The Deep State is an informal but profound alliance between the military industrial complex (against which president Dwight David Eisenhower warned us in November of 1960); the intelligence agencies of the United States, the United Kingdom and the State of Israel, plus their counterparts in diverse NATO member states; the traditional mass media in the United States and in US allies; the Democratic Party; and, traditionalist members of the Republican Party such as the Bush Family, the Cheney family, the McCain family and their political allies. The Deep State has riddled the federal government at all levels with moles, i.e. unelected bureaucrats, especially in the Department of Justice and its state and local level analogues, and throughout the federal judiciary; moles who carry out the orders of their billionaire masters rather than those of the people we elect to run our government, unless, of course, those interests coincide. Populists, from both the left and the right wings of the political spectrum, are individuals and organizations who believe deeply in democracy and liberty, but believe that the formal governmental institutions responsible for guaranteeing such concepts are inept and corrupt, and thus, they have little faith in the traditional political castes.
The Deep State manages to hold unto dictatorial power (i.e., control of legislative, executive, judicial, police and electoral functions) by keeping the populists divided based on fringe issues, most notably abortion and the right to bear arms, and by focusing attention on polarizing issues such as race, gender, sexual preferences, national origins, religion (and its absence) and the fake war on terror. Under the Biden administration, the Deep State has criminalized the right to protest, unless, as in the case of the Black Lives Matter rights, the protests serve their domestic political aspirations.
It is obvious that the Deep state profoundly manipulated the 2018 congressional elections and the 2020 presidential elections and that such manipulation had a profound impacts on the results. It is also at least possible and possibly likely, that the use of mass mail-in ballots without requiring the voters themselves to turn them in facilitated electoral fraud, possibly enough to have impacted the 2020 presidential election. Many of those who protested those results, whether violently, peacefully or through the legal process have been subjected to the full weight of federal and state penal systems in clear violation of the most fundamental principles of what used to pass for democracy in the United States, and that includes not only Republicans, but independents and members of smaller political parties. Many people who despised the GOP candidate in that election had no problem with the subversion of the civic rights involved as it helped their “team” to win, despite that such victory proved utterly hollow (where is health care for all, world peace, economic wellbeing, equity, equality, etc.?). But now, in a sense, the precedents they applauded have come back to haunt at least some of them, actually, the very best among them. I refer to the current police and legal attacks against students, faculty members and others who dare to protest against Israeli genocide.
As in the case of the Deep State machinations in the 2020 presidential elections, it is clear that the students, faculty members and others protesting against Israeli genocide have an existentially valid point. Everything they demand involves what the Nuremburg trials following the second war to end all wars prohibited and sought to punish by invoking the death penalty against the leaders involved and forever outlawing their political movements, outlawing them everywhere, but that has not proved to be the case as neo-Nazis rule the Ukraine, with full Deep State support, as well as Israel. And those who dare to point that out, to protest against it either violently, peacefully or through legal actions, find themselves persecuted, both civically and legally, with their futures placed in serious jeopardy, as is the case in the series of trials against protesters and critics of the results of the 2020 presidentai election.
It is profoundly ironic that the issues involved in both cases are so similar, while those involved feel that the two principle issues are completely different, and that the members of each group have nothing in common, when in reality, they are, in fact, so similar. Each group is comprised of deeply committed individuals who profoundly believe in truth, justice and equity, and who are willing to risk their “lives, property and sacred honor”, a phrase once attributed to United States founding father Patrick Henry”, to see justice done. They have a common enemy, the Deep State which adroitly manipulates them and uses each of the groups against the other in order to maintain the dictatorial power that permits it to abuse police at all levels and the penal laws such police and departments of justice are sworn to uphold, in order to continue the very profitable state of perpetual war, to continue to overthrow governments and to keep the truth under wraps, as it does, for example, though the imprisonment of one of the world’s only real journalist, Julian Assange. All actions which maximize the profits and minimize the risks of the wealthiest and least honorable among us.
How ironic that Trump supporters, to whom it is obvious that he is being persecuted through abuse of power in order to prevent his return to power, and that the corporate media has made a mockery of the truth in order to assist in that process, trust that same media when it calumnies against those who oppose genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, deeming them domestic terrorists, the same label it applies to those who expressed their outrage at what they perceived to be massive electoral fraud, in their protests at the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021. And how ironic that the students, faculty members and their supporters who are being subjected to high handed mass media and police abuse and abuse of legal processes to stifle their protests against obvious genocide, with tactics all too similar to those used against the s called January 6 terrorists, don’t realize that they not only have a commonality of interests in the legal process, but that many of their goals are compatible rather than antagonistic.
It is irony such as this, it is our own civic incoherence, which permits the worst among us to attain and maintain power, while the lives of the best and most courageous among us are destroyed. Something for all of us to consider as we vote this November and to consider that there are at least five candidates running for president, not just two, and that many political parties and movements are fielding candidates for the Senate and the House of Representatives, not just two. And that the same is true at the state and local levels. And that the only wasted votes are those we decline to cast for the things in which we believe and which we instead cast based on induced fears and in support of purportedly lesser evils. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, an intermittent commentator on radio and television, and, an occasional contributor to diverse periodicals and publications. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
Zionists and the Holocaust, The One with a Capital H as Well as the One Taking Place Today
A disturbing reflection by Guillermo Calvo Mahé, April 30, 2024
This reflection is long overdue and deals with facts that have been in plain sight for a very long time but which have been obfuscated, distorting the terrible reality in which we find ourselves and thus, making real solutions to the problems we face unattainable. However, the horrible deliberate slaughter we are experiencing in the Middle East, specifically in Palestine (Hedges, 2024, Al Jazeera, 2017), has brought the issue treated in this reflection to the forefront and, if the phrase “never again” is ever to attain the meaning ascribed to it (primarily as a slogan) following the Holocaust, it is essential that the concepts involved be fully and accurately examined. The topic dealt with in this reflection deals with the sociopolitical phenomenon known as Zionism, a widely used term usually devoid of context which, to an extent, this reflection seeks to provide. Not as a mere academic exercise but as a wakeup call and an existential warning, especially to the Jewish community which has been and continues to be used and abused by Zionists for their own nefarious purposes.
