Overlapping Circles

Jessica Hagy's venn diagrams.

Words By Jessica Hagy
from GOOD Magazine

Juergen Jazzanova mixtape on FUTUREBOOGIE

from flavorpill NYC

A jack of all trades, Futureboogie advances jazz-oriented dance music with a booking agency, design collective, and, most notably, a rock-solid radio show. Also an online outpost for the group's Bristol-based club night, the website features revolving updates and a vast archive of past sets. This week, Tru Thoughts/Ubiquity artist Quantic drops jazz and deep funk in Bristol and Berlin-based Jazzanova delights with a mixtape featuring cuts from International Pony, on-the-rise UK producer and remixer Jesse Rose, and drum 'n bass don Marcus Intalex. For a fresh weekly fix, be sure to catch Futureboogie's radio broadcast, live in the UK and archived on the site, which comes complete with detailed tracklists for cratediggers and hardcore heads.

Jazzanova Mixtape

mp3 [53mb]

• Billy Bang Sextet – Abuella (Soulnote)
• Jesse Rose – Stop, Look and Listen (Henrik Schwarz Version) (Front Room)
• International Pony – The Royal Pennerkaums (Island)
• Markus Intalex – Refreshed (Soul:r)
• Dub Tao – Season Dub Hard Edged)
• Dimlite – Outernational Duet (SK)
• DJ Type & JB – The P.L. (Root Elevation)
• Thief – Hold On (SK)
• DJ Shadow – This Time (Island)
• Winfield Parker – I Wanna Be With You (Parker & Lyles)
• Stereotyp – Take the Weight (G Stoned)
• Guida de Palma & Jazzinho – Da Tempo ao Tempo (N.Conte Mix) (Freestyle)
• Drumlessons – Strings of Live (Sonar Kollektiv)

Saam Farahmand -- Music Video Director

Saam Farahmand has directed some of the best videos of 2006 for up and coming UK bands such as Klaxons, Buzzworthy, Dead Disco, and New Young Pony Club. He is definitely on my watch list. Here is a sample.

one (tame version)

Two (the original by Saam)

Simian Mobile Disco -- Hustler
Dir: Saam Farahmand

Is Iran Next?

Joschka Fischer

Can politics learn from history? Or is it subject to a fatal compulsion to repeat the same mistakes, despite the disastrous lessons of the past? President Bush’s new strategy for Iraq has posed anew this age-old philosophical and historical question.

Ostensibly, President Bush has embarked on a new political and military strategy for the war-torn Iraq. Bush’s new course can be summarized under three headings: more American troops, more Iraqi responsibility, and more US training for more Iraqi troops.

If you apply this new plan to Iraq alone, two things immediately catch the eye: almost all the proposals of the Baker-Hamilton report have been ignored, and the plan itself – in the face of the chaos in Iraq – is quite simplistic. In light of the failure of all previous “new strategies” for stabilizing Iraq, there is little to suggest that the newest “new strategy” will succeed any better, despite the additional 21,000 US soldiers.

What is interesting and really new in the US administration’s recently announced policy is the way it reaches beyond Iraq, to deal with Iran, Syria, and the Gulf states. Here, unexpected and genuinely new decisions have been announced: an additional US aircraft carrier group will be moved to the Persian Gulf; Patriot anti-aircraft missiles will be stationed in the Gulf states; and the additional 21,000 soldiers far exceed what the American generals had asked for to deal with Iraq. So one wonders about the purpose of this military build-up? One might almost think that Saddam was still alive and in power, so his overthrow had to be prepared all over again.

The surprise of Bush’s new policy is its shift of political focus from Iraq to its two immediate neighbors. Bush accuses Syria and Iran of interfering in Iraq, threatening its territorial integrity and endangering American troops, and, more generally, of seeking to undermine America’s allies in the region. If you add to this the seizure, on President Bush’s orders, of Iranian “diplomats” by US forces in the northern Iraqi town of Erbil, a completely new picture of the President’s plan comes to the fore: the “new strategy” does not follow the advice of the Baker-Hamilton report, but harks back to the disastrous strategy of the neo-cons. Iran is now in the superpower’s sights, and the US approach brings to mind the preparatory phase of the Iraq war – down to the last detail.

Where does all this lead? Basically, there are two possibilities, one positive and one negative. Unfortunately, the positive outcome appears to be the less likely one.

