 1914′. Haiti and Cuba‘ for the National City Bank’ the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street’ Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912′ the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916… China to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.” (Butler)

Conclusion

There is no doubt that certain forms of American Christianity and fictional apocalyptic perspectives have influenced many people in the U.S. and around the world. However, at this point it should be clear to all that these perspectives have always been superseded and manipulated by the tangible and pragmatic albeit myopic elite interests of the day. As extreme as some of these apocalyptic perspectives may seem, one is almost left wishing for their greater influence of at least some fictional visions of the future, such as those conjured in Wells’ “The Days of the Comet.” Instead U.S. foreign policy has been dominated by very convincing super-nationalistic and hubristic radicals; an iniquitous and insidiously pervasive ideology that seeks to use the ignorant to do its bidding as the elite that direct it vicariously leave their loafer prints across the faces of those people around the globe deemed to be beneath the narrow interests of the self-important. With history as our guide it’s clear to see that this reality won’t change until the conditions that make it possible are dispensed. If there comes a time when apocalyptic thinking more fully instructs the path the U.S. decides to put itself upon the vision must not include the violent and systematic elitist conditionings of the past that litter the pages of our history as it can easily be observed that those having failed to learn these lessons are presently in the process of repeating them.

Works Cited

Berlet, Chip & Aziz, Nikhil. “Culture, Religion, Apocalypse, and Middle East Foreign Policy.” 5 Dec. 2003.
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/analysis/2003/0312apocalypse.php

 

The Harris Poll #11, February 26, 2003. The Religious and Other Beliefs of Americans.

http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=359

 

North, Gary. “The Foreign Policy of 20 Million Would-Be Immortals.”

http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north188.html

 

Wells, H.G. “In the Days of the Comet.” 1906.

http://www.online-literature.com/wellshg/days_comet/

 

Aslam, Abid. “US Selling More Weapons to Undemocratic Regimes That Support ‘War on Terror.’” 25 May 2005.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0525-04.htm

 

Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC [Retired]. “War Is A Racket.” 1935.

http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm

“TARGET GLOBAL WARMING, TARGET EXXON”

With over 1400 local events, the April 14 National Day of Climate Action, www.StepItUp07.org, offered a national wakeup call, with citizens in every state raising their voice. But even as we build on this powerful day to move forward, we need to talk about why it’s been so hard for Americans to recognize the climate issue’s urgency.

As recently as July 2006, the acknowledgement of the crisis by ordinary Americans lagged behind not only our counterparts in Great Britain, Germany and Japan, but also behind those polled in China, India, Argentina, Nigeria and Indonesia. U.S. citizen awareness has increased significantly in the wake of this past winter’s massive storms (even before the latest East Coast disaster) and coverage of the international scientific reports. But though between 77% and 83% of Americans now acknowledge that global warming poses a serious problem, only 55% in a January Pew poll say the issue requires immediate government action, and only 47% in the same Pew poll say that they believe it’s human caused. This means there’s still serious denial. And to dismantle its architecture means taking on the key role of ExxonMobil.

Those who dismiss global warming’s threat have embraced a series of arguments, retreating from one to the next as they’re trumped by reality. The planet isn’t really warming, they say. If it is, it’s due to random fluctuations or sunspots, not human-created greenhouse gases. And even if global warming is real, it will bring more benefits than problems. Wherever I go, people offer up the same rationales. Some even rattle off the names of dissenting scientists, websites, or journal articles. They dismiss the 99% unanimity of international climate scientists and scientific associations by saying those sounding the warning are all on the take and probably also personal hypocrites.

“They’re just giving the government funding agencies what they want,” a student in Colorado Springs told me two weeks ago. “If they don’t, they won’t get their grants.” It’s an odd concept of pandering, given the massive challenges faced by any elected leader who takes the scientific message seriously. But the deniers insist that a handful of contrarians whose views are refuted by every major scientific study are somehow more credible than the collective judgment of practically every climate scientist in the world.

These arguments emerge from the standard echo chamber of Hannity, Rush, and Fox News. But the spokespeople who articulate them in these venues and others more mainstream have been overwhelmingly sponsored by Exxon. As the Union of concerned Scientists explores in their meticulously detailed report, Smoke, Mirrors and Hot Air, and as George Monbiot examines in his powerful global warming book Heat, Exxon’s strategy of using a handful of industry-funded  dissenters to cast doubt on an overwhelming scientific consensus was borrowed from the fight over tobacco regulation. In 1992, a major EPA report warned of the medical harm from second hand smoke. In response, Philip Morris hired the PR firm APCO to create a supposedly independent group, The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC), to promote scientists who’d dispute this harm. Enlisting enough other corporate supporters so the effort didn’t seem just a tobacco industry creation, TASSC’s mission echoed the phrase from a memo of fellow tobacco company Brown and Williamson, “Doubt is our product.”