Zionism was originally a positive and important defensive reaction to European antisemitism seeking to encourage persecuted Jews worldwide to unite to aggressively defend their rights to equality and eventually, to establish a special refuge under Jewish control (Eichler, 2013). Many places were considered, including Argentina, Brazil and Uganda but eventually, the Palestinian portion of the Ottoman Empire came to be especially coveted, although it had been inhabited for millennia by, among others, the descendants of Jews who had refused to leave Palestine despite Roman persecution, most of whom had first been forcibly converted to Christianity and then to Islam. Those descendants of the original Hebrew population form the core of today’s Palestinians, albeit intermixed with other nationalities and cultures including Arab migrants.
In its quest to wrest Palestine from its inhabitants (Al Jazeera, 2017), Zionism unfortunately morphed into a rabid subgroup within Judaism but which also included Christian fundamentalist. The latter, although inherently anti-Semitic, see the establishment of a dominant Jewish state in Palestine as a prerequisite for Armageddon and then, the second coming of their messiah (Lewis, 2021) whom they refer to as Jesus the Christ, appellations which that individual never used, his name probably having been Yeshua ben Yosef. Problematically, Zionists attempt to speak for all Jews despite being rejected and considered anathema by many (Glass, 1975) and, instead of reducing antisemitism, have increased it, in many cases actively promoting it in an effort to force recalcitrant Jews to come under their umbrella, especially with respect to securing a Jewish majority in Palestine (Dowty, 2008; Nicosia, 2008; Reinharz, 1985). Indeed, Zionist tactics and strategies have come to mimic those of the German Nazis during the second war to end all wars, an irony of epic proportions. In light of the foregoing, it is essential to understand that Zionism and Judaism are extremely far from synonymous.
Unintended consequences are not always bad things; sometimes they make us reexamine past assumptions and beliefs. That is certainly the case with respect to the current genocide perpetrated by Israeli Zionists against Palestinians in the quest for ethnic cleansing (Hedges, 2024; Borrows-Freedman, 2024) and the support of such atrocities by all the major participants in the second war to end all wars, both Allies and Axis powers. Atrocities involving Israeli genocide and ethnic cleansing ongoing for over three quarters of a century (Al Jazeera (2017), in fact, since the end of the second war to end all wars, a war purportedly fought to eliminate state sponsored crimes of lesse humanidad, although, as in the case of most wars, the purported purpose was far from accurate.[1] In light of that reality, it is past time to conduct an objective review of just what happened during the build up to the second war to end all wars, what really happened during that war and what happened immediately following the war, in order to determine why it occurred, who was to blame and just how widespread the evil was. One question that has been asked but never answered with respect to that war’s immediate aftermath is why the atomic bombing of Japan was not considered genocide or the internment of Japanese Americans in concentration camps not considered a crime of lesse humanidad, such as the crimes with which leaders of the countries that lost that war were charged.[2]
The reality is that history has demonstrated that the Nuremburg trials and their Tokyo counterparts (Sellers, 2010; Buruma, 2023) were fraudulent travesties in large part orchestrated to divert attention from massively horrible war crimes committed by the victors, not just violations of human rights during the war but during the preceding centuries. It is therefore no surprise that their high sounding promotion and promises of a better, more just world have proven profoundly empty and that tens of millions died in vain, among them, twenty-seven million Russians, as well as the victims of the Holocaust. We celebrate the victims of that Holocaust, the one with the capital H, but dare not look into why it occurred or the role of Zionism in promoting it and turning Germany from a bastion of opportunity for Jews (Reinharz, 1985, chapters 3 and 4)[3], into their assassin, a question much more than just relevant in analyzing the nature of Zionism and its goals in light of the murderous nature of Zionism today (Rossinow, 2018), always noting that Zionism and Judaism are very far from synonymous. Indeed, during the first half of the twentieth century as it is today, Zionism is the prime promoter of antisemitism.
Very few people realize that during the first war to end all wars, the vast majority of Jews everywhere in the world were pro-German, including those in Germany, Russia and the United States, and that Zionists, betraying the majority of Jews everywhere, were tasked by the British with orchestrating the defeat of the Central Powers (Germany, Austria Hungary and Turkey) by goading the United States into entering the war on behalf of the Triple Entente (the United Kingdom, France and for a time Russia) in exchange for the land occupied for millennia by Palestinians (Cornelius, 2005; Stein, 1961). That was done and was the main reason that Germany, devastated in the post war “peace”, turned on its patriotic Jews, i.e., because Zionists claimed to have acted on behalf of Jews worldwide, without, of course, having the right to make that claim.
