december 16-31, 2012 tells the facts and names the names vol. 19, no. 22

Army’s geography programs, which Geography Counterinsurgent involve creating tools to collect, integrate, and analyze geospatial data By Joel Wainwright from the entire world. Some of this work ince the 1970s, the once-musty the newest arrow in the quiver isn’t a is coordinated by the Army’s “Human academic field of geography has fancy bomb; it’s human geography. The Geography Working Group,” but the enjoyed a renaissance. Global Summit’s theme was “maximizing force Army’s geography research stretches well Sclimate change, new geospatial efficiency through intelligence in the beyond the Pentagon. technologies, and the emergence of human domain.” Participants attended Consider the Bowman Expeditions, a critical form of human geography talks with titles like “Understanding a series of research projects carried out have transformed the discipline. Many the local culture and history of target by academic geographers who conduct departments have seen rapid growth populations” and “Thinking like the detailed fieldwork in various hot spots – in the number of majors and faculty natives”. The profs and GIS nerds were Colombia, Iraq, Jordan, and elsewhere. and geographical approaches to global there to teach the spies and generals how The Expeditions are designed to produce problems have attracted considerable to efficiently map the world and plan for detailed maps of local communities for attention. Recently geography has even their wars. the program’s funder: the US Army’s captured the attention of the US military. This Summit is only the latest sign Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO) Consider the “Human Geography of a broader trend: the US military’s at Fort Leavenworth. When the Bowman Summit” held recently near the Pentagon. rediscovery of human geography. Of Expedition to Oaxaca in southern Generals and spies rubbed shoulders the four branches, the US Army has Mexico was revealed to be funded by with GIS geeks and staid geography been especially active and open about the FMSO, participating indigenous professors, plus the usual retinue of its investments in human geography. An communities rebelled, publishing a trio private contractors – eager as ever to unclassified US Army presentation of public denunciations of the project. sell the latest tools to the Pentagon. But provides a glimpse into some of the wainwright continued on Page 2

of the anti-rock hearings), future Music Censorship HUD Secretary Jack Kemp, soon to be Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tipper Gore and the Encore Lloyd Bentsen, past president of the American Bar Association Robert By Lee Ballinger Wallick, Merrill Lynch vice-president usic connects us. Music records, tapes, and CDs. Shortly after the Bruce Thompson, and Secretary of inspires us. Music helps us to 1985 hearings concluded, the Recording Agriculture John Block. Many other vent our anger. Music gives Industry Association of America (RIAA) luminaries attended, including a few Mus visions of a better world. As a result, agreed to put warning labels (Tipper foreign dignitaries. If the real purpose some people don’t like it. This was on stickers) on the music. was simply to raise money, these well- full display at the September 1985 Senate The hearings got tremendous heeled folks could have just sent a check. hearings on rock lyrics, which consisted publicity, which the PMRC used to help Instead it was a meeting of America’s of Al Gore and other politicians bashing construct its bully pulpit. But watching power elite, brought together to discuss music by trotting out raunchy lyrics the hearings on CSPAN doesn’t give a full the threat music posed to them. As the while three musicians—Frank Zappa, picture of what was at stake. Ramones sang on “Censorshit,” music John Denver, and Dee Snider—defended That could be seen in 1986 at a secret censorship was “just a smoke screen freedom of expression. gathering in the Maryland countryside. for the real problems, S&L deficit, the That same year, the Parents Music Billed as a “family picnic” and a “Pig homeless, the environment.” The people Resource Center (PMRC) came out of Pickin’ Barbecue,” it was also a benefit who created those problems wanted the woodwork. They were a group of for the PMRC. The “Benefit Committee” to solve a different one—the fact that Washington wives who used the clout included Marine Corps commandant music was the conscience of the world of their politician husbands to develop P.X. Kelly, Marriott vice-president and musicians were using the corporate some clout of their own. Their goal was Fred Malek, former Republican Party structure to spread their messages. music censorship, so they allied with chairman Dean Burch, Senator Al The Tipper stickers and pressure from the PTA to press for warning labels on Gore, Senator John Danforth (initiator the government and the police had an Ballinger continued P. 3 Col. 3 december 16-31, 2012

