I just watched the ABC Lateline interview with Christopher Hitchens...My notes.

The first question was; What does the situation in New Orleans tell us about the last superpower?  (Ha Ha)

Hitchens suggests that there was an unpardonable lack of preparation.  And; No coordination before the event.

Then there was the inevitable question what 'do 'These revelations about human nature - well American nature, what does it tell us?

Hitchens went on to stress the Hobbesian aspect of what is occurring, and I think this is the wrong way to look at it as I suggested in draining the swamp of the Mississippi.  But he is always informative about the machinations of the situation within America.

When the inevitable question about spending money in Iraq whilst cutting national projects was raised, Hitchens commented that this idea has moved from latent to blatant in the mind's of the people.   'All that money going to an A-Rab'...

He predicted that this will be seen as ' A hinge event of the second term'.  And that it reflects incompetence and insouciance.   The transcript will be found here.

http://abc.net.au/lateline/

I agree with the basic sentiments expressed by Anita and Keza, but we must get deeper than the cliché point of ‘empowering the people’ and come up with specifics.

All industrialized countries deal with their natural disasters reasonably smoothly, and so will the U.S. now they have got rolling. However, the extent of failure in relation to preparedness, and the delays in the immediate evacuation and flood responses in a country such as the last superpower no less, are quite breathtaking. 

The problems are systemic, but also connected to ‘the boy who cried wolf syndrome’ (amongst both the masses, and the authorities at all levels).   They were all familiar with hurricanes, became over confident and paid the price.  

Obviously, what has happened is not in the interests of anyone (other than perhaps a few of the lumpen-proletariat, and the political opponents of George W Bush).  If political and technical leaders all had their time over, things would no doubt have been done differently. Now, as a result of the obvious failures, the political heat is on.  So a hyped up, yet business as usual style of clean-up activity, will speedily resolve the engineering, and recovery problems, and vast improvements will be noticeable very quickly.

Even though Bush has already accepted formal responsibility, the enquiry into ‘what went right, and wrong’ led by George W Bush will eventually produce explanations which we can expect will be intertwined with some excuses for the federal elite.  This is because the ruling-class has a dual problem; they need to know the truth, and yet they need to conceal the contradictions of class society. 

The ruling-elite, additionally, need to spin their personal role in as favorable a light as possible; simply because they face elections.  We saw this effect recently with the military enquiry in Iraq where General Sanchez, clearly guilty, as exposed at ‘Do What Must Be Done.net’, was nevertheless exonerated, and found to be blameless for  the Abu Ghraib scandals.

I think we can anticipate the enquiry’s technical findings, at least to this extent; the hurricane caused widespread damage, but the failure of the levees brought the catastrophe.  Most people who had decided to stay put in New Orleans, did so on the presumption that the levees would not fail, and so  would have been fine had that presumption been proven correct. 

The levees were the key link, and that link was let go.  The forces to defend them were not sufficiently in place before the storm; during the storm; or just after the storm (when they failed).  Even from this distance, it is clear that they could have been defended far more strenuously and should never have been breached. 

All levels of authority to a greater or lesser extent made mistakes, and that will be revealed by the enquiry.  This disaster, to the extent that people are being critical, was a planning problem at all levels.  But because all classes want the cause of this technical failure identified and rectified, in order to improve preparedness, and prevent a tardy response (at any level) the next time, there will be change and improvements implemented.  It’s in everybody’s interests, so it’s inevitable.

However, the point being made in earlier posts is really about changing systems to achieve greater democracy, and not just refining the technical capabilities of the bureaucracy that assesses the situation, takes the decisions, and gives the orders. 

Naturally, there is a real risk that as democracy expands at the base, inexperience at that level can lead to greater milling about and indecision, especially during times of crisis; indeed middle management types will emphasize this, as they try to preserve their powers and privileges.  However, if there is greater centralization at the higher levels, simultaneously as the base expands, the middle levels can lose their authority in both directions and the outcomes be improved to ‘cut out the middle men’.

