© Eso Antons Benjamins, a.k.a. Jaņdžs

NOT-VIOLENT TERROR
80 Climbing Mt. Citheron (XIII)

Tomislav Sunic, a Croatian political scientist, in a paper called “Liberalism and Democracy?  Carl Schmitt and Apolitical Democracy” writes that “…if one assumes that a new type of homogeneity can develop, e.g., homogeneity caused by technological progress, then one cannot dispute the functionality of a liberal democracy in which the homogenized citizen remains thoroughly apolitical: hypothetically speaking, political issues in the decades to come may no longer be ethnicity, religions, nation-states, economics, or even technology, but other issues that could ‘homogenize’ citizens. Whether democracy in the twenty-first century will be based on apolitical consensus, remains to be seen. Schmitt sincerely feared that the apoliticism of ‘global liberal democracy’ under the aegis of the United States could become a dangerous predicament for all, leading not to global peace but to global servitude.”

The above illustrates the thunder clouds approaching. Far in the background one may also hear thunder. Below is a scene of the way it is happening in Latvia with a sketch of the political background of it.

This past week several Latvian “political” parties made yet another step toward apolitical politics when the Citizens Party (PS) declared its readiness to form a coalition with the New Times Party (JL) and Party for Different Politics (SCP). Said coalition is to be called “Unity Party” http://www.uic.edu/orgs/unity/UnityMonthJPEG.jpg , and according to Girts Kristovskis, chairperson of the Citizens Party, it will oppose parties of the oligarchs and pro-Russian parties. The talk among the Unity Party members is to concentrate on “doma” (to think thoughts) of economics. (Source: DELFI.lv, 6.2.10.)

What is Unity Party? Let us start with the definition of “unity”, which at this link is best expressed as (6): “one of the principles by which a uniform tenor of story and propriety of representation are preserved; conformity in a composition to these; in oratory, discourse, etc., the due subordination and reference of every part to the development of the leading idea or the establishment of the main proposition.” In other words, the Unity Party (when officially announced) may present to the public a definite program.

We already know from the news that Unity will be anti pro-Russian and oligarchs. In other words, the political “enemy” is established; however, the economic program is yet at its muz muz stage. The lack of an economic program at this stage indicates that it will likely remain at the muz muz stage even after the founding, which means the Unity Party will remain as apolitical as the activity of muz-muzing usually is. To be any other way, Unity has to choose an authority figure that the rest may join as advisors, but who in all cases will respect the authority figure.

The Karlis Ulmanis regime (1934-1940) of Latvia was a regime that started its life (by way of a coup) on May 15, 1934, but soon became a “soft” dictatorship. K. Ulmanis  main support came from the Farmers Party (Zemnieku partija), the military circles, and, not least, from the inability of the radical and the “we-agree-to-disagree-in-almost-every-case” parties to be unified enough to move along the country’s economic development. In a sense, K. Ulmanis came to power as a result of an ad hoc Unity Party that soon became known as “Ulmanis regime”.

Ulmanis was the authority who spoke to Latvians and spoke on behalf of them. He was the guide in all future projects and, like it or not, he enabled many Latvians to become market savvy. The “market” in its modern guise was a concept that was new to Latvians, especially the bookkeeping part and the discipline to run a business successfully. He used his college education (agronomy and farming) at the University of Nebraska, to raise the level of education for Latvians, most of who were still of peasant stock. Ulmanis returned to Latvia from the U.S. (1913) with a broadened perspective, ready to help develop Latvia with—of course—other Latvians as his helpmates.

However, a year after his return from the U.S., WW1 broke out. The war devastated Europe economically. The new nation of Latvia, which Ulmanis helped found (1918), would need to act with an especial foresight to rebuilt its economy and educate its people. Ulmanis was ready for the task, but its execution, due to many political fractures, was to lag behind. On May 15, 1934, Karlis Ulmanis staged a coup and seized the reigns of the Latvian state.

My grandfather and father, the first the founder and both editors-in-chief of the newspaper "Jaunākās Ziņas"  (since 1911) at the time, saw the political picture with a neutral eye. They appeased social disagreement, such as existed, by printing jokes about the clumsiness of “vadonis” (leader), but never disapproved of him. Apparently, the judgment of the political and economic situation by the editorial staff and publisher, authoritarianism was acceptable for the benefits it brought to the majority of Latvians, and, not least, kept the newspaper from getting shut down as the authorities reminded the staff of such a possibility often enough. A certain antagonism that existed among the newspaper’s publisher, its editorial board, and the Ulmanis regime came from both competing for the populist vote. Ulmanis needed the populists because he needed majority support to stay in power (without going to military rule), while “Jaunākās Ziņas” desired to increase the number of its subscribers and had to keep peace—a tight balancing act sometimes—among newspaper’s editorial staff and a publisher of differing minds.