One reads: represent only a small side-project for ground.” “[The geographers] never informed the US Army and far more significant What do these initiatives amount to? us that the data they collected in our geographical projects are underway. They mark an unprecedented attempt to community would be given to the The hub for US military/intelligence integrate geographical data from various Foreign Military Study Office (FMSO) geographical research lies not in sources (open source data mining, of the Army of the United States, nor the US Army, but in the National fieldwork, satellites, and so on) to build did they inform us that this institution Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), platforms for geospatial analyses that are was one of the sources of financing an enormous, secretive organization capable of mapping people’s movements for the project. Because of this, we in the Beltway’s shadow lands: a sister across the entire planet—for potential consider that our General Assembly organization to the CIA, focused military applications. was tricked by the researchers, in order exclusively on mapping the world and David Price has published several to draw out the information the[y] producing fine-grained, real-time terrific articles inCounterPunch detailing wanted. The community did not request geographical analyses of anything the US the ‘weaponizing’ of anthropology the research[;] it was the researchers government or its military may desire. since the 1960s. Why is the military who convinced the community to The NGA’s website describes itself as ‘weaponizing’ human geography today? carry it out. Thus, the research was a “combat support agency” and the There are two broad ways to answer this not carried out due to the community’s “primary source of geospatial intelligence question. need, it was the researchers […] who […] for the Department of Defense and The first centers on geospatial designed the research method in order the US Intelligence Community.” In technology. Recent advances in to collect the type of information that a recent advertisement for geospatial satellite, surveillance, and mapping truly interested them. […] [W]e wish to analysts, the NGA asked: “Imagine being technologies have been nothing short express to the public […] our complete able to identify anything on, above, or of extraordinary. Couple this with the disagreement with the research carried ubiquity of geographical data-collection out in our community, since we were not “It’s one thing to – cellphones, video cameras, computers, properly informed of the true goals of and other components produce streams the research, the use of the information know where each of spatial data that allow everything obtained, and the sources of financing.” bomb will fall... to be located and tracked – and the When the ‘Oaxaca controversy’ possibilities for mapping people’s lives broke, many academic geographers were it’s quite anoth- around the world are revolutionized. shocked to learn about the US military’s er to know where The founder of the Bowman Expeditions, new investment in human geography geographer Jerry Dobson, once research. But the Bowman Expeditions the people are, and summarized the value of such tools: “It’s that requires GIS.” one thing to know where each bomb will fall, and GPS can tell you that. It’s quite another to know where the people are, beneath the Earth’s surface and display and that requires a GIS.” The US military that information visually to provide a EDITOR-IN-CHIEF has been at the forefront of developing meaningful foundation for decision- Jeffrey St. Clair these technologies and, together with making to ensure the safety of the world. the NGA, sees geospatial technologies MANAGING EDITOR That’s the job of the National Geospatial- as critical for success in what they Joshua Frank Intelligence Agency.” call “battlespace” (the totality of a war Apart from collecting data and environment). The soldier not only SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR producing maps for the military and needs constant access to information Nat St. Clair State Department, the NGA is the about his battlespace; he also produces coordinating body for an extraordinary BUSINESS data through multiple sensors that project called the “World-wide Human Becky Grant feed information, all of it spatial, back Geography Data Working Group” (or Deva Wheeler to the ‘geospatial intelligence’ analysts WWHGD). Its stated purpose is to build DESIGN (‘GEOINT’). “partnerships around human geography A second answer emphasizes Tiffany Wardle data” – i.e., find ways to collect datasets geopolitics and the recent failures of the on human geography from as many Alexander Cockburn US in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thanks to sources as possible – and make that 1941- 2012 the overwhelming dominance enjoyed information “available to promote human in air power, the US military was able security”. But who will have access to all P.O. Box 228 - Petrolia, CA 95558 to quickly control airspace and, at least this data, and who will decide what form nominally, these country’s territories. 1-800-840-3683 of human security needs promoting? Yet of course the US did not win any [email protected] That will be the US government and meaningful hegemony (its nostrums its military. The NGA has an elegant www.counterpunch.org about the ‘war on terror’ were more formula that foreshadows the uses of All rights reserved. effective at silencing dissent at home) these data: “human geography tells and thus US military practice effectively ‘when’ and ‘where’ to put boots on the

2 december 16-31, 2012

continued from page 1 became counterinsurgency. In the for human geography research has Ballinger classic tradition of colonial war, US spiked in recent years. Typically defense immediate impact. Promoters were jailed leaders like General Petraeus emphasized funding flows through a third party for putting on shows. Wal-Mart, the the importance of fine-grained social which helps assuage academic scruples nation’s biggest music retailer, refused and geographical studies of the entire (e.g., MINERVA grants are funded by to stock stickered product and many population. In the mid-2000s, the Army the Pentagon, yet processed through retailers who did sell it were arrested. called this “human terrain mapping”. the NSF). But money is not, in my view, Musicians such as Bobby Brown, the Today the military and NGA prefer to a sufficient explanation. Status anxiety Beastie Boys, LL Cool J, and Tommy Lee simply call it ‘human geography’. While and the attraction of power also play a of Motley Crue were also arrested and many of their texts are classified, this considerable role. As former Harvard Jello Biafra went to trial over the cover statement from the Institute for Defense President Derek Bok observes, “it would to his Frankenchrist album. There were and Government Advancement reflects be fatuous to ignore the effect of money PMRC-endorsed record burnings. The the prevailing conception of human and worldly ambition on scholarly major record labels set up in-house lyric geography in Arlington County: writing and research. Many professors censorship committees and rappers who “The process of studying not only your are subject to these pressures, and it is had songs criticizing the police were not enemy and his tactics but the people quite possible that the resulting dangers allowed to record. Insurance coverage around him who could give him shelter pose a greater risk to scholarship than was cancelled for rap tours. Fans were or turn him in to the authorities is a big any threats arising from conventional arrested for wearing band t-shirts. A part of the discipline known as human attacks on academic freedom.” Florida public radio station lost its geography. It is cultural awareness […] What “resulting dangers” may funding for playing an Iris DeMent raised to a critical level for intelligence result from geography’s dalliance with song. Many states and cities introduced gathering and tactical decision making. counterinsurgency? The extensive laws to restrict music. Police established […] But human geography isn’t confined involvement of the US military and NGA local and national monitoring networks, to cultural sensitivity and human in geographical research, especially disrupted shows and tours, set up intelligence gathering. Technology under the heading of ‘human geography,’ concert roadblocks to keep fans away, – from unmanned aircraft that spot may lead people around the world to and threatened to make it impossible for anomalies in normal village behavior to assume that geographers have ties to the Time/Warner to do business. digital simulators that train convoy truck US military, thus putting all academic All this was done in the name of drivers how to behave in potentially geographers at some risk. Moreover, protecting women and children. volatile situations like striking a extensive military involvement threatens Censorship point man Al Gore, who as pedestrian in a hostile neighborhood the openness required of scholarly – helps map out the human terrain and debate and intellectual inquiry. And develop actionable intelligence […].” if the US military is avowedly drawing Subscription Information For academic human geographers geospatial intelligence from open-source Subscription information can be found like me it is extraordinary to see our geographical research, how are we to at www.counterpunch.org or call discipline described in such terms. It know whether our research will not toll-free inside the U.S. is simply false to say that studying inadvertently cause harm to those we 1-800-840-3683 our enemies and their tactics “is a big study? If we cannot safeguard our data Published twice monthly part of the discipline known as human from use by the military, the ethical basis except July and August, geography.” What we generally aim for our research erodes. 22 issues a year. to produce in our intellectual work These are strictly academic concerns. is not “actionable intelligence” – a Far more serious consequences will 1 - year hardcopy edition $55 euphemism, of course, for knowing be felt by future targets of the US 1 - year email edition $35 who to kill – but something more government. They will find that their 1 - year email & hardcopy edition $65 prosaic: we seek a coherent and rigorous lives and communities have already been 1 - year institutions/supporters $100 understanding of the world by examining mapped and analyzed – as potential 1 - year hardcopy/low income $45 the processes, social and natural, that battlespace. CP 1 - year email only low income $30 make it what it is. Rather than engage Renew by telephone, mail, or on our in “human intelligence gathering,” human Joel Wainwright, a human geographer website. For mailed orders please geographers aim to help others learn to who teaches at Ohio State University, include name, address and email be more effective at critically analyzing is the author of Geopiracy: Oaxaca, address with payment, or call 1-800- the world. Militant Empiricism, and Geographical 840-3683 or 1-707-629 3683. Add Nevertheless a growing number Thought (2012, New York: Palgrave). His of academic human geographers first book, Decolonizing Development, $17.50 per year for subscriptions mailed are enlisting themselves for the new Colonial Power and the Maya (2008, outside the U.S. assignment with the military. The Oxford: Blackwell), won the Blaut award. Make checks or money orders payable to: standard explanation is money. While He can be reached at wainwright.11@osu CounterPunch accurate figures are unavailable, we can edu. Citations for this essay are available Business Office be certain that funding from the US upon request. PO Box 228, Petrolia, CA 95558 military and NGA flowing to universities