That such Zionists actions would lead to a massive increase in antisemitism was not only understood by Zionist leaders but was an important goal as they hoped that the extremely talented and productive Jewish community in Germany would be forced to immigrate to Palestine. That the costs of that massive and vituperous increase in antisemitism would be horrendous was irrelevant as, is the case of today’s genocide in Palestine, the ends, any ends at all, justified the means. However, German Jews were not as easy to manipulate as Zionists hoped so in 1933, well before the Holocaust, the one with the capital H, the World Zionist Organization, again acting in the name of all Jews, formally declared war on Germany, economic war to be sure, and organized a worldwide embargo on trade with Germany much as the United States has done this millennium with numerous countries, including Cuba, Venezuela, Iran and North Korea, and increasingly with Russia and China. The Zionist hope was that Germany would overreact and thus, that its Jewish population would either emigrate to Palestine voluntarily or be expelled. Zionists actually facilitated such emigration in collaboration with Adolf Hitler, on amicable terms, by negotiating what became known as the Transfer Agreement. All of the foregoing is clearly documented for anyone interested in the truth. See for example, “The Transfer Agreement and the Boycott Fever, 1933” (Walensky, 1987), a study published by someone with profound antizionist sentiments, to be sure, and thus attacked as unreliable, although, while its opinions and conclusions may be unsettling, even troubling to many, the facts are impeccable and are also documented by Jewish sources well-disposed towards Zionism (see Weiss, 1998).
The foregoing information is shared, not to justify the Holocaust, or to deny it, but to illustrate the nature of Zionism, an abomination to true Judaism, one willing to sacrifice anyone and anything in order to attain its delusional dreams of power and dominion. Domination not only over all Palestinians (or at least any that survived) but also of all Arabs and all Muslims, all in a sick parody of the Nazis final solution to the Jewish problem, the latter, a solution in large part crafted with the help of hypocritical Zionists themselves. Given that Zionists were willing to risk the death of six million Jews in order to appropriate the Palestinian homeland, their actions today putting the world at risk of nuclear holocaust ought not to shock or surprise us.
Most Zionists have always believed that genocide is an acceptable tool, taking the cue from the numerous instances in Hebrew history where it was used against their opponents, purportedly under divine command (Lemos, 2023). The examples are legion (most contained in the Torah) starting with the exodus from Egypt, the annihilation of Jericho, etc. Many have been cited by current Israeli leaders, including Israel’s prime minister, foreign minister and minister of defense as examples to follow with reference to the Palestinian people, more than 24,000 of whom, as of the date of this reflection (April 30, 2024), have been massacred by the Israeli Defense Forces, the vast majority of them defenseless women and children, many in obvious cold blood with the location of mass graves now a normal occurrence. Events celebrated in festive dancing and songs not only by Israeli soldiers, but more disturbingly, by Israeli children.
The so-called law of unintended consequences all too frequently results in terrible disasters and one might take the position that the horrible experiences involving antisemitism during the last century involved that phenomenon, but that would be a mistake. The consequences of Zionism were foreseen, intentional and lasting, impacting millions of people every day. The crux of this reflection is that today’s Zionist conduct, to the detriment of Jewish interests as well as to that of Zionism’s opponents, is not new. And perhaps, as an aside, to note how ironic it is that the three branches of the Abrahamic religion, Judaism, Christianity and Islam seem to have adopted the fratricide of Abel by Cain as their guiding principle.
A reading of the sources and suggested readings below makes the foregoing absolutely clear and it is the author’s hope that readers, disturbed by what is alleged in this reflection, will read, digest and analyze them. Many are available on line. The author has reached the conclusion that with the help of Zionists leaders, millions of Jews were the victims of genocide during the first half of the twentieth century. Readers may reach other conclusions. Nonetheless, it seems ironically clear that Zionism, which was a reaction to the crimes against many hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Jews, the victims of antisemitism throughout Europe during the past two millennia, have used the promotion of antisemitism as the most successful tool in their arsenal. An arsenal not really meant to protect the Jewish people but to consolidate power among a select group within Judaism, to steal their neighbor’s land, and to murder millions directly and indirectly through manipulation of Zionist allies in the United States and ironically, in Europe. Europe, where antisemitism was prevalent for millennia while the Islamic world, including Palestine, was the only place where Jews, as people of the book, were provided refuge and a modicum of opportunity.
Lemos, T.M. (2023): “Chapter 6, Genocide in Ancient Israelite and Early Jewish Sources”, pp. 185 – 208, The Cambridge World History of Genocide, Part II – The Ancient World; Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
[1] The American Civil War is an obvious example. The claim that it was fought to eliminate the scourge of African slavery is obviously untrue, witness President Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address and the fact that slavery continued in numerous Union states throughout that war, but continues to be taught and stressed as a fact. In truth, Abraham Lincoln was a rabid racist who felt Africans were inferior, should never attain political rights in the United States and indeed, should all be shipped out of its jurisdiction, preferably to Liberia or Panama, as he felt that Africans and whites could never, and should never, live together. See, e.g., Adams, 2000.
[2] Those objectives are critical but beyond the scope of this reflection and indeed, as it has been for over three quarters of a century, much of the required research seems impossible given existing legal prohibitions on research and expression, and the relentless classification of essential information as top secret. One wonders why? But even if the information were readily available, the required report would be beyond the scope of even detailed treatise, requiring the free exchange of diverse opinions to untangle the incredible web deliberately woven to obfuscate the truth we need to know. Thus, of course, the scope of this brief reflection is much more limited, but perhaps, nonetheless essential.
[3] Most Russian and German Jews supported the Germans, as did much of the largely anti-British Irish. Indeed, the other principle Central Power, the Ottoman Empire was also supported by most of the Jews and indeed, both David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben-Tzvi volunteered for the Turkish Army and, when they were rejected, moved to the US and tried to recruit Jews to set up a Jewish unit in the Turkish army, see Teveth, 1985, pp. 25, 26.
