April 23, 2012
Baby, my cash money
Would this sentence be a fair illustration of the entire terms of engagement of the rest of the world with the United States? From Foreign to Economic to Defense Policy it is a narrative as though of a paid intercourse: “Baby, my cash money.”
This latest scandal, too will probably be obfuscated and news cycled out of our imaginations—but for this moment this paradigm is clear. Many complain that the US simply does not build relationships based on principals of social, human and cultural rights. The US engages only on the basis of financial transactions: it gets what it can’t get otherwise by simply buying it. If it is refused it simply removes the offending resister usually an elected leader of a country with resources it wants and puts into place those who are compliant and willing to be paid for their services. And when, and if, they are not paid what they were told they would be paid, then well that’s when the whole thing becomes a conflict zone, like the corridor of the Hotel Caribe on the early morning after the “previous night’s intercourse.”
Ironically, this happened at an Economic Cooperation Summit where the agenda includes economic issues and those of Corruption and of Security or as it is called now Terrorism. The scandal around the Americans, involves 11 Secret Service agents and as many military personnel including green berets and so forth. Entrusted to protect the President of the United States the team had arrived in Cartegana ahead of the President who attended the Summit of the Americas conference organized by the 34-member Organization of American States.
What brought this behavior and breach to light was that the Secret Service agent refused to pay the agreed US$800 and paid only US$30. Which points to the probability that such behavior is routine and par for the course and charged to the tax payer. Would the world be better off if only the US would refuse to pay more often or that the rest of the world would stop soliciting?
But there is a rise of the Security and Intelligence Infrastructure globally with its epicenter in the United States policies to finance and encourage this sort of enterprise. Everything including foreign policy and Development is viewed through this prism: The Role of Security in Development and Maximizing Opportunities. And oddly enough, at almost any development conference nowadays—it’s easy to pick out who represents a particular country because they reflect their country's mindset. Its easy to see where the ones who look like secret service agents are from by the haircuts, the glasses the vehicles.
For all the good that is done which still remains lean and paper thin, the underbelly is huge. How many girls and boys are destroyed each hour because all the different forms of human trafficking? A scourge which world leaders speak against along with issues of violence in forums such as the one in Cartagena. And yet those entrusted with protecting such leaders are themselves agents of harm. Take any country termed as in need of assistance and rescuing from the “bad guys” and you will find that hotels at night where the “good guys” are entrenched are also filled with call girls going up to their rooms —young women—forced by poverty into prostitution. Selling their bodies to the touts of privatization and free market enterprise and its apostles.
What will it take to realize that it isn’t about war and blood money? I don’t know what it is about but I know it isn’t about that. And the reaction by President Obama to such a grave breach in his security by the guards meant to protect him seems more appropriate to a prisoner rather than the President. This is cause for concern. And it took an impoverished single mother earning a living at the kind of job that the system allows her, to have had the agency, to stand her ground for her fair share and to bring all of this out into the open.
Other Writings by Maniza Naqvi:
The Middle Way, the Difficult Way—Sharper than a Sword and Narrower than a Hair
A Matter of Detail: The Masonry of Graffiti and Symbols
The Kreutzer Sonata in Addis Ababa
Battle Songs: These Children Can’t Be Bought
Hitched In History to Crimes Against Humanity
Imagining Lyari Through Akhtar Soomro
Rimbaud and Insider Information on Disasters Foretold
Expressing Fidelity Through Sorrow's Hope
Losing the Plot: Habits of the Heart (Complete Novel)
The Art of Resistance: Under Siege
The Leftist And The Leader (A Play)
Posted by Maniza Naqvi at 12:10 AM | Permalink
Comments
Isn't this current news story a trivial distraction?
Who are the biggest whores on the planet and what is the biggest house of ill repute? Why our elected Congressional Representatives and the U.S. Congress, no? And they charge a lot more than $800 per trick don't they? We have the best government money can buy. Is it any wonder it is moving straight down the cesspool of bankruptcy and ruin?
Posted by: WJAbbe | Apr 23, 2012 5:20:17 AM
The U.S.eh? looks more and more like it has a stealth department of doom at its core.
Posted by: Dredd | Apr 23, 2012 9:33:40 AM
The NYTimes article today is scarey and seems to be suggesting that the Obama Administration is afraid of the Secret Service and can't criticize what happened?
Posted by: ToC | Apr 23, 2012 5:48:42 PM
"to be suggesting that the Obama Administration is afraid of the Secret Service and can't criticize what happened"
Americans elected a senator and his buddies from one of the most corrupt cities in the U.S. (Chicago).
The likelihood that one or more of them have engaged in illegal/immoral behavior within the view of Secret Service agents is near certain.
Posted by: DAS | Apr 23, 2012 9:10:39 PM
Love the accompanying allegorical photo: a phallus with electronically assisted hearing.
A president afraid of the Secret Service? What's the Dealy with that?
Posted by: Neal Deesit | Apr 24, 2012 4:10:23 AM
ToC: I should have put that in the piece--the odd reaction that sounds almost like a prisoner rather than a president.
DAS: your comment turns me cold. Is that all you got out of this piece and the actual incident that has been unmasked?
Neal: Thanks. The link you've attached is pretty frightening...wow. Makes me anxious and worried.
Posted by: Maniza | Apr 24, 2012 9:10:15 AM
Maniza,
No, of course not. I just think the author has found a "paradigm" that only exists because of the people that have populated our highest positions of government of late.
The "paradigm" wouldn't exist if our leaders were less cynical and calculating themselves.
Many thought Obama was different. I can't see anything from his biography to suggest that he would have been any different than Bush: a calculating egotist.
But thankfully not all Americans are calculating egotists. So there is hope if we choose better.
Unfortunately that will have to wait at least four more years as our only choice this time around will be between two calculating egotists.
Posted by: DAS | Apr 24, 2012 2:20:50 PM
DAS,
I think the paradigm exists because of the system. Anyone holding that position of President in this system as it is set up is bound to follow the "Baby here's your cash on my terms" with the rest of the world..complying on the basis of "Baby where's my cash".In fact any President in this system is a Prisoner of the system--accountable to it rather than to the people who voted.
However, I totally disagree with you about Mr. Obama. I think he is your best choice this year as he was four years ago and wisdom would warrant that Americans re-elect this fine--very fine--thinking man. America is better for him. He makes Americans want to be better than they are. He embodies all that Americans aspire to be. Then, after yo have elected him--the for the next four years--join the movement on the streets agitating for a new social and economic system that engages the world in a decent and equitable manner--so that the President you elect in 2016 truly is someone that reflects the People's power.
Posted by: Maniza | Apr 24, 2012 2:41:54 PM
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