3 december 16-31, 2012 part of the Clinton administration would working through the National Political the PMRC, led not by liberals but by help to usher in welfare reform, NAFTA, Caucus of Black Women, organized the very musicians and their fans who and the prison-industrial complex, picketing of record stores and got the were in the crosshairs of the censors. cared about lyrics? Al Gore cared about Congressional Black Caucus, National Dozens of grassroots anti-censorship women? Dow Corning, which as of 2010 Organization For Women, the NAACP, groups sprang up, mostly in small had paid out $1.2 billion to women who and the National and Progressive Baptist towns. Davis, California. Yellville, have suffered medical problems with Conventions to support a boycott of Arkansas. Linton, Indiana. Ashland, Dow’s silicon breast implants since the Tower Records for selling hip-hop music. Massachusetts. Gulfport, Mississippi. 1970s, also paid for a PMRC anti-rock Tucker was no marginal gadfly. In 1995, This upsurge culminated in the National music booklet that claimed that the sharing the dais with Hillary Clinton, Anti-Censorship War Council, held at music was to blame for AIDS because she spoke at a Pentagon banquet, where Chicken’s Night Club in Midvale, Ohio it doesn’t promote “sexual abstinence.” she called for using abandoned military on August 8, 1992. There it was decided Al Gore was Dow Corning’s strongest bases as “training centers” for inner city to present the 30,000 anti-labeling advocate in the Senate. youth who would be under the direct petitions the movement had gathered to Dow Corning wasn’t the only control of the military. Tucker’s proposal the RIAA at its Washington headquarters corporation bankrolling censorship. was warmly received by an audience and to demonstrate outside PMRC 7-Up helped defray the costs of the Pig which included Joint Chiefs chairman headquarters in Arlington, VA. This Pickin’ Barbecue and Marriott, Alcoa, happened a few months later, led by the and Merrill Lynch all gave money to the We live under an editors of Rock Out Censorship, a national PMRC. So did the foundations associated newspaper based in the tiny hamlet of with R.J. Reynolds Tobacco and Chemical ever-growing sys- Jewett, Ohio. Boycotts of Marriott and Bank. Coors donated office space to the tem of control that 7-Up were launched in response to their PMRC. support of the PMRC. Marriott pledged The censorship wars accelerated includes the Patriot to never give the censors money again developments that are now in full bloom. Act, cameras on al- while 7-Up president John Albers tried The PMRC brought the previously to plead innocent by calling the homes marginal rightwing lunatic fringe onto most every cor- of organizers to claim his company was the public stage and gave it their blessing. ner, gang databases, a lover of rock & roll. At Occidental The police-produced Back In Control College in Los Angeles, students staged a Manual that deems music to be Satanic post-Occupy restric- five day takeover of administration offices and cautions parents to watch out for tions on protest, after the school cancelled a scheduled the Star of David was endorsed by cultural festival because it would attract Tipper Gore. Focus on the Family, now privacy invasion as “the wrong crowd.” a significant player on the political scene a fact of digital life. Things have been relatively quiet with Tim Tebow’s 2010 Super Bowl FOF on the censorship front for the past endorsement/commercial on its resume, John Shalikashvilli and the Secretaries several years. The overt attacks have used its then $57 million annual budget of the Army, Navy, and Air Force. A year greatly subsided and so has the media to spread a “rock is Satanism” message. later, at a NPCBW luncheon, Tucker hysteria. Why? The easy availability of Focus on the Family opposed Earth welcomed Energy Secretary Hazel downloaded music is one reason but Day, child care, and the anti-apartheid O’Leary, Senator Carole Mosely-Braun, the main factor is that there was a war struggle that was such a big part of the Coretta Scott King, and Tipper Gore to and the other side won. We live under hip-hop scene while putting out an audio an event where $14,000 was raised for an ever-growing system of control that tape, Bringing Hope to the Inner City, in Tucker’s anti-music campaigns. The war includes the Patriot Act, cameras on which Dr. John Perkins warns against against rap helped to reinforce the image almost every corner, gang databases, getting drugs out of the black community of the “young black thug,” smoothing the post-Occupy restrictions on protest, because “You’ll have a generation of way for the prison-industrial complex. privacy invasion as a fact of digital life, people who are going to get a leader and The US prison population has gone from and a political system whose corporate say the problem is society around us.” 750,000 people at the time of the 1985 agenda resulted in two mothers who Susan Baker, co-founder of the PMRC, censorship hearings to 2.7 million people were running for office (Jill Stein and was on the Focus on the Family board. today. Cheri Honkala of the Green Party) being Music censorship also highlighted the Today we have an African-American arrested and handcuffed to chairs this growing class split among blacks. While President and attorney general, forty- past October for attempting to enter the rap music brought the voices of poor one African-American members of Presidential debates. communities such as the South Bronx the House of Representatives, and six It’s not clear if the lyric committees and Compton to the world, the rich and African-American Fortune 500 CEOs. still exist since star chamber proceedings powerful in the black community moved None of them was heard to argue with are not subject to sunshine laws. But to attack it. Typical was C. Delores Bill Cosby as he traveled the country lyric committees may no longer be Tucker, a Pennsylvania slumlord who was bashing rap music and attacking poor necessary. In a December 8 New York the state’s commonwealth secretary until blacks for being poor. Times op-ed piece, Somali-born singer fired for misuse of public office. Tucker, There was a wave of resistance to K’naan revealed that his record company