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, an intermittent commentator on radio and television, and, an occasional contributor to diverse periodicals and publications. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
As an independent academic, researcher, political analyst and commentator, I have several observations concerning candidates for the 2024 presidential nomination.
First, as to the GOP, albeit only two of the four mentioned remain, I would rank candidates as follows on the basis of danger to humanity and world peace: most dangerous, Nicky Haley (a Biden clone and Deep State shill); then, Ron DeSantis, Donald Trump and Vivek Ramaswamy. Ramaswamy seemed the most interesting, notwithstanding his Hindu inspired Islamophobia and reminded me of Tulsi Gabbard in some respects, but, as in the case of DeSantis, he has acknowledged the inevitable and dropped out. There were other GOP candidates but they really had nothing to offer, indeed, as in the case of Haley, most were sponsored and paid for by pro-Biden, Deep State loyal Democratic Party related donors. Of course, ranked on the basis of lousy personality, pomposity, apparent ego and childishness, no one can touch “the” Donald. Haley refuses to abandon her quest but that may be a preplanned Deep State strategy to cause Mr. Trump to expend resources ahead of the real contest in November. Ms. Haley and the Deep State are as friendly as is Mr. Biden and the Deep State. Cozier than that one cannot get.
On the Democratic Party side, well, there is no side although two candidates Dean Phillips, a Biden clone who feels Biden is just too old and infirm, and Marianne Williamson, a talanted and interesting non-politician, are running. However, the ill named Democratic Party has refused to organize debates and the corporate media is doing all it can to cooperate by rendering everyone but Mr. Biden invisible. Still, Ms. Williamson bears consideration. On the worst to best basis therefore, Ms. Williamson seems best, followed by Mr. Phillips (as neutral, or neutered, as one can get), and then, in last place, the worst candidate from any party, movement, etc., perhaps ever, the eternal warmonger and merchant of personal greed and corruption, “Genocide Joe”, aka, Mr. Joseph Robinette Biden.
Independents and third party candidates are very interesting and provide the most intelligent, competent and honest candidates so, of course, they are carefully facing assassination by silence. For the record, and in their case, in no particular order given that they are all pretty good, I would rank the top three as follows: Cornel West, an Afro-American philosopher, academic, civil rights leader, political activist and pacifist as the best, although his campaign seems terminally hokey; then, his former running mate (she was at the top of the ticket, he was in the second spot), perpetual Green Party candidate, Jill Stein, who shares most of Mr. West’s political perspectives but is a Jewish woman, rather than an Afro-American male; and, perhaps most interesting but with a fatal flaw, the most recognized candidate among the independents (largely because of his family name), Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. He is, of course, the son of the late senator, attorney general and assassinated presidential candidate whose name he bears, and the nephew of the late, assassinated president, John F. Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy shares many of Dr. West’s and Ms. Stein’s progressive perspectives but is apparently owned, lock, stock and barrel, by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), not unexpected given the reality that his father was assassinated by a Palestinian, but still, his tolerance for Israeli genocide and ethnic cleansing pretty much neutralizes his many positive qualities for most people who might otherwise have been inclined to support him.
The real question is, of course, given realities associated with the United States electoral system as impacted by lax voting standards and requirements; interference by the legal and penal system as well as the intelligence agencies; interference by most of the owners of major Internet platforms; and, the utter lack of objectivity by the corporate press (most in favor of Democrats, no matter what, but one in favor of Republicans on the same basis), what difference do candidates make, or the will of the electorate for that matter???
Of course, as in 2016, all of us but especially the Deep State may be surprised. But I doubt it. They’ve learned their lesson. The one sure thing is that the best person running, the most ethical, most experienced, with the best judgment, hasn’t a chance.
Good (and bad news) from another source concerning this year’s federal election, the person who would have been the best presidential candidate (he once was, but was trounced), Dennis Kucinich, is running for the House of Representatives again, albeit this time, wisely, as an independent. Goooo Dennis!!! Gooo independents!!!! The bad news is that he is not running for president. The corporate press, of course, is doing all it can (again) to make him invisible so any help readers can provide to overcome that tactic would, I’m sure, be greatly appreciated. He was Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s campaign manager but resigned when Mr. Kennedy’s anti-Palestinian bias led him to support Israeli atrocities. Good for him (Dennis, not Robert), his integrity, unlike that of most politicians, is neither for sale nor for lease. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
To an objective political observer, admittedly an endangered species as, among other things, he or she would need to have been either politically neutral or supportive of political movements with no chance of attaining or sharing in political power, January 6, 2021 was a reaction against a series of real insurrections that began more than four years earlier, insurrections which began during early November of 2016 when the leadership of the Democratic Party orchestrated a slow motion coup. A coup orchestrated in conjunction with most of the corporate media, the outgoing Obama administration, a large portion of the federal bureaucracy (especially the intelligence agencies and the Department of Justice), a significant portion of the judiciary at both state and federal levels and traditionalist members of the Republican Party (who vehemently opposed their party’s candidate). The insurrection, in large part involved a quest for autocratic power by political professionals tied to the military-industrial-intelligence complex but included many decent citizens who were terrified of the president-elect, both because of the successful media campaign against him as well as because of his “shoot-himself-in-the foot pomposity, belligerence and immaturity.