If the threat of force – a force that the US is quite obviously building – aims at preparing the ground for serious negotiations with Iran, there can and should be no objection. If, on the other hand, it represents an attempt to prepare the American public for a war against Iran, and a genuine intention to unleash such a war when the opportunity arises, the outcome would be an unmitigated disaster.

Unfortunately, this danger is all too real. Since the Bush administration views Iran’s nuclear program and hegemonic aspirations as the major threat to the region, its new strategy is based on a newly formed undeclared anti-Iranian alliance with moderate Sunni Arab states and Israel. The nuclear program is the dynamic factor here, because it will set a timeline for action.

But air strikes on Iran, which America may see as a military solution, would not make Iraq safer; they would achieve exactly the opposite. Nor would the region as a whole be stabilized; on the contrary, it would be plunged into an abyss. And the dream of “regime change” in Tehran would not come true, either; rather, Iran’s democratic opposition would pay a high price, and the theocratic regime would only become stronger.

The political options for stabilizing Iraq, and the whole region, as well as for securing a long-term freeze of Iran’s nuclear program, have not yet been exhausted. The current state of Iran’s nuclear program does not call for immediate military action. Instead, the focus should be on diplomatic efforts to detach Syria from Iran and isolate the Tehran regime. But this presupposes American willingness to return to diplomacy and talking to all the parties involved. Tehran is afraid of regional and international isolation. Moreover, the recent municipal elections in Iran have shown that betting on diplomacy and a transformation of Iran from within is a realistic option. So why the current threats against Iran?

The debacle in Iraq was foreseeable from the beginning, and America’s numerous partners and friends predicted it quite clearly in their warnings to the Bush administration. The mistake that the US may be about to make is equally predictable: a war that is wrong will not be made right by extending it – that is the lesson of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.

The ideologically driven strategy of regime change by means of military force led the US into the Iraq war disaster. Getting into Iraq and defeating Saddam was easy. But today, America is stuck there and knows neither how to win nor how to get out. A mistake is not corrected by repeating it over and over again. Perseverance in error does not correct the error; it merely exacerbates it. Following the launch of the new American policy, the old question of whether politics can learn from history will be answered again in the Middle East. Whatever the answer, the consequences – whether good or bad – will be far-reaching.

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Joschka Fischer was Germany's Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor from 1998 to 2005. A leader in the Green Party for nearly 20 years, he is now a visiting professor at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School.

Copyright: Project Syndicate/Institute for Human Sciences, 2007.
www.project-syndicate.org

Reprinting material from this website without written consent from Project Syndicate is a violation of international copyright law. To secure permission, please contact distribution@project-syndicate.org.

Ashura on Park Avenue or Shia and Sunni, A Ludicrously Short Primer

Posted January 29, 2007, by Abbass Raza
on 3quarksdaily

Even now, many people who hear these terms daily on the news are confused about what the real differences are between Sunni and Shia Muslims, so I, having been brought up in a very devout Shia household in Pakistan, thought I would explain these things, at least in rough terms. Here goes:

It all started hours after Mohammad's death: while his son-in-law (and first cousin) Ali was attending to Mohammad's burial, others were holding a little election to see who should succeed Mohammad as the chief of what was by now an Islamic state. (Remember that by the end of his life, Mohammad was not only a religious leader, but the head-of-state of a significant polity.) The person soon elected to the position of caliph, or head-of-state, was an old companion of the prophet's named Abu Bakr. This was a controversial choice, as many felt that Mohammad had clearly indicated Ali as his successor, and after Abu Bakr took power, these people had no choice but to say that while he may have become the temporal leader of the young Islamic state, they did not recognize him as their divinely guided religious leader. Instead, Ali remained their spiritual leader, and these were the ones who would eventually come to be known as the Shia. The ones who elected Abu Bakr would come to be known as Sunni.

This is the Shia/Sunni split which endures to this day, based on this early disagreement. Below I will say a little more about the Shia.

So early on in Islam, there was a split between political power and religious leadership, and to make a long story admittedly far too short, this soon came to a head within a generation when the grandson of one of the greatest of Mohammad's enemies (Abu Sufian) from his early days in Mecca, Yazid, took power in the still nascent Islamic government. Yazid was really something like a cross between Nero and Hitler and Stalin; just bad, bad in every way: a decadent, repressive, dictator (and one who flouted all Islamic injunctions), for whom it became very important to obtain the public allegiance of Husain, the pious and respected son of Ali (and so, grandson of Mohammad). And this Husain refused, on principle.