4 december 16-31, 2012 summoned him to a breakfast chat in the primary enforcer of music censorship Another ‘Conference October where they told him that he will continue to be the police, who exert needed to stop writing songs about their will without regard for the niceties of Polluters’ Confirms politics and war and “avoid subjects too of the legal process. Climate Catastrophe far from fun and self-absorption.” Each year, millions more guitars, In Russia, two members of the band keyboards, drums, turntables, and sound By Patrick Bond Pussy Riot remain in jail for the band’s systems are sold and become part of songs and videos which mock the America’s collective artistic stash for e suffered the spectacle in Orthodox church, a key cog in Russian musicians to draw from. Meanwhile, 2011, in Durban. Now it president Vladimir Putin’s system of the 99 per cent is staggering to its feet. was Doha’s time in the sun, social control. Could something similar A majority of Americans oppose the andW the feudal Qatari regime proved happen in the United States? The legal war and endorse universal healthcare. an entirely appropriate host for the basis for it already exists. Millions of immigrants marched in United Nations Framework Convention In 1988, Congress unanimously passed 2006. A million people demonstrated in on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 18th the Child Protection and Enforcement the streets for public education in 2011 Conference of the Parties. Act which gives the federal government followed by the explosion of the Occupy Putting an oil tycoon (Abdullah bin the power to arrest anyone connected movement. Millions of people are Hamad Al-Attiyah) in the chair and a with selling or promoting an album that searching for ways to avoid foreclosure. carbon trader (Christiana Figueres) as is “obscene,” the definition of which is left A social explosion is coming. Music the main UN official personified the to the imagination of the music police. summit’s failure to address climate It also gives the Justice Department the Past anti-censorship and instead promote the agenda of right to take the “community standards” polluters and profiteers. Even so, the of south Florida established in the 2 Live efforts failed be- contradictions are so extreme that Crew case and apply them to any city in cause they weren’t emissions markets – the 1-percenters’ America. main operative strategy for climate policy In 1996, the Clinton/Gore l i n k e d t o t h e – can only crash further as a result of the administration easily got Congress to struggles echoed negotiators’ failure to undergird market approve the Telecom bill, which makes demand with emissions cuts. it a crime punishable by up to five years and amplified in This should have surprised no in prison to distribute or promote by the music itself. one. Recall from Qatar’s last globo- any means music that is “obscene, lewd, governance moment in 2001, that its lascivious, or filthy.” The definition of hosting hastened the demolition of will be a big part of it, weaving its magic those terms will be left up to prosecutors the World Trade Organisation thanks to inspire us with visions of a better who are free to go after not just artists to lackadaisical top-down global future. It will be attacked. Since a dying or record companies but bloggers and governance – after all, no serious mainstream music industry will no DJs as well. Among the 91 Senators who protesters were permitted in Doha to longer be an effective censorship partner, voted for the bill were John Ashcroft, remind elites of their responsibility. those attacks will likely be more ferocious convener of the 1985 censorship hearings; Think of this little country hosting the than any we’ve seen before. current Vice-President Joe Biden; Ernest 2022 soccer World Cup, having bribed The heroic efforts of anti-censorship Hollings, whose wife was a leader of the Zurich FIFA mafia, soon building groups in the past failed because they the PMRC; and Carol Mosely-Braun, once-off stadia and then deconstructing were defensive and single issue. They convener of her own Senate anti-rap them for export. weren’t linked to the struggles which hearings. Doha was bound to tumble off the were echoed and amplified in the music In 2003, under the leadership of Joe Durban Platform – itself an utterly itself. Today those struggles are so close Biden, Congress approved the RAVE useless document when it comes to to each other they can feel each other’s Act (98-0 in the Senate, 400-25 in the binding emissions cuts or raising the breath. Still, they need the connective House). The law is not actually specific financing required for renewable energy, power of music to consummate their to raves and makes the organizers of public transport, fossil-free agriculture marriage while music cannot defend almost any public event liable for prison and production, zero-waste disposal itself without being deeply woven into time and $250,000 fines. The supposed and all the other economic rebooting that linkage. A different strategic path is target is drug use but prosecutors are not that civilisation desperately needs this opening up before us. That is truly music required to prove that anyone attending century. Those NGOs and commentators to my ears. CP an event actually possessed drugs. who continue to justify their existence at These laws were passed to be the summits by repeatedly raising hopes Lee Ballinger, a contributing editor to enforced, designed for a time when the and then whining obviously suffer an CounterPunch, coedits Rock and Rap conflict between the progressive agenda abused-spouse syndrome, structurally Confidential. embedded in so much of our music and unable to cut free and make the changes the reactionary nature of the government necessary for genuine climate advocacy. could no longer be papered over. Of course there were a few nuances Whatever the ultimate fate of these laws, in Doha, as blocs of countries formed