So, Karlis Ulmanis became an authoritarian leader. He took advantage of the anti-nazi mood in the country by supporting the out-migration of Baltic Germans (many believed to be nazi sympathizers) and appeasing those among the public that were unhappy by making them happy through an increased sense of public pride in being a Latvian. The latter were to be thought of in terms of ethnicity. If one was a citizen of Latvia, one was of Latvia’s first (or second, etc.) generation and thus one of its sovereign owners. Under K. Ulmanis, Latvia was a majority democracy with the majority facilitating its rule through an authoritarian president.

Unfortunately, on Latvia’s eastern border was communist Soviet Union with a definition of cosmopolitanism that identified cosmopolitanism with liberal consumerism. Having encouraged the departure of the Baltic Germans, Ulmanis set up the conditions that would enable the Baltic Germans to be replaced by the Baltic Slavs who arrived into the country with the Soviet times. Are the parties who today represent the Slavs to be the enemies of the Unity Party of Latvia? Does the Unity Party plan to encourage Latvia to continue to be an ethno zionationalist state?

Lest it be the same rhetorical bluff that has guided the ship of the Latvian state since 1991, who in the “Unity Party-to-be” is going to be “the authority”? Who and what is to be the sacrifice?

The climb up Mt. Cytheron has not yet begun, certainly not in the context of our times. As Oedipus of ancient times found out, his story stands for the way of all too human endeavors, and one has to take issue with such “naked” dirty politics that the Unity Party leads one to anticipate. An anti Baltic Slav campaign will lead to the plague that puts the future of all Latvia-born children in hawk.
Asterisk & Notes of Interest:
 On the theme of “more-equal-than-others” see George Orwell's "Animal Farm" .
A recommended read: “The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism” by Emmanuel Goldstein (A book within a book from George Orwell's "1984")  
Of great interest to me is this and like articles. It presents some of my reasons for supporting the growing of Johns Grass in Latvia.
These blogs tend to be a continuum of an idea or thought, which is why—if you are interested in what you read—you are encouraged to consider reading the previous blog and the blog hereafter.
Partial entries of my blogs may be found at LatviansOnline + Forum Home + Open Forum –ONLATVIANPOPULISM vs LATVIJASLABEJIE. If you copy this blog for your files, or copy to forward, or otherwise mention its content, please credit the author and http://esoschroniclnes.blogspot.com/  

© Eso Antons Benjamins, a.k.a. Jaņdžs

NOT-VIOLENT TERROR
79 Climbing Mt. Citheron (XII)

Given the rapid breakdown of the community and community oriented hegemonies and the exponential rise of atomized individuals cultured into being by consumerist broths, society is footloose and free to do as it may. With money in the pocket, anyone may dance his or her way to almost anyplace they wish. Those without money also may go their way and many do, but the process of numbing one’s self with alcohol enough not to feel no pain of death in the cold, is a process that may take years. It’s a strange world, Mr. Jack.

A long time ago “freedom” meant having the opportunity to live away from princely courts and find refuge in a subsistence economy. Last time this was tried in the U.S. was when the hippies moved to the states of Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia in Canada in the 1960s. Some of them survive to this day by growing Johns Grass. In the rest of the world subsistence living—free but subject to finding food at the garbage dump, young women earning a living through prostitution, men growing and selling Johns Grass, and people dying as if they never were—is still the experience of the majority of humankind. Consumers may watch this world by taking "slum tours" as part of their consumption of vacation time. They may be preparing themselves for the rising tide of poverty that may force them to be discarded by the failed brain of our age of technology. On the other hand, there is also something to be said for wanting to live at the level of our forebears. Many would be happy to join them if using a horse and no car would free them from having to pay the government taxes.

It is a paradox of our civilization that it has not only rejected but also forgotten how the first human beings came into existence in conditions that offered them a comfortable subsistence living. In our own day, we are witnesses to how the advantage that an Earth full of fruit and life offered our ancestors has been squandered by using up ever more “lebensraum” (living space) in pursuit of consumption. Though Hitler failed in his attempt to carve out more living space for the German people by means of war (a nationalist activity often going by the name of fascism), a worldwide increase in poverty is only now beginning to see in consumerism a form of fascist dictatorship. Of course, I am speaking of a “soft” fascist dictatorship. For many Latvians going back to the ways of their forebears (if the world of the forebears could be recreated) would be an improvement over a country created with such foresight that 150,000 have left it, a no lesser number would like to, and the remainder wondering what fate had in mind when it put them ashore in Latvia

In the world as a whole, “Lebensraum” (living space) comes in many different sizes and shapes. There is concern over enough space for a growing population [risen from 2 billion inhabitants in 1950 to 6.5 billion by 2010, sixty years later, and expected to rise to 9 billion by 2040], but along with the growth of human population, the size of the ruling class has increased as well. It is, therefore, something like two billion Earth inhabitants stealing a living from the 4.5 billion others. Unfortunately, while the steal is successful, it is a steal that fails, because the theft helps increase the size of the middle classes on a planet of diminishing resources, certainly of such as are relatively cheap. Meanwhile, that part of humankind that was persuaded to abandon the ways of antiquity, yet never have had the opportunity to rise above the poverty level, continues to bring to life more people like itself than ever.