The insurrection was clear and obvious on January 20, 2017, inauguration day, when massive demonstrations against the new president were held in diverse parts of the country but especially in the capital, Washington, D.C., seeking to disorder the inauguration where the “protestors” swore to do everything in their power to disrupt the new administration, asserting that the new president was not their president. Unlike the events of January 6, 2021, those efforts were carefully coordinated, orchestrated, funded and organized with former attorney general Eric Holder as the point person. Mr. Holder had been charged by the outgoing president, Barak Obama, to lead a “civic” organization purportedly engaged in coordinating large scale, full time activities to “promote democracy”. As important as the Holder led organization was the attack on the new president launched by the Democratic Party in Congress and through the bureaucracy alleging that Hillary Clinton’s defeat in the 2016 presidential election had been due to illegal foreign interference by the Russian Federation. In the federal bureaucracy, the insurrection was stimulated through a series of continuing leaks of both classified information and rumors, most of which lacked serious merit. Finally, concurrently with the foregoing, an ongoing series of nationwide violent disturbances, including takeovers of government property were coordinated with the assistance of local elected officials, purportedly in protest of police abuse of power resulting in the deaths of a number of people who were apparently, but not always, involved in illegal activities.
Supporters of the newly elected president watched all of the foregoing in dismay, protesting the lack of related enforcement of applicable laws and, concurrently, the whole country was put through the spectacle in Congress and in the Justice Department referred to as Russiagate. The new president was accused of violations of the emoluments clause of the Constitution because his long established businesses continued to operate and a number of his supporters were promptly indicted by a hostile Department of Justice as unregistered foreign agents under rules that apparently did not apply to his political opponents. They still don’t. Nor, apparently, does the emoluments clause.
During the 2020 electoral cycle, as evidenced in information that became public when Elon Musk acquired Twitter, all the major social media platforms, major portions of the federal bureaucracy (especially the intelligence agencies and Department of Justice), all conspired to obfuscate evidence unfavorable to the incumbent’s opponent in the presidential election and to promote disinformation unfavorable to the incumbent, as well as to deprive the incumbent of access to most major media, social as well as corporate. In addition, purportedly based on measures required to avoid the consequences of the Covid 19 pandemic, most states controlled by Democratic Party affiliated governors relaxed restrictions designed to avoid electoral fraud by expanding access to both receipt and return of electoral ballots through mass mailing without required voter requests, and enabling their return, not by voters but by third parties, something anathema worldwide in states that seek to promote electoral integrity and avoid a market in votes.
The result of the foregoing was that an important plurality of the electorate lost confidence in the electoral results, especially when a barrage of mail-in ballots, many harvested by third parties and subject to discrepancies involving dates and signature verification, arrived at the last instant changing the anticipated electoral results. The foregoing seemed especially egregious in elections in the State of Georgia were many residents of foreign states were encouraged to move their voting domicile to Georgia in order to permit them to vote there. While problematic the issue became acute when a runoff was required in elections to the Senate and it was suspected that voters who had already cast ballots in other states, moved their voting domicile and were allegedly permitted to vote in the second round of the elections, although they’d not been registered in the first round. Numerous complaints of voting irregularities and improprieties were lodged all over the country but, in stark contrast to the allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 elections, the vast majority of such complaints were dismissed on procedural grounds and few were in fact investigated, exacerbating the suspicion that the election had been “rigged”.
On January 6, 2021, Donald Trump was still president of the United States and called for massive but peaceful protests, much the way the Democratic Party did in 2017, but also, to assure that protests did not get out of line, he urged that federal troops be deployed to protect the Capitol, an offer rejected by the Democratic Party leaders who controlled both the House of Representatives and the Senate. In the United States infiltration of political and civic movements by local, state and federal agents has become normal and the groups that organized the proposed protests for January 6 were thoroughly infiltrated, apparently not only by agents charged with gathering intelligence, but by agents provocateur who apparently participated in encouraging some of the protesters to invade the Capitol grounds in order to delay certification of the results of the 2020 presidential election by the Democratic Party controlled Senate while a member of the Republican Party still served as that bodies presiding officer. Apparently, some hoped that the vice president would order an investigation of the claims of electoral fraud and delay the certification but in that, they were very mistaken. A small group broke off from the massive protests and apparently, in many cases with the assistance of Capitol police, invaded the Capitol seeking to occupy it. Something not common but not unheard of either in other protests during the past century. To many of them, the Capitol represented the most appropriate site to engage in political protest, but some of them crossed the line and engaged in ludicrous activities as though they were souvenir shopping or engaging in photo sessions. There was some violence but the only serious violence was that taken by federal agents and police against the trespassers, in one case, involving what appeared to be the type of abusive taking of life which had led to the prior year’s Black Lives Matter protests. It is interesting to reflect on the purported terror the trespassers caused among the members of Congress present, members from both parties, members despised by most of the electorate with an approval rating at the time of only 20%. That approval rating is now even lower. Perhaps they have good cause to fear the electorate which, however, while disapproving heartily of Congress as a whole, keeps reelecting the same people in their own districts.
The consequences of the protests and trespass on January 6, 2021 were completely different than the reactions to myriad protests during the prior four years, many of which involved violence and takeover of government property on a long term basis, but few if any charges or prosecutions. Instead of investigating the allegations of electoral irregularities which led to the protests concerning the results of the 2020 elections, many of the protestors as well as the trespassers were charged with serious crimes, with many prosecuted, found guilty and, if they dared to fight the charges, sentenced to lengthy periods of incarceration. The fact that they honestly believed they were performing their duty to protect the Constitution was, despite constitutional guarantees and especially the provisions of the Declaration of Independence, deemed irrelevant. As was the comparison with the activities of the four prior years.