5 december 16-31, 2012 with differing agendas. But unlike at the mention of economic development as the Thailand, Cambodia and El Salvador 2010 summit in Cancun, no country had priority for developing countries. There last year. During the Doha summit, the the bravery of little Bolivia, which then is no mention of a difference between Philippines was hit by a typhoon, leaving attempted to block consensus for the sake developed and developing country 500 dead and 300,000 displaced. of a reality check. As usual, Washington action.’ But dare suggest that the ‘climate debt’ came to sabotage a genuine climate Washington’s grandstanding on behalf from these disasters be paid in part by solution, and as usual, succeeded with of polluting industries was especially the United States – using what should its primary objective, to prevent making evident when poor countries raised the be the uncontroversial ‘polluter pays’ binding emissions cuts notwithstanding prospect of ‘Loss and Damage’ bills on principle – and you get this response Barack Obama’s post-election climate the scale of Superstorm Sandy, which from Stern: ‘I will block this. I will shut confession. wrecked roughly $60 billion worth of this down.’ Though Loss and Damage Recall the bragging after last year’s US property overnight last month. As language survived in the final text, Stern’s summit in Durban by Washington sea-level rise inundates the Bangladesh ruthless defence of US interests included insider Trevor Houser – formerly an coast and small islands, as glaciers watering down liability language and aide to lead Washington negotiator Todd in the Andes and Himalayas melt, ensuring that the World Court will not Stern – speaking to the New York Times: as African soil dries and crops burn, soon have an opportunity to provide an ‘The Durban Platform was promising there will be similar–sized bills in the Advisory Opinion. Explained Wesleyan because of what it did not say. There is non-industrialised world, broached by University professor Michael Dorsey, ‘A no mention of historic responsibility Pakistan’s one-third flooding in 2010, for World Court finding could cause a flurry or per capita emissions. There is no example, or huge storms that devastated of exploratory climate lawsuits in various

Privatizing the Air: vague calculations. In 2010 a vast ‘carousel fraud’ in the EU ETS was exposed, costing taxpayers more than €5 billion, on a Value- The Emissions Trading Scam Added Tax (VAT) fraud… Public money is being poured into carbon markets. The Just after Doha ended, CarbonTradeWatch and other groups public purse must cover the cost of legislation and regulation associated with ‘climate justice’ politics launched a campaign for the markets, the cost of enforcement to pursue fraud, theft to discredit the EU review and relegitimization of its Emissions and corruption, and bear the cost of tax and revenue evasion Trading Scheme (ETS). The organizations argue that “the scams through carbon markets… In times when citizens are structural failures of the ETS cannot be fixed”: shouldering the severe impacts from the economic crisis and • The ETS has not reduced greenhouse gas emissions…offset ‘austerity’ packets, yet more money is being used to further pay projects have directly resulted in an increase of emissions the companies that caused the problem in the first place. worldwide as between 1/3 and 2/3 of the projects do not The logic of the ETS is to benefit market actors. Since its represent real carbon reductions. The large emissions reductions inception the ETS was adopted because industry was content registered after 2008 in the EU can be attributed mainly to the with it. It was in fact oil giant BP, with the support of the UK economic crisis… in some European countries, more than 30% of government, who lobbied the EU to adopt the ETS as the main consumption-based emissions were imported… instrument to deal with climate change… • The ETS has worked as a subsidy system for polluters… over- The path shown by the ETS locks-in a fossil-fuel economy. allocation of permits covering existing technologies rubbed out The ETS reinforces the same logic of over-production and any incentive to a transition towards low-carbon production consumption based on fossil fuels.. It allows more pollution while processes… windfall profits accrued from passing through these implementing ‘clean development’ projects which mainly harm ‘costs’ reached €14 billion between 2005 and 2008… Electricity local populations and environments… producers windfall profits [were] anywhere between €23 to €71 The ETS closes the door to effective policies, while reinforcing billion [from 2008-12]… 75% of the manufacturing industry other false solutions such as nuclear energy, agrofuels and tree receiving permits for free at least until 2020 (meaning an extra plantations. The logic of trading pollution is being expanded revenue per year of around €7 billion)… to other arenas, such as biodiversity and water offsets, which • The ETS is based on inherently volatile carbon prices. Carbon will replicate the problems of the carbon market, whilst further prices have been continuously unstable, with a clear descending commodifying and financializing more of nature’s capacities, trend since 2008… functions and cycles. • The ETS increases social and environmental conflicts in Southern Insisting on trying to ‘fix’ a system that is broken from the start countries… The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is the deviates attention and resources away from just and effective biggest offset scheme which has demonstrated to bring severe policies. By exporting the EU ETS failure to other countries, under social and environmental consequences upon the communities the cover of ‘leadership’, masks another wave of interventions where the projects are implemented, including lands and human from above in Southern countries, increasing the social and rights violations, displacements, conflicts and increased local environmental debt from North to South… environmental destruction… The struggle against the ETS is the struggle for social, Carbon markets are particularly susceptible to fraud. In the environmental and climate justice. We call to all civil society carbon commodity, measurement of whether the pollution has organizations and movements to endorse this call and join the or hasn’t occurred is estimated by proxy measures and other fight against ETS. ­– PB