The ‘authorities’ at all levels must be brought to account in such a way that they are not just improved, but challenged to surrender more of their power to both lower and higher levels.  The middle has to continually justify itself until its very existence is under threat. 

We are used to this process occurring in the economic sphere. (Farming keeps changing to ever larger agribusiness, and continues to expand and create employment for rural proletarians; family farms are ground under; corner stores go the way of the blacksmith; and independent petrol sellers become as rare as hens teeth etc.)  However, it seems it is just as important that this occur politically.

This flattening of the mass of people may well be good for the preservation of the capitalist system in the medium term, say a hundred years, give or take, (groan), enabling the system to bend more and break less, but revolutionaries have to struggle for improvements within the system, until such time as the system actually breaks and has to be changed, otherwise we would be good for nothing at all, simply because we would have developed no practical experience.

Incidentally; the increasingly rapid spread of this economic process is apparent to all, as standards of living are rising, even for the poor; but while the economy has continued to perform well and unemployment levels have fallen, or been more widely spread into a broader under-employment, (including internationally) there is not much interest in the process.   Other than of course from the latest petit-bourgeois going under; or the latest proletarian being discarded; or the peasant still stuck in the countryside.  But economic crises eventually do come along and the processes are again revealed starkly to the forgetful masses in the form of mass unemployment and system failure.  However, as this is more an article of faith in leftist thinking in the context of this article, I’ll leave that point and resume.

Bureaucratic bungling to the degree just demonstrated in the U.S. is comparable to the widespread incompetence within the ranks of all levels of authorities in the U.S.S.R. before it collapsed in farcical circumstances, and went to history’s dustbin; however I think the U.S. is in the process of mildly reforming itself to the extent that it’s not about to go that way quickly (say in the next ten or so years) but nevertheless, we are once again moving into ‘interesting times’.

Since 9/11, George W Bush has dumped the old policies that led to such a failure and has been actively promoting bourgeois revolution in the Middle East.  The U.S. has obviously been promoting the establishment of parliamentary democracies, and ‘the rule of law’ (as these laws become established by the revolution), while the pseudo-leftists were, and are largely still in massive denial about this.  Just listen to Galloway 'debating' Hitchens, how can people avoid the conclusion that Galloway is anything other than a caricature of a leftist! 

After Katrina, Bush will have to apply some of the Iraqi lessons to his domestic front.

The policy of a revolutionary war of liberation in Iraq, no matter how messy, (and war certainly is that), has no alternative, and the purple fingers of the Iraqi masses will continue to condemn pseudo-leftists. (Picture this conversation in ten years time, long after the Coalition has gone home: ‘Daddy, what did you do during the war to liberate the Iraqi people?  I advocated leaving Saddam in power, because I thought the U.S. just wanted the oil’)

Walid Jumblatt style conversions (after Syrian troops went off on the road to Damascus) will spread, but the time frame for these conversions to be widespread is still several years away.  This is because actual observations of the practice of what the war in Iraq has led to (or leads to), is now required to change most people’s stance. 

Issues like oil, and or the installation of Iraqi political puppets; anti-democratic Constitution’s; or permanent U.S. military bases, must now prove themselves in practice one way or the other.  The theory debate has been fought out and people have chosen to believe what they want to.  

I think explanations like oil, and puppets etc have self evidently collapsed; but they are still widely believed in, so I have to believe that time will expose more fair-minded people to the reasoning, and their views will change.  However, I’m reminded that there are many people who are not fair-minded, such as the old school U.S. foreign policy establishment, and many committed pseudo-leftists.

When the foreign policy establishment realized that the new Bush policies were not just the usual phony rhetoric about supporting democracy, but a genuine reversal of policies followed since the end of WW2.  i.e. their policies, they were virulently hostile to the changes but they had to mask this hostility with phony expressions of doubt over whether such good intentions were possible to achieve etc.