The last three years have done nothing to diminish the absence of faith in the legitimacy of the electoral system. Indeed, flagrant attempts to defeat democratic (small “d”) support for the ex-president have increased, with the full weight of the judicial system at both the state and federal level, both the penal and civil systems, weaponized to prevent the former president, who leads all the presidential polls, from returning to power; to prevent him from even appearing on presidential ballots. That, of course, reinforces rather than diminishes the certainty among those who believe that the 2020 presidential election was “stolen”, that they were right, and that those involved in the disturbances at the Capitol three years ago were brave patriots fighting to preserve, rather than to overthrow democracy.
Many believe (with cause) that the electoral systems in purported democracies all over the world are unreliable, and that includes many in the United States. They may well be right. They are probably right. Even if votes are actually counted accurately, as to which there is now serious doubt, manipulation by the corporate media, social media, the bureaucracy and the judicial system has become fairly obvious. That is a systemic problem in a system where selection of members of the judiciary is a thoroughly politicized process and where self-serving billionaires not only control all media, but own it, and have the technological tools to completely manipulate it.
The issue of a downward spiral involving geese and ganders is now very concerning. If Mr. Trump regains power, what happens next? The bureaucracy is so thoroughly entrenched, as is the judiciary, that attempts to reform them would require massive dismissals, something that the courts could easily obstruct for at least four years. Calling for a new constitutional convention may be an answer, but the specter of declaration of a state of insurrection, martial law and the emergence of a permanent, formal dictatorship seems all too likely. The former may be the case regardless of who wins given that another election deemed stolen may well lead to a real insurrection, and as Abraham Lincoln taught us, the only way to deal with real insurrections is through an autocratic dictatorship. Not that we’re all that far from such a situation now.
Donald Trump is not the cause of the foregoing problems, although he may well be a catalyst. It is hard to understand, given his personality and mannerisms, how so many voters support him, but they do. And, as in the case of so many who vote for Democratic Party candidates although they loath them and their policies, many Trump supporters support him, I strongly suspect, because they loath the party of perpetual war, ever increasing defense and intelligence budgets, foreign intervention and polarizing woke policies, the Democratic Party. And because in both cases, although other options exist (in this electoral cycle, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Jill Stein and Cornel West come to mind), they are frozen out of the quest for power by the corporate media and the duopolous dictatorship under which we’ve lived all of our lives.
As an aside, one wonders how those who celebrate the 4th of July can feel so opposed to political insurrections by citizens who honestly believe in the principles enunciated in the Declaration of Independence celebrated on such date. Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, believed that such reactions were healthy and ought to take place at least every twenty years. While to me that seems extreme, given our current polarization and the extent to which our civil and political liberties are being curtailed, I acknowledge that populist reactions from both the left and right wings of the political spectrum appear to have reached a boiling point. Given this sad state of affairs, one obvious to those of us who live abroad but apparently invisible to too many of those who live in the United States, the future certainly bodes ill for the United States, but as far as most of the world is concerned, that may not be a bad thing.
Things on which to reflect, seven plus years after the start of the successful Democratic Party insurrection of 2017. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
The concept of democracy in conjunction with governance seems a sacred cow, unfortunately, a dysfunctional sacred cow given that the concept of democracy is neither understood nor respected and that what is required for the constitutionally guaranteed “public welfare” is efficient, transparent and honest governance with the capacity for long range planning and for providing its constituents with the opportunity to fully realize their capabilities and to lead peaceful, comfortable, happy and fulfilled lives. That is certainly not what exists anywhere today. Rather, we have self-perpetuating systems built on pillars of omnipresent corruption implemented through corrupt mass media and administered by corrupt entrenched bureaucracies. Human rights, as the long-term Israeli genocide in Palestine supported by the United States and NATO makes clear, are mere delusions.
There are two principal poles for what is considered democratic governance, presidential systems with legislatures elected for fixed terms, and parliamentary systems which meld legislative and executive functions for variable terms, the exact length depending on how well the executive, which stems from the legislature, and the legislature are able to function collaboratively. The latter is both more democratic and more coherent, but has its own internecine flaws. In addition, there are forms of governments that require voters to participate (or else), generally in uniparty Communist systems, the most successful being those in the Peoples Republics of China and Vietnam, but according to the western press at least, they apply serious restrictions on personal liberty.
Looking at the most efficient governments, those most able to function strategically as well as tactically, it appears that long term executive leadership is essential, leadership such as that demonstrated in Germany during the long chancellorship of Angela Merkel and in the Russian Federation during the Putin era and the aforementioned Chinese and Vietnamese systems. Of course, corrupt and inept long term leadership, such as that in Egypt, is awful. Trusting that a majority of the people make the best electoral decisions has proven a fallacy, largely because the “people” are not free to select candidates, that function in reality being effected through a partisan filtering system controlled by purported elites and now, imposed in countries like the United States through blatant judicial manipulation as well. In addition, the resulting disinterest results in lack of participation so no candidate is likely to ever receive more than 50% of the eligible vote, the quintessential aspect of democracy.