The majority of consumers live in cities, and it is around the cities that the human nakeds fill the slums. What once was a land for the original human subsistence dwellers, has become the private property of monster farms (probably bank owned) and the “bonus receivers” among bank employees, who invest and use retirement money of the middle classes for their own and the bank’s benefit. One may say that the natural order at the time when the first human beings appeared on Earth has been completely reversed: the haves then are the have-nots of today while the rulers-pretend-not-to-be are the Socialist Oligarch Party, SOP, of today.

More “growth” is obviously not a solution, but a problem to all areas that live as much on borrowed money as on borrowed time for lack analysis of the sustainability level of society and how to implement it. Sometimes a culture overgrown by a myth no longer either useful or principled may hinder the development or survivability of society as a whole.

While Latvia is a small nation, and one may think that it should escape notice of how it falls apart with all attention directed to the “biggies”, Latvia may play a big role in other ways. The current government is a perfect afterimage of what happens to those suffering from delayed gratification. The zeitgeist of consumer fascism shines bright in the eyes of almost everyone who knew the torture it was to stand in the long lines at stores during Soviet rule, yet was privy to television soaps from abroad. Such subjectivities obviously filled the heads of those who served Latvia’s bureaucracy and those who came to office as ministers and politicians. If consumer fascism is often well camouflaged in the West, it shows up in clear relief in post-Soviet Latvian morality.

Rather blatant presumption of hegemony among consumers translates itself best in images of television advertisements. The hegemony of images in advertising are unmistakeable. However, the modeling of the image began at the top, at top business and government level. There were no speed limits or blocks against running off the tracks. The examples of behavior in Latvia were set at the top and devolved down toward the valley where the people lived.

 The dazzling brightness of economic wisdom in the halls of Latvia’s “refounders” made plans to built "A Castle of Light"  to house a library that would put the Library of Congress in Washington to shame, but cost a mere ~140 million lats (~$300 mil.). It built the world’s most expensive bridge (~ Ls 600 million, with the lats almost twice as costly as the dollar, i.e., $ 1.2 billion) before its need was proven, and 27 million lats have simply gone missing. These and other objects reflect the high expectations of elected and unelected officials with no direct responsibilities to the voters—from 1991 on until the present 2010 election campaign. What an ironic spectacle of not only a lack of vision, but of the post-Soviet mindset revealed in all its dullness and primitiveness in the circles of the post-Soviet apparatchiki of Latvia.

The run for the sill began immediately after Latvia was retrieved—with help from the U.S.—from Soviet grasp. With America’s support, and soon part of NATO, the Latvian government felt safe. Latvian men went boar hunting and ate boar’s balls to prove the men they are. They could care less about Putin in Moscow waving red handkerchiefs and sending unkind messages, for we have in Latvia a partidocratic and zionationalist consumer nation on wheels already. Of course, consumer fascism does not smell but of coconut oil and olive skin. Latvia had one of the fastest growing economies in Europe a few years ago.

In any event, naked greed, sometimes robbery (but through an escape hatch in the ceiling always out of reach of prosecution) took the high chair of setting the public an example of correct behavior, and though there was talk of honor and honesty, the money did not go into education or its promotion. Today the founding institutions of Latvian consciousness, the village choirs and the Festival of Choirs that meets every five years to train their voices together, goes without state support. The ad hoc organizers and interested parties are left on their own, in effect homeless. If on some other occasion hard times are an opportunity for innovations, the government of Latvia is now saying in so many words that there is no mandate from the people for the choirs to stay among the living. Ligo Latvia! (Viva Latvia!)

I have already suggested using a “not-vote” as the occasion for choirs to meet near polling places and invite everyone to a not-vote sing-along.

Asterisk & Notes of Interest:
On the theme of “more-equal-than-others” see George Orwell's "Animal Farm". 
A recommended read: “The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism” by Emmanuel Goldstein (A book within a book from George Orwell's "1984" ). 
Of great interest to me is this and like articles . It presents some of my reasons for supporting the growing of Johns Grass in Latvia.
These blogs tend to be a continuum of an idea or thought, which is why—if you are interested in what you read—you are encouraged to consider reading the previous blog and the blog hereafter.
Partial entries of my blogs may be found at LatviansOnline + Forum Home + Open Forum –ONLATVIANPOPULISM vs LATVIJASLABEJIE. If you copy this blog for your files, or copy to forward, or otherwise mention its content, please credit the author and http://esoschroniclnes.blogspot.com/