Bush had to describe the former rotten policies, as ‘excusing or tolerating tyrannies’, rather than correctly pointing out that, the previous policies were often to install and maintain murderous tyrannies.  Neither side could expose just how rotten the U.S. policies have been.  That is exactly why so many people do not believe Bush, and think his policies are the same old phony rhetoric masking a vicious imperialism throwing its weight around for the sake of nicking oil.

But the foreign policy establishment are losing the debate, (‘what could they possibly say’ springs to mind) and the changes to the establishment’s views, and administrative personnel are now settling down and becoming the newly accepted wisdom as the old school continues to depart.  There is now no alternative to the Bush doctrine in Iraq.  Tweedledee and Tweedledum views are being re-established in the two party dictatorship that is the last superpower.

At any rate, Iraq as a task will be over when the next U.S. President is elected, and the old foreign policy establishment tries to make its comeback.  The rest of the swamp-draining project is still up for grabs though because Americans will get a change as Bush is a second term President. 

It’s two years too early to even guess what policies the next President will abandon, or go soft, on or adopt, before or after the election.  But the elites are starting to position their preferred candidates, and even Hilary Clinton is a real possibility.  So, Middle Eastern swamp-draining could be set back; but it cannot be undone in Iraq, and Iraq’s influence on the region can not be undone either.  The revolution in the Middle East has been kicked started.

Whatever happens, the next Presidential Administration has to continue the ‘War on Terror’, and there will have to be further military actions for years in Afghanistan as but one example.  Isolationism is not an option, so there will have to be debate about where to next, in the context of the continuing real decline of U.S. power. 

We will not see a new round of the U.S. installing or propping up people like Pinochet, Marcos, and or Suharto, despite the ranting of the ‘stoke the war’ sorts.  Pressure will still have to be applied to the Saudi regime; Iran; Nth Korea; and the Israelis; and once that level of policy position is rusted into place there is not that much wriggle room left. But I would like to read what others think are the main dangers.

What Hurricane Katrina has exposed in the U.S. is that a two party dictatorship (like Australia and Britain), is ‘not that much better than a one party dictatorship’.  Mainstream views become reduced to two, Tweedledee and Tweedledum parties, and a stagnant bureaucracy settles in.  This is hidden pretty well when science is pushing development along as swiftly as it is at present, but nevertheless these bastards are genuinely holding things back.

The struggle for Proportional Representation is very important, not because it genuinely spreads more power to the lower levels, but just to gain some room to ‘let a hundred flowers blossom, let a hundred schools of thought contend’.

However, a contradiction exists in that globalization and technological progress implies greater centralization.  The answer, IMV, is to go after bureaucracy and keep up the attack on ‘middle management’.  Continue to centralize.  Attack small is beautiful thinking and the underpinning green philosophy.

All classes want to prepare for disasters, and don’t really have separate interests in the face of a natural disaster.  Hurricane Katrina, has had a political dimension added to it because it has been mismanaged.  Those left to fend for themselves want to know who stuffed up.  Class and race were put forward as explanations for the tardiness in response, and though the race question is largely falling flat; the class question is unavoidable. 

If you owned a car and could drive out of town no problem; if you were poor; sick; or without transport; you were in trouble.  If you were a rich president, you could rant about zero tolerance of looting, while poor, or thirsty people, on the ground saw things decidedly differently. 

I have no knowledge of the U.S. to be specific in any political demands.  But as for Australia, I see no reason to change from the policy of campaigning to expose the ALP, while not supporting the Liberals, or the ‘left in form, but right in essence’, Greens.

Being ‘left of the ALP and hostile to it’; and in order to break the duopoly and force a change to Proportional Representation I see no need to change from campaigning to bring down ALP state governments, and defeating ALP attempts to become the Federal government by targeting ALP marginal electorates, and advocating informal voting.