6 december 16-31, 2012 jurisdictions, so the State Department they still argue for Kyoto’s extension count on to set up the carbon-cutting twisted arms, even threatening aid, to because its obligations do not include schemes… The Doha talks failed to prevent island nations like the Republic them. In contrast, Washington was pave the way for billions of dollars to of Palau from even putting it on the joined by Norway and Mexico to oppose be invested in projects to cut carbon agenda.’ the crucial language in Kyoto (and in emissions through stopping deforestation Stern also backtracked on $100 billion/ the original 1992 Rio Earth Summit) and degradation of rain forests.’ year Green Climate Fund commitments specifying ‘common but differentiated In other words, if you are of the belief his boss Hillary Clinton had made in responsibilities’. that climate catastrophies are market Copenhagen three years later. The next Such conflicts between North and problems – externalities – that simply goal to be missed is $60 billion for the South were sharp as ever, as Third World need market solutions (emissions trading Fund by 2015, and it remains a nearly Network’s Meena Raman reported, and or carbon taxes) to ‘get the prices right’ empty shell, with only provisional were ‘only papered over superficially in and assure clear price incentives, your commitments of a few billion by Britain the final hours to avoid an open failure.’ hope in the global negotiators has and Germany. Canadian negotiators also The main rich-country block taking a bit evaporated. California’s carbon market sabotaged climate finance, and a year of responsibility includes the European formally begins in January, just when the ago formally dropped out of the Kyoto Union and coal-addicted Australia, world’s main news source turns gloomy, Protocol so as to continue tar sands joined by oil-soaked Kazakhstan. In confirming again that the processes of development. Australia’s case, that little bit amounted elite management of world financial and It would be foolish to trust the Fund to unconditionally committing just ecological crises amounts to little more with putting resources into genuine 5 percent cuts in emissions by 2020, than pushing the bubble around. CP climate mitigation and adaptation using 2005 as a base, around the same projects, given the vast bias to as Washington’s. Worse, several rich Patrick Bond directs the University of corporations and the inadequate civil countries – Australia, New Zealand, KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society society oversight so far. What is most the Ukraine, Kazahkstan, and Norway in Durban and authored Politics of urgently needed is a mechanism to pay joined by Kyoto Protocol defaulters Climate Justice for UKZN Press. the climate debt directly to the victims Japan and Russia – argue for a greater of climate chaos instead of to corrupt role for carbon markets, even during the bureaucracies and aid agencies, such as week that this ‘false solution’ generated a Basic Income Grant mechanism – but further criminal investigations into fraud, that will require more visionary strategies involving even Deutsche Bank. For years, Attention to change power and financial flows than the European Union’s Emissions Trading are currently available. Scheme and the UN Clean Development Subscribers Three other formations – the G77/ Mechanism (CDM) have been unable With the next issue, China group, Association of Small to shake the reputation of giant casinos Island States and Least Developed based on the ‘privatisation of the air’. Volume 20 Number 1, Countries – warned against allowing But like many financial casinos, the the next commitment period of Kyoto carbon markets continue to fail the CounterPunch will be to become a short-term ‘public relations free-marketeers. Because Japan and celebrating our 20th exercise.’ Their valid concern is that New Zealand don’t have legally binding ‘creative accounting’ from carbon targets, they were expelled from purchase Anniversary and will markets means offsets allow Europe to of carbon credits, which shrinks demand claim large GreenHouse Gas cuts, with even further. Indeed, although extending be transitioning to a Eastern Europe also enjoying ‘hot air’ the Kyoto Protocol until 2020 at least magazine format. Issues, allowances because of the early 1990s provides a renewed fiction that carbon crash that flattened industrial output markets can aid emissions cuts, they which will be four times and hence emissions. In addition, China markets are effectively dead, especially has become a useful idiot for Northern those that support Third World trading longer than our previous emissions-cutting claims, simply because in the CDM and the offset strategy for since the 1997 deal was cut in Kyoto, East forests known as Reducing Emissions layout, will now be Asia won a substantial shift in industrial through Deforestation and Forest delivered to subscribers production that once took place in the Degradation (REDD). rich economies. ‘Nations dodged a chance to agree on a monthly basis. For In ramping up emissions dramatically several measures that could have lifted the past dozen years, the Chinese are rock-bottom demand for UN-backed email subscribers, the conjoined with the other large emerging carbon offsets,’ reported Reuters Point digital version of the countries – Brazil, India and South Africa Carbon. ‘Investment in new CDM (together known as BASIC) – which in projects has ground to a halt as the value magazine will be sent as 2009 signed the Copenhagen Accord of the credits they generate has plunged offered by Barack Obama. Though 95 percent in four years to well below a pdf only. that deal wrecked the Kyoto Protocol, 1 euro, crushing profits that investors