If the foregoing is accurate, then perhaps we need to consider how to implement a meritocratic rather than democratic method of selecting our leadership on a long term basis, but a method subject to earlier democratic revocation for misfeasance or malfeasance and with significant personal penalties in the case of any such revocation. It could, for example, involve, in the first instance, a selection process embodying the philosophy of the original Electoral College in the United States, with a democratic revocatory process exercised both periodically, say every five years, or on the spot if invoked by a significant portion of the electorate dissatisfied with the results of the incumbent leader. Electoral participation by the citizenry would, as it was in ancient Athens, be a duty and not a right, with serious consequences for shirking it or exercising it in a corrupt manner (e.g., selling or renting it). It smells a bit too much like the fascist ideal of an overall, all-powerful leader, except for the revocatory mechanisms but those make all the difference. Admittedly, the concept needs to be polished a bit with a check and balance mechanism such as a negative legislature, an elected body charged with political control functions and the ability to veto executive decrees (which would replace traditional legislative functions), but not responsible for enacting legislation. A multi cameral negative legislature would be best, one chamber being selected democratically, one based on pluralistic concepts and one selected meritocratically based on expertise in diverse areas but all three chambers voting as one. Of course, an independent judiciary would be essential, but not one charged with constitutional control or review, as would an independent body controlling the electoral system, perhaps a body selected by the legislature. The most serious penalties under the penal system would be reserved for violation of political and judicial duties, pretty much the way it is today in the People’s Republic of China.
If it ain’t broke don’t fix it is a saying reflective of a great deal of common sense but one that does not apply to our current models of governance.
Something to at least consider, although implementation in the face of the entrenched and ruthless deep state makes any kind of real reform improbable. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
Charles Dickens’ “a Christmas Carol” has, since it was first portrayed on the stage and screen, resonated with very diverse segments of our population although now, more realistic Carols seem to focus on a new verse, one appended to the beginning of “the Twelve Days of Christmas”, one that starts six months earlier than the older verses and deals with “… myriad merchants a’ selling ….” So perhaps that older resonance is a bit dulled and in need of refreshing.
Perhaps a bit of reflection might help, a bit of introspection as the solstice skims by us and echoes of pagan Yule and Roman Saturnalia regale us with mirth to go along with the myrrh purportedly provided to an ostensibly special infant born in Palestine long before Zionists sought to destroy that part of the world; well, destroy it, then absorb it, and then turn it into an exclusive Palestinians-free paradise. One might be excused for wondering what use a newborn would have for myrrh, a fragrant gum resin obtained from certain trees and used, especially in the Near East, in perfumery, medicines, and incense, but, what the heck; … so the story goes and the gift of myrrh is not its least credible aspect.
Soooo, … let’s reflect away to the tune of “Jingle Bells”, or perhaps, the Jose Feliciano version of “Feliz Navidad”:
On an individual basis, the Christmas season is delightful, at least for people blessed with positive familial harmonics supplemented by ties of easily accessible meaningful friendship, but it is deeply depressing for those not so set apart. The latter group concerns me deeply because it is comprised of the forgotten and of those who for one reason or other, never seemed to matter. Those with whom the Nazarene, whose birthday so many purportedly celebrate during this season, would be most concerned, assuming he existed and was as beneficently described rather than the angry Pauline version. Of course, while in the modern “Western” world the season focuses on the Nazarene, the season’s traditions are primordial and have been, in many cases, usurped through manufactured syncretism with far older and more complex cultures, cultures which in some cases have refused amalgamation.
Perhaps the foregoing might serve as a thought bandied about among the ghosts of Christmas past, Christmas present and Christmas future, a thought we might all want to take into account and perhaps, about which we might even consider doing something positive. And if so, why limit it to this particular season?
Bah humbug!!!! I wonder what exactly, using linguistic analysis and perhaps philology that is meant to mean. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
Alabaster and indigo, or is it, … “or” indigo. Negative entropy blues, anyway.
It’s said, albeit in an all too unreliable source, that “for everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven”. Perhaps there’s a bit of truth there. Perhaps not.
It’s approaching the Ides of December in an odd-numbered year, a year preceding one in which February will be a day longer. An illusion of course, as are all months in a solar year. But, at any rate, it’s at least a metaphorical season, a season for memories as another galactic solstice approaches.
A season for melancholy and nostalgia, for yule logs and the revels of Saturnalia and little drummer boys not yet blasted to shreds; a season for wistful bagpipes and for sanguine guitars, Arabic music melding with Keltic. A season for reflecting on the pasts we’ve lived and on those we might have lived, for good or ill. A season for introspection and for reflection on feelings of love we’ve shared and for speculation on loves we should have shared but let slip away, and perhaps, for regretting some that might best have been avoided.
A season, perhaps, for discarding enmities and hatreds, although that’s all too often much too hard to do. A season for remembering friends who’ve passed beyond the veil and for regretting the time not found to spend with them. Perhaps a season for wondering whether there’s a state of unity that might make everything worthwhile (if, in fact, “for everything there [really] is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven”) or, a season for lamenting that the purported prince of Peace was an illusion.
Introspective reflection is as dangerous as it is beneficent. Perhaps more so.
Reflections are all too often more bitter than sweet. So many regrets, so many mistakes, so many paths not taken. So many twists and turns into obscure shadows, flashing echoes drawing us further and further into a dark abyss where terror dwells as others, thundering, warn us away. Cherished memories more and more quickly fading; more and more tarnished with each passing day as things in which we once took pride turn out to all too often have been mere delusions.
Here and there, barely noticed and all too often ignored, unexpected rainbows play with fireflies and tiny birds buzz in place sipping sweet nectar from flowers blooming in myriad tones and hues. Clouds form shifting tapestries on azure fields above swirling waves of peaks changing from greens to greys then from blues to purples and, every once in a while, tipped with gleaming cones of winter’s bright white; peaks interspersed with golden fields and silvered river valleys, all doing their best to ignore intrusive asphalt roads and cement cities. Transient monuments to imagined triumphs slowly but surely returning to the dust from whence, like us, they came.