Yazid said he would kill Husain. Husain said that was okay. Yazid said he would kill all of Husain's family. Husain said he could not compromise his principles, no matter what the price. Yazid's army of tens of thousands then surrounded Husain and a small band of his family, friends and followers at a place called Kerbala (in present day Iraq), and cut off their water on the 7th of the Islamic month of Moharram. For three days, Husain and his family had no water. At dawn on the third day, the 10th of Moharram, Husain told all in his party that they were sure to be killed and whoever wanted to leave was free to do so. No one left. In fact, several heroic souls left Yazid's camp to come and join the group that was certain to be slaughtered.

On the 10th of Moharram, a day now known throughout the Islamic world as Ashura, the members of Husain's parched party came out one by one to do battle, as was the custom at the time. They were valiant, but hopelessly outnumbered, and therefore each was killed in turn. All of Husain's family was massacred in front of his eyes, even his six-month old son, Ali Asghar, who was pierced through the throat by an arrow from the renowned archer of Yazid's army, Hurmula. After Husain's teenage son Ali Akbar was killed, he is said to have proclaimed, "Now my back is broken." But the last to die before him, was his beloved brother, Abbas, while trying desperately to break through Yazid's ranks and bring water back from the Euphrates for Husain's young daughter, Sakeena. And then Husain himself was killed.

The followers of Ali (the Shia) said to themselves that they would never allow this horrific event to be forgotten, and that they would mourn Husain and his family's murder forever, and for the last fourteen hundred years, they have lived up to this promise every year. This mourning has given rise to ritualistic displays of grief, which include flagellating oneself with one's hands, with chains, with knives, etc. It can all seem quite strange, out of context, but remembrance of that terrible day at Kerbala has also given rise to some of the most sublime poetry ever written (a whole genre in Urdu, called Marsia, is devoted to evoking the events of Ashura), and some of us, religious or not, still draw inspiration from the principled bravery and sacrifice of Husain on that black day.

Earlier today, I took the following unlikely pictures on the ritziest road in New York City, Park Avenue:

This is the procession commemorating Ashura, or the 10th of Moharram. In front, you can see a painstakingly recreated model of the tomb of Husain. The mourners are dressed mostly in black. It is a testament to the tolerance of American society that despite the best attempts of some of its cleverest citizens to proclaim a "clash of civilizations," it allows (and observes with curiosity) such displays of foreign sentiment.

The procession is made up of Shias of various nationalities, with the largest contingents being from Pakistan and Iran.

A young Shia holds up a banner, perhaps forgetting for a second that he is supposed to be mourning.

You can see one of the coffins with roses on it, which are ritualistically carried in the procession.

The self-flagellation is in full swing at this point. (The arms are raised before coming down to beat the chest.)

This is "Zuljana" or Husain's horse, caparisoned with silks and flowers.

The self-flagellation, or matam, reaches a climactic frenzy before ending for Asr prayers. Later in the evening, there are gatherings (or majaalis) to remember the women and children of Husain's family who survived to be held as prisoners of Yazid.

nose jobs, Boris Gruchenko, and being Iranian

I have always tried to keep this blog apolitical--apart from my disdain for the far right in any shape, form, or nationality -- I consider myself as someone who always shies away from ideology.

But to live in Tehran and to stay non-political at a time like this reminds me too much of Boris, the main character from Woody A llen's Love & Death, who tried to demonstrate the depth of his commitment to pacifism by shooting his bullet into the air after being shot in the left arm by his opponent in a duel. Well, his stray bullet came back and hit him in his right arm. Moral of the story? Be a pacifist, but don't be surprised if you are shot.

This is in short--the long apology for the political content of late to those who couldn't care less about politics and with whome I would find myself under normal circumstances, or rather, normal geo-coordinates. Lonely on North 35, though started humorously, is begining to sound ominously fitting. ht

reposted from April 2006.