7 december 16-31, 2012

Life in a Yoga Sex Cult now-balding-and-gray bespectacled and firmer women is that they’re “too man known for his psychic overtures skinny” and need to become “more Romania’s Tantric to extraterrestrials and paranoid rants robust.” In fact, older MISA women, at Guru against “freemasons” and other shadowy Bivolaru’s behest, are known to exert global conspirators might somehow strong pressure on newcomers to live By Stewart J. Lawrence place them on the fast track to Nirvana up to the guru’s Rubenesque beauty – or in MISA parlance, “help them evolve standards by consuming large amounts ecilia Tiz is a 46-year old spiritually.” of ice cream and other unhealthy fatty divorced housewife who lives What it’s given them, instead, is foods, defectors say. in the quiet German town of permanent entrée to Biovlaru’s far-flung Not all MISA women submit to CLeverkusen, just south of Dusseldorf. She sex empire, a kind of floating harem-for- Bivolaru’s efforts at behavioral control. first met Gregorian Bivolaru, the self- hire in which his closest female disciples But only those that do – or seriously styled guru and founder of the Romania- engage in erotic video-chatting online try – can advance up the group’s ranks, based Tantric yoga cult known as MISA and dance nude in strip clubs in Japan apparently. One key test for aspiring shortly after the group was founded in and Europe to raise money for MISA. MISA women is the annual Miss 1991. Some of these women also attend MISA’s Shakti beauty contest that is held at the Then married with a young child, she annual summer camps on the Black Sea conclusion of the summer camps while and her husband Vlad were intrigued by where they live in the so-called “Shakti the MISA female elite is populating the idea of a “spiritual” movement that villas,” practice yoga, perform kinky sex Bivolaru’s harem. Women who enter the preached greater openness and personal games (including ritual masturbation), contest must pass through a succession intimacy in relationships, improved and dutifully wait their turn to have of trial stages, and many talented and diet and physical health, and human sexual intercourse with Bivolaru. beautiful women never even make it “liberation” through the practice of a It’s not entirely clear how many past the first stage. Why? They haven’t uniquely Romanian brand of “esoteric” women have agreed to become, in effect, sufficiently “fattened” themselves up, yoga. They readily agreed to sign on as Bivolaru’s concubines. One former former participants say. local MISA yoga instructors. member notes that about 300 women And that’s not all. Aspiring MISA But Bivolaru’s call for help in live in the Shakti villas each summer and women are also expected to shave their establishing the group’s German branch that most of them probably have sex with vaginas and are constantly exhorted to alongside the ones then forming in the guru at least once over a month-long act in “sexually liberated” ways. Having Denmark, the UK, Hungary, and some period. Bivolaru and MISA have been multiple sex partners and being open to two dozen other countries, including the in business for over 20 years, so even by love-making with other women confers United States, left them feeling uneasy. modest estimates that’s quite a few sexual higher status, defectors say. At the Even from the start, something didn’t encounters for just one man. “villas” for women, space is even set aside seem quite right about the guru, Tiz says. Tantric yoga, of course, has always for expressions of lesbian love. Nudity In one of their first encounters, she was been closely associated with sensual and the wearing of sexually provocative shocked when Bivolaru commented that pleasure, and the Tantric tradition that clothing is considered de rigeur. her body lacked “vitality” and abruptly Bivolaru extols, Kashmir Shaivism, Bivolaru also has his fetishes – suggested that she start watching erotic is notorious for falling prey to including oral sex, and what American movies to “awaken” her femininity. Then, unscrupulous Western gurus in search of porn aficionados typically refer to as in a bizarre twist, and with her husband a charismatic mass following. In the US, “watersports.” MISA has produced an still at her side, Bivolaru recommended John Friend’s Anusara yoga movement entire series of porn videos like the that Tiz visit him alone in Romania to and Geshe Michael Roach’s Buddhist “Exaltation of Pee” that celebrate the receive what he referred to, cryptically, as sect both claim a strong Tantric lineage, presumed mystical power of “urinary an “identification.” and earlier this year both men became orgasm.” In fact, the guru himself It was only much later that Tiz realized engulfed in highly-publicized scandals reportedly encourages the women he what an “identification” actually was: involving sexual abuses of power. beds down to drink copious amounts Bivolaru had just invited her to have sex. But when it comes to creating an of water so that they can urinate in According to defectors, including unhealthy sexual atmosphere for women, his mouth for long periods while he contributors to the web site www.exmisa. few yoga movements – other than pleasures them. Some of these women org, Bivolaru’s sexual passes at women Bagwan (Osho) Rajneesh’s notorious sex have fallen in love with Bivolaru, but are no mere ad hoc flirtations. He’s made cult of the 1980s, perhaps – can compete many are repulsed, and either flee before thousands of them over the years – some with the wacky and exploitative world of their session, or participate reluctantly, to underage girls, including the 14-year Bivolaru’s MISA. once, and never return, defectors say. old he eventually “married” – as part Bivolaru, it turns out, is extremely Tiz eventually left MISA, after trying of MISA’s theology of celebrating the particular about what his Divine to square her belief in sacred monogamy “Divine Goddess” through Tantric sexual “goddesses” should look like – with the more libertine practices – arousal. voluptuous and decidedly plump – or and outright sexual exploitation – she And it turns out that hundreds what some MISA defectors describe, encountered in MISA. Her husband Vlad of women have accepted Bivolaru’s with derision, as “like a whale.” A became enmeshed, however, to the point invitations, convinced that sex with the common MISA complaint about trimmer of seeing Bivolaru as his personal savior.