As part of creating that doubt, APCO’s Steven Milloy founded JunkScience.com, which would later become a key website for global warming denial. Milloy also became associated with other key climate change denial organizations, like the Competitive Enterprise Institute (which has called the Kyoto accords “a power grab based on deception and fear”), and later become a columnist for Fox. Major climate denial activist Frederick Seitz also had strong tobacco industry ties, drawing $585,000 from RJ Reynolds between 1979 and 1987 before going on to the George Marshall Institute.  Exxon jumped in to support these efforts early on, as part of a more general assault on government regulation and action. As the scientific consensus around global warming began to solidify, they began funding a series of studies and spokespeople to insist that mainstream scientific opinion was sharply divided. Between 1998 and 2005 the company has invested over $16 million in challenging the overwhelming consensus among climatologists, spreading the resources among at least 43 different institutions to give the appearance of a broad chorus of dissent.  Whether the Heartland Institute, Alliance for Climate Strategies, Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, or the Competitive Enterprise Institute and George Marshall Institute, they all got major Exxon support for their role in arguing that no global warming crisis existed.  Until recently, the efforts to sow doubt have worked, with the help of a compliant media and the Bush presidency.  And though a number of other energy companies also participated, ExxonMobil was the critical initiator, and remained firmly denying the crisis even as other oil companies, like BP Amoco and Shell, acknowledged the gravity of the threat.

Many of us know Exxon’s role in climate change denial, and have avoided buying their gas for that reason. Others have avoided the company because of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. But we need more than individual actions. In July 2005, major environmental groups launched an international boycott. The coordinating organization, www.exposeexxon.org, has played an important role in getting the word out about the company’s role. Their petition campaign for Exxon to cease funding global warming deniers and join other oil companies in making significant investments in renewable energy has generated over a half million signatures. But their effort has mostly been a media campaign, as opposed to one focusing on grassroots organizing.

Even with this initial pressure, though, the company seemingly begun to backtrack. This January, new CEO Rex Tillerson claimed followed strong criticism of Exxon’s actions by the British Royal Society, US Senators Snowe and Rockefeller, and in the Union of Concerned Scientists report, by announcing that they’d stopped funding “five or six” of the groups that promoted climate change skepticism. But except for the Competitive Enterprise Institute Tillerson refused to name all the individuals and groups Exxon has given money to or specify those they’ve cut off. And he gave no reason for the shift, although an Exxon spokesman did say the adverse publicity was a distraction.

Meanwhile, the company is still paying a handsome salary to former American Petroleum Institute lobbyist and Bush Council on Environmental Quality chief of staff Philip Cooney, who Exxon hired after he resigned following media reports of how he edited the reports of climate scientists to render them innocuous. They even sponsor a website aimed at British primary school children, featuring a cute climate skeptic robot that claims the cause of global warming remains uncertain. And ExxonMobil continues to be rated lower environmentally than every other major multinational oil company. While the company’s stated shift may be hopeful, it’s by no means certain that it’s anything but greenwashing.

Solving global warming will be hard enough, even without orchestrated opposition. And off course we need to focus on where we need to go, like StepItUp’s call for an 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050. But if we only do that and ignore the counterattacks, our efforts will continue to get Swift Boated, and it will be far harder to build the necessary political will for them to succeed. Targeting Exxon pressures them and other corporations to stop trying to undermine the scientific consensus and to stop blocking attempts to rein in greenhouse gas emissions—as in a recent Competitive Enterprise Institute ad that proclaimed about CO2, “they call it pollution, we call it life.” It also highlights the roots of why so many Americans have resisted the reality of the crisis—how what many of us think this is just our personal skepticism is product of a deliberate disinformation campaign.

Some questionable companies are hard to boycott—where do you start with Haliburton? But ExxonMobil has a presence in every city in this country. Their gas stations are accessible for rallies and picketing. Every dollar that their stations lose and every bit of adverse press coverage will create further pressure.

Imagine if enough organized effort was focused so that Exxon had to sell or close some of their stations. Or if enough Americans understood their manipulative role so that both the company and the groups they’d supported lost all media and political credibility. Think about how INFACT (now the Corporate Accountability Campaign) ran their largely successful campaigns against Nestle and GE. Or how the United Farm Workers conducted their grape boycotts. Or the successful recent campaign of Florida’s Coalition of Immokalee Workers to get Taco Bell and McDonalds to require their subcontractors to pay higher wages to tomato pickers. These efforts didn’t just call on individuals not to buy specific products from the problematic companies. They actively organized, in communities, in congregations, and on campuses. They convinced their fellow citizens to withhold their dollars in a way that created the maximum public attention.

Global warming solutions exist, and we need to forge the political will to enact them, building on existing programs like California’s “million solar roof” legislation and the climate change initiatives of the European nations. But even as public attitudes begin to shift, and major corporations like GE, Dupont and BP Amoco are at least talking about taking the issue seriously, Exxon continues to impede political progress. To prevent a future of endless climate-driven disasters, we’re going to have to keep talking about their role.

Paul Rogat Loeb is the author of The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen’s Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear, named the #3 political book of 2004 by the History Channel and the American Book Association. His previous books include Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time. See www.paulloeb.org

Next Page »