The Ides of December are upon us, … again. Then the solstice will arrive, winter in half the globe, summer in the rest. Cycles continue. Divergent rites of passage form myriad wakes woven into strange tapestries by disinterested fates, one a crone, another a mother and the third barely a lass. All the while, Alekto, Megaera and Tisiphone, the Eumenides, curious but patient, continue to watch, certain that all things, good or ill, will come to those who wait.
Or so, the ubiquitous “they”, say.
Alabaster and indigo, or is it, … “or” indigo. Negative entropy blues, … anyway. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
If this is not the most beautiful song ever, there are none more beautiful: Don McLean’s Vincent, an Ode to Van Gogh. More beautiful as poetry than as music and, set to prose it might read like this:
Starry, starry night, paint your palette blue and gray, look out on a summer’s day with eyes that know the darkness in my soul.
Shadows on the hills, sketch the trees and the daffodils, catch the breeze and the winter chills in colors on the snowy, linen land.
Now, I understand what you tried to say to me and how you suffered for your sanity, and how you tried to set them free. They would not listen, they did not know how; perhaps they’ll listen now.
Starry, starry night, flaming flowers that brightly blaze, swirling clouds in violet haze reflect in Vincent’s eyes of china blue; colors changing hue, morning fields of amber grain, weathered faces lined in pain are soothed beneath the artist’s loving hand.
Now, I understand, what you tried to say to me, how you suffered for your sanity, how you tried to set them free. They would not listen, they did not know how, perhaps they’ll listen now.
For they could not love you, but still your love was true and when no hope was left inside on that starry, starry night, you took your life as lovers often do. But I could have told you, Vincent, this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you.
Starry, starry night, portraits hung in empty halls, frameless heads on nameless walls with eyes that watch the world and can’t forget, like the strangers that you’ve met; the ragged men in ragged clothes, the silver thorn of bloody rose lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.
Now, I think I know what you tried to say to me, how you suffered for your sanity, how you tried to set them free. They would not listen, they’re not listening still, perhaps they never will. _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
It’s a beautiful, sunny Saturday in the city in the sky. The one set among snow clad peaks and thermal springs near an adjacent volcano or two and the remnants of several glaciers. The one set atop the central range of the Colombian Andes in the midst of a sea of mountains dressed in diverse verdant shades. It seems summery although in the Northern Hemisphere, the part of our planet in which this part of Colombia is set, it is late autumn, just short of winter. But then, this close to the equator, seasons tend to meld and shift and be measured in hours rather than months.
The world seems as bad as it’s been since the second war to end all wars a bit over three quarters of a century ago, all the lessons it purportedly taught at best unlearned but more they were probably just fictitious attempts at justifying unjustifiable terminal follies. Again. After all, the second war to end all wars took place less than two decades after the first war to end all wars ended. And wars? Well, they’re just fine, in fact, perhaps healthier than ever.
Still, … as individuals here and there, life plows on, life: full of interpersonal challenges and triumphs, its own interpersonal beauty and mystique artfully masking our own errors and mistakes.
The Global South (which ironically includes Russia and China and Iran but definitely not the Ukraine) seems to be making headway in its quest for liberation from the constant abuse, humiliation and looting that flows from the North. But not without severe challenges as the Global North has no intention of brooking what it considers insolence by lesser species. By people almost but not quite human.
Notwithstanding the hypocritical “woke”, condescension still rules.
Still, … there is a scent of a different sort of future and lingering echoes seem to wonder whether such future will be better or just filled with shadows from the past, and whether the images we’ll see in our future mirrors will reflect who we’ve been, or we claim to have been, or who we wish we had been, or who we’d like to be, or who we’ve been forced to become. Hopefully the images that stare back at us will not be too much like those of those who for so long have oppressed so many. Wishful thinking, I know, but “if our reach does not exceed our grasp, then what’s a heaven for”, as Robert Browning wrote. But then, he was a poet, not a politician, a journalist or a historian (the illusory professions).
Omnipresent, dystopia seems to rule. We seem to be a people in transition, greedily tearing down the past without any agreement on what will replace the corrupt social institutions that have been decaying, putrefied for millennia. Decaying but refusing to die. That confuses and polarizes us as we’re manipulated by the worst among us, the Northern hegemonic wannabe leaders who refuse to let go and definitely decline to share, but who still exercise almost total control. Yet, “almost” is an optimistic harbinger, a qualifier that hints at possible changes, perhaps even beneficent changes.
Who can tell?
But we can hope.
Especially on a beautiful sunny Saturday in early December, one in which at least some of us are safely ensconced among some of those we most love, … at least for the day.
The carnage, genocide and ethnic cleansing underway in Palestine by the worst cultural descendants of the tribe which, after looting Egypt, went on to plunder and murder every man woman and child in ancient Jericho, continues unabated despite popular condemnation in the Global South and even, among an enlightened minority in Europe, the United States and even Israel, although, from here in the heights of the Andes, as in the United States and Europe, to some, that all seems very far away. Far enough away so that the screams of pain and dying gasps and mourning and lamentations are barely audible and thus, perhaps, at least for them, can be sanitized and washed away.
Or at least shouted down and obfuscated through carefully crafted rhetoric, with reckoning postponed, if not for ever, at least for another day.
After all, who mourns for ancient Jericho today? _______
Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.
Guillermo Calvo Mahé 