The struggle today is not so much between the "Left" and the "Right" -- terms that are difficult to apply in many nations -- as between those who know what time it is and those who don't. Putin does, but most Western leftists -- who, lacking in the vision thing, are more reactionary in the proper sense of the term than even Islamists dreaming of a Caliphate -- don't.
On 10/17/07, Robert Wrubel <bobwrubel at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Yoshie wrote:
> "The French Left, however, need a vision thing. What
> kind of vision? Like this. The 21st century shall be a
> Eurasian century, in which European nations for the
> first time become Europe, under Franco-German
> leadership, a Europe that recognizes Islam as a
> Eurasian religion, an integral part of the Western
> Civilization that ought to have existed but never did.
> And this Europe shall have a foreign policy of their
> own, independent of Washington's, and come to terms
> with nuclear Iran, push the Jewish state from the sea
> to the river to give voting rights to Palestinians in
> the OPTs, and re-invite Turkey, a friend of Iran
> and Israel, in good faith to become a member of the
> European Union."
>
> And where/how does Russia fit in this "Eurasian"
> vision? Gabriel Kolko thought Europe would eventually
> wean itself from America and become partners with
> Russia.
If the Europeans stop siding with the Americans and cease and desist from rounding up usual suspects, Russia and the emergent Europe can create the beginning of a beautiful friendship between them.
On 10/17/07, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Oct 17, 2007, at 12:49 PM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>
> > What should a feminist, especially a Muslim feminist, do? Don't look
> > into the Western and Islamist mirrors. Instead, play with Orientalism
> > and Occidentalism in aesthetic elaboration of Islamic civilization,
> > inventing a new tradition of beauty in Islam and defamiliarizing it at
> > the same time.
>
> Maybe you've got a future as an advice columnist.
I'm in search of my Prince, or Princess, who will put my advice -- _The Prince_* for the 21st Century, of which my Russian formalist construction of Islam is an indispensable part -- into practice, men and women of virtue who are prepared to meet fortune and make her serve their ends.
Pending the birth of my Prince, or Princess, the Axis of Sexy has my favor.
Sexy
Ahmadinejad (not quite as enchanting as he once was in his twenties [when he looked like this: <http://montages.blogspot.com/2005/07/mahmoud-ahmadinejads-face.html>], but still by far the sexiest world leader -- very feminine)
Correa (the best looks in Latin America!)
Putin (muscular, but not ostentatiously so, and charmingly sinister)
MEND (look at this man, and see if you don't want to support this outfit based solely on this photo: <http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/02/nigeria_photoessay200702?slide=16>)
In the Eye of the Beholder
Chavez (far from handsome, seen objectively, but endowed with sex appeal from charisma that his people have given him, of which, from what I have heard, he has been making full private use)
Evo (ditto, except the private parts)
Could Have Been a Contender
Nasrallah (must lose the glasses)
Sadr (must lose baby fat)
Assad (must acquire personality and stop looking like a cutout figure)
Haniyeh (a teddy bear -- must let go of his playhouse state)
Senior Division
Fidel (once the most dashing revolutionary in the world -- though not as pretty as Che -- and still intellectually sexier than his prosaic brother after all these years)
* <http://www.constitution.org/mac/prince25.htm> The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli CHAPTER XXV What Fortune Can Effect In Human Affairs, And How To Withstand Her
IT is not unknown to me how many men have had, and still have, the opinion that the affairs of the world are in such wise governed by fortune and by God that men with their wisdom cannot direct them and that no one can even help them; and because of this they would have us believe that it is not necessary to labour much in affairs, but to let chance govern them. This opinion has been more credited in our times because of the great changes in affairs which have been seen, and may still be seen, every day, beyond all human conjecture. Sometimes pondering over this, I am in some degree inclined to their opinion. Nevertheless, not to extinguish our free will, I hold it to be true that Fortune is the arbiter of one-half of our actions, but that she still leaves us to direct the other half, or perhaps a little less.
I compare her to one of those raging rivers, which when in flood overflows the plains, sweeping away trees and buildings, bearing away the soil from place to place; everything flies before it, all yield to its violence, without being able in any way to withstand it; and yet, though its nature be such, it does not follow therefore that men, when the weather becomes fair, shall not make provision, both with defences and barriers, in such a manner that, rising again, the waters may pass away by canal, and their force be neither so unrestrained nor so dangerous. So it happens with fortune, who shows her power where valour has not prepared to resist her, and thither she turns her forces where she knows that barriers and defences have not been raised to constrain her. -- Yoshie