Xark!

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Our expanded selves & The Construct

I’m not a particularly active dreamer, so when I get strong messages in my sleep I tend to pay attention. On Saturday morning I woke up with an odd idea in my head, which made me take notice. On Sunday I woke up with more of it in place, as if my dreaming self had been installing the idea in segments.

It’s a Singularity idea, although I don’t think it’s necessarily just a post-Singularity idea. And here’s the way I think I’m supposed to introduce it:

We understand cyberspace to be the virtual space between all the nodes on all our computer networks. And I’ve defined my concept of Spookworld as being everything that exists between the nodes of organized deception.

This new concept is called The Construct, defined as everything that exists between nodes of intent. And since I’m really introducing two ideas here (The Construct and “nodes of intent”), I’d better start by explaining the foundational idea: scaling humanity to the Law of Accelerating Returns.

Lunch hour report: Hersh on Iran NIE

(Editor's note) Say what you want about reporter Sy Hersh, but remember this: History gets the last word. His coverage of the Bush Administration's wars just keeps on getting confirmed -- months, even years later, yes, but that's the way things go in the world.

So what does Hersh have to say about the NIE on Iran's nuclear weapons capabilities? Here's a transcript of what he had to say to Wolf Blitzer on CNN last night (-dc)...

Reading William Gibson: Media

"In the early 1920s," Bigend said, "there were still some people in this country who hadn't yet heard recorded music. Not many, but a few. That's less than a hundred years ago. Your career as a 'recording artist'" -- making the quotes with his hands -- "took place toward the end of a technological window that lasted less than a hundred years, a window during which consumers of recorded music lacked the means of producing that which they consumed. They could buy recordings, but they couldn't reproduce them. The Curfew came in as that monopoly on the means of production was starting to erode. Prior to that monopoly, musicians were paid for performing, published and sold sheet music, or had patrons. The pop star, as we knew her" -- and here he bowed slightly, in her direction -- "was actually an artifact of preubiquitous media."

"Of--?"

"Of a state in which 'mass' media existed, if you will, within the world."

"As opposed to?"

"Comprising it."

-- Hollis Henry, lead singer of the long-defunct indie-rock band The Curfew,  gets a lesson in the New World Order from for-profit spookworld entrepreneur Hubertus Bigend in Chapter 20 of William Gibson's new novel, Spook Country.

Reading William Gibson: Terrorism

"A nation," he heard himself say, "consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation." He opened his eyes and confirmed Brown there, his partially disassembled pistol in his hand. The cleaning, lubrication, and examination of the gun's inner workings was ritual, conducted every few nights, though as far as Milgrim knew, Brown hadn't fired the gun since they'd been together.

"What did you say?"

"Are you really so scared of terrorists that you'll dismantle the structures that made America what it is?" Milgrim heard himself ask this with a sense of deep wonder. He was saying these things without consciously having thought them, or at least not in such succinct terms, and they seemed inarguable.

"The fuck --"

"If you are, you let the terrorist win. Because that is exactly, specificially, his goal, his only goal: to frighten you into surrendering the rule of law. That's why they call him 'terrorist.' He uses terrifying threats to induce you to degrade your own society."

Brown opened his mouth. Closed it.

"It's based on the same glitch in human psychology that allows people to believe they can win the lottery. Statistically, almost nobody ever wins the lottery. Statistically, terrorist attacks almost never happen."

There was a look on Brown's face that Milgrim hadn't seen there before. Now Brown tossed a fresh bubble-pack down on the bedspread.

"Good night," Milgrim heard himself say, still insulated by the silver membrane.

Brown turned, walking silently back into his own room in his stocking feet, the partial pistol in his hand.

Milgrim raised his right arm toward the ceiling, straight up, index finger extended and thumb cocked. He brought the thumb down, firing an imaginary shot, then lowered his arm, having no idea at all what to make of whatever it was that had just happened.

-- Drug addict and hostage Milgrim lectures his captor during a rare moment of semi-lucidity in Chapter 29 of author William Gibson's latest novel, Spook Country.

Hersh: J'accuse

Have you heard about Seymour Hersh's interview with Major General Antonio Taguba yet? I heard about it today... but not from reading a newspaper.

"There was no doubt in my mind that this stuff (the explicit images) was gravitating upward. It was standard operating procedure to assume that this had to go higher. The President had to be aware of this."

That's the two-star general who was tasked with investigating the program of torture and abuse at Abu Ghraib, the same man who was forced into retirement this year. Hersh hit the talking-head circuit last night to promote it. On what planet is this not front-page news? Everywhere?

"This Pres?"

More.

Iraq: Victory for nobody?