An Interview with Gary Sick

Posted on The Council on Foreign Relations, January 23, 2007

Gary G. Sick, a former National Security Council adviser on Iran, says an “emerging strategy” is developing that brings the United States, Israel, and Sunni Arab states in an informal alliance against Iran. He does not believe the United States would launch a military attack on Iran at this time because it lacks the military ability to be in Iraq and Iran at the same time.

By: Bernard Gwertzman, Consulting Editor

Sick, founder and executive director of Columbia University’s Gulf 2000 Project that conducts research on Persian Gulf countries, also says a “very serious opposition” to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is developing in Iran. Because of this, he says the Iranians will soon be willing to seek a deal on their nuclear program.

Professor Sick, you were quoted in an interview on National Public Radio as saying there’s a kind of informal alliance among the United States, Israel, and the Sunni Arab states all worried about Iran. Does this amount to a new American policy for the Middle East?

I don’t know if you can call it a policy, but I really think it is a strategy that is being adopted. It has several very real advantages. First, all three parties—the Sunni states in the Gulf, plus Jordan and Egypt—are very worried about Iranian expansion in the region and of Shiite expansion in the Middle East. And of course Israel is very worried about Iran and makes no bones about it quite openly. For the United States, I think there’s a perception that by focusing on Iran, you can remove some of the emphasis on Iraq, which of course is a catastrophe. So there are some advantages to all sides and there also have been real contacts among all of the parties, which I think go beyond just casual talk.

Talk about the contacts. We know of public contacts—Vice President Dick Cheney was in Saudi Arabia, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been in Egypt, Israel, and Jordan as well as in the Gulf States recently. There have been rumors of the Saudis meeting with the Israelis. Have you been able to confirm that?

They obviously have released no data about what the conversations included. But there was a report in the Israeli papers that was never denied. It was simply dismissed by the Israelis as not something to be talked about that did talk about senior Saudi officials—who might in fact be Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who’s a former ambassador to the United States—meeting with very high-level people in [Israeli] Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s government. I can’t absolutely confirm that, but I’ve seen no firm denials from the Saudis, despite the fact that you would think they would have an interest in doing so.

And, of course, we’re seeing this problem in action right now in Lebanon, where there’s a major confrontation going on between the Shiite Hezbollah and the Sunni-led government.

I do believe the whole Lebanese situation was the galvanizing moment for this emerging strategy. The action by Hezbollah in attacking Israel [last summer] was seen as an extension of Iranian power and an extension of its influence in the region. And the outcome of this, which is taking the form of Hezbollah challenging the Christian/Sunni government of [Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad] Siniora, I think, is also perceived as an Iranian plot. I personally think that’s an exaggeration, at least in terms of Iranian direct control or involvement in this. But if you look at Hezbollah as an Iranian creature—which I don’t, but many people do—you come to the conclusion this is a battle between Israel and Iran or even, by extension, the United States and Iran, and that Lebanon is the battlefield where this is being fought out.

Of course when you look at this, when you talk about this kind of strategic alliance, or whatever you call it, then the Iraq invasion was a total mistake, right, because it empowered Shiites?

I think it was. And I think it was by almost any consideration that you want to take. Certainly the way it’s played out has been a complete disaster for, I think, just about everyone involved. The big issue here, however, and one of the indicators that something really is going on is not only that Bush talked about Iran quite a lot during his [January 10] speech that was supposed to be about Iraqi strategy, including the surge in forces and so forth.

He identified Iran as a very important aspect of U.S. policy in the region. And that was followed almost immediately by the arrest of Iranian officials in Iraq in various places, including Kurdistan. That sent, I think, quite a strong signal that, if nothing else, there is a shift in focus here and that perhaps Iran is being set up as the excuse for why the Iraq policy is not working very well.

And much has been made of the fact that Secretary Rice on her recent visit, particularly to Egypt, did not get into any discussion about democratization, whereas last year she was very outspoken on the need for more democratization in the Middle East.

Well, if there is a new strategy emerging, as I have postulated, I think the United States has a couple of important things that it must do for the parties to this coalition, if you like. One is that the United States is going to have to shut up about democratization—that this has put our authoritarian Sunni allies in the region on the defense and it complicated their lives. I think the days of pushing democratization in the Middle East are probably over, at least for the time being. And also, I think it requires the United States to take a more active role in promoting an Arab-Israel settlement of some sort. The Arabs—Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Cooperation Council, Egypt, Jordan—if they’re going to cooperate with the United States on Iran and if that involves at least an implicit cooperation with Israel, they need some political cover.