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Tiz never did. When Vlad began taking “absurd,” and MISA has never presented Japan’s Resurgent on lovers, she decided it was time to any evidence to support it. In fact, while leave. vilifying Tiz in print, the group has Militarism But unlike hundreds of other MISA repeatedly declined offers to appear with dropouts, Tiz didn’t just fade away. her on television to defend its bizarre By Tom Clifford Angered and still suffering the sting of organizational practices. her lost marriage, perhaps, she began Despite the attacks – including a Beijing. speaking out, and the Romanian media, recent defamation suit in Germany – new day is dawning in which had largely treated Bivolaru Tiz takes satisfaction in knowing that Japanese politics, or so the as a victim ever since his arrest and she’s helped dozens of distraught parents nationalist Shinzo Abe, whose imprisonment by communist authorities reconnect with their “lost” daughters. Agrandfather served in the Tojo war in the 1980s, started to listen. She’s also served as a “mother hen” to a cabinet, would have us believe. The Last year, Tiz shocked many number of younger women who remain trouble is that a new day for Abe will Romanians when she appeared on a estranged from their families. break with a rising sun that will chill the national television program to denounce This bitter fact remains: Bivolaru region. Bivolaru by name. And she wasn’t alone. remains at large and travels freely abroad, The timing is profound, as if history Two former MISA members who’d despite an international warrant for his was mocking us. As China marked the joined the cult as teenagers appeared arrest issued by Interpol in April 2008. In 75th anniversary of the Rape of Nanking, wearing masks – too ashamed to show the absence of stronger protests or legal Japan elected as its prime minister the their faces, and fearful of retribution action, MISA is likely to survive. grandson of an official at the heart of the – and recounted their own unsavory Roxana-Malina Chirila, who joined war machine. experiences. Since then, Tiz has become MISA when she was just 14, credits Abe’s grandfather, Nobusuke MISA’s “public enemy one,” the object of Tiz with helping her successfully exit Kishi, was jailed after the war as a public scorn and vitriolic attacks through the group. She spent eight long years suspected war criminal but went on postings on MISA’s various websites, struggling to define herself inside MISA to become prime minister (as if Albert including Yogaesoteric.com, the group’s and twice barely managed to escape Speer had become German chancellor). official mouthpiece. from being coerced into sex by Bivolaru For all but five years of the last 60 In recent months, Tiz and other in Paris. The entire experience has left years Japan has been governed by the MISA detractors have received support her deeply shaken and at one point, she Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). from an unexpected source: Mihai contemplated suicide, she says. Now, 24, This is a group of right-wing parties Rapcea, the group’s former lawyer. In an she’s an aspiring writer and activist with a that came together to consolidate their interview with a Romanian newspaper, promising professional career. But other voter base after the initial liberalism Rapcea described his employer as a young women may never fully recover, of America’s occupation gave way to a man obsessed with the sexual conquest cult experts say. more rigid approach following Mao’s of “young girls” who “had lost his way, In the past year alone, two MISA victory in China and civil war in Korea. spiritually.” He told the newspaper that members – a man and a woman – took The Japanese refer to this as the Reverse Bivolaru had sunk so low that he was their lives, and at least half of the Danish Course. even appropriating the esoteric yoga MISA group, NATHA, has sought The traditionalists that America had texts written by others and claiming counseling and therapy, according to originally shunned in Japan were now them as his own. the “Dark Side of Tantric Cult,” a 2009 back in favor. After the interview was published, Finnish public television documentary Japan prides itself on its sense of Bivolaru announced that he was (available online). history But the lessons of its past remain “suspending” Rapcea from internal Tiz’s own daughter has just entered fundamentally unabsorbed. The failure to MISA operations for a period of three college, her first extended period away apologize for atrocities, especially but not years – a rare public punishment, but from her mother’s care. The women Tiz just Nanking, means relations between also a limited one. Apparently, Rapcea tries to help remind her of her daughter, it and China and its neighbors are has far too much on Bivolaru and MISA she says, and she’s grateful that their own stunted by the toxic waste of arrogance. to be completely severed from the bond is strong enough to withstand the Japan has pretended for 22 years that organization. kinds of pressures that have led other its moribund economy, tarnished Tiz remains unfazed, even as some young women throughout Europe to get democracy and sense of drift were friends and supporters suggest that caught up in cults like MISA. manageable. The people were told what she’s become obsessed with MISA and “My daughter seems to think I’m Europe is being told now; that with the should simply “move on.” Bivolaru and another Erin Brockovich” Tiz says, application of painful remedies, the his followers have called her a jealous with a chuckle. But more than a few country will again have a future to inspire and bitter wife, and sometimes accuse women who have managed to escape it and a present to be proud of. her of being mentally ill or suffering from MISA’s predatory clutches would almost But time is running out. China was the “demonic possession.” Another charge is certainly agree. CP great boost to Japan, without that mass that she’s working for Bivolaru’s old bête market on its doorstep, the economy noire – the Romanian secret police. Tiz Stewart J. Lawrence can be reached at would be in even worse shape. But the vehemently denies that charge, calling it [email protected]. Chinese are turning against purchasing

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Japanese products. What makes Japan so different and Japan experienced its only time of Patrol ships from both China and belligerent, is a piece of Tokyo real true liberalization. Trade unions were Japan shadow each other off a group estate near Book Street and, alarmingly, allowed, political debate and dissent of jagged islands in the East China nestled beside the defense headquarters. encouraged. But then the occupying Sea. In the skies above, planes buzz Yasukuni is a shrine dedicated to Americans became concerned by the each other. This is not Europe of 1912- far-right militarism, where history Cold War and reversed course. War 14, but there are disturbing similarities. and facts are warped through Japan’s criminals were rehabilitated, Abe’s Rising jingoism, militarism, a “teach- Black Hole of consciousness. A mural grandfather among them, and political them-a-lesson-attitude” emerging, a new at the shrine celebrates Japanese stability became the watchword. Beliefs power threatening an established one, resistance at the battle of Tokyo Bay. that sustained and nourished the extreme strident “no surrender” utterances and Divers are seen heroically attaching right were never challenged, as they were aggressive posturing from politicians. A mines to US warships. But there was in post-war West Germany. single shot, at sea or in the air, would be no battle. It is make believe. The Rape Imagine the outrage if a truck bearing heard around the world. of Nanking is ignored. This is not a symbols of the SS and blaring out The actual timing does not help either. shrine, as so often mistakenly said, that wartime propaganda paraded down The world will soon turn its attention honors the war dead. This is a shrine Berlin’s Kurfurstendamm today as to the centenary marking the outbreak that honors Japanese militarism. It policemen stood idly by. Impossible, yet of what innocently, and misleadingly, celebrates conquering other lands. an equivalent occurs in Tokyo daily. became known as the War To End All Nobody is suggesting that Japan will In Japan where the defeat of Wars that led to The Peace To End All become a military state in the foreseeable militarism, not militarism itself, has Peace. future, but the building blocks for such been discredited, the reminders of a The average shelf life of a Japanese PM, a state are disturbingly visible on the militaristic era are an everyday sight, and since 1945, is about 18 months. Abe will streets of Tokyo - from the schoolboys many of its people seem blind to their probably fall from power by the summer in their Prussian-style uniforms with menace. CP of 2014. That is not a reason for those brass buttons, to the menacing black against conflict in the region to cheer. The sound trucks which blare out nationalist Tom Clifford reported from Japan from Galtieri option for weak leaders, marine propaganda and to which police turn a 2000 to 2003. He now lives and writes in adventurism, is discredited but should deaf ear. China. never be discounted. Immediately after World War II,

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