And the obvious political cover for them would be that they can claim that there’s an invigorated effort to find peace between Israel and the Palestinians, and I think to that extent they need to have some demonstration of progress. I note that Condoleezza Rice, in her trip to all of these Arab countries, has in fact been stressing there’s going to be a vigorous push on the Palestinian issue.

The United States has also announced it’s increasing its naval strength in the Persian Gulf. Another aircraft carrier is going out there, making two aircraft carriers on station. What do you think the likelihood is of any military action against Iran?

In addition to sending the aircraft carrier, the United States is placing Patriot missiles in the Gulf. You’ve got to remember that in the event of a real or threatened military strike against Iran, the big concern is how Iran might retaliate. And one way they could is to use their existing, relatively short-range missiles to attack, for instance, oil loading on the Gulf. So I think the Patriot missiles are there to demonstrate that the United States is prepared to defend those countries if it comes to that. It’s also clear the Iranians have been actively building an infrastructure that would give them the capability to retaliate against American forces in Iraq.

I’m not at all convinced they’re in fact doing that currently. I think they’re preparing the way to be able to do it and I think the U.S. arrests of Iranian officials in Iraq are related to that process. As to the likelihood of an actual military campaign against Iran, I continue to believe that’s not going to happen. And I think the logic of the thing is that if you think you can do it with a quick air strike, you’re kidding yourself. Basically any strike that the United States would undertake against Iran would have a series of effects: one is to strengthen the current government [and] President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. But it will also lead to severe Iranian retaliation somewhere, against somebody, somehow, whether it’s U.S. forces or U.S. allies.

And I think the end result would be that if the United States really wants to deal with the problem, it can’t stop at an air strike, it’s going to have to go on and put boots on the ground. And the reality is, we don’t have those boots right now. Iran is a huge country. It’s far more nationalistic than Iraq. And it would actually make the Iraqi campaign look simple by comparison. So I personally think that the U.S. administration is going to talk about it as the Israelis are talking about it, very openly, but not in fact do it.

What do you think is going on in Iran now? There have been a number of reports now of vocal opposition to Ahmadinejad, including from the dissident Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri. Do you think there’s a possibility of any change in internal Iranian policy?

The Iranian internal political scene is always more complicated and actually more interesting than it’s made to be in the sort of stereotypes basically in the Western media. There is very serious opposition building up to Mr. Ahmadinejad in Iran. Basically the entire political elite are coming together in opposition to him. They see him as really a disaster as far as Iran’s policy is concerned.

If I’m correct about this emerging strategy on the part of the U.S., the Arabs and Israel, he bears a lot of responsibility for making that happen. He has made it easy for people to be afraid of Iran and to act against it. But I think it would be very dangerous to suppose that there’s going to be a sudden overthrow of him or something of the sort. I do think there’s a major effort on the part of the political leadership in Iran, apart from Mr. Ahmadinejad, to isolate him and to reduce his influence over events. That’s very hard to do with somebody who loves publicity the way he does and who is constantly making ill-considered remarks of all kinds.

But I think that’s part of the game. I do believe, for instance, that Iran in the next five or six weeks is probably going to celebrate the completion of a series of linked cascades of centrifuges as part of their uranium enrichment program. This is a very small achievement actually, but they will make a big thing of it and have a national celebration that they have become, in effect, a nuclear power.

At that point, I do believe that the Europeans, in particular, have an opening that if they wanted to say, "Okay, let's go back now to the bargaining table. You've proved your point. Now let's stop and talk about this," Iran would probably be in a situation where it could possibly make concessions. I hope that opportunity isn’t lost, because I do believe that if a reasonable offer is put on the table and raised with Iran under those circumstances, there’s a very real chance that the political elite in Iran will in fact use that as a rallying point and try to outflank Mr. Ahmadinejad.

You think there’s a possibility at that point that Iran might agree to a temporary suspension of its enrichment?

I think that is a very real possibility. And I’ve been hearing this from some Iranians who are quite well-plugged-in to their nation’s policies.

That would open the door to U.S.-Iranian talks.

That’s right. And I think that after the celebration is going to be the moment when that idea can be tested. And my guess is that Iran will actually be willing to consider a suspension of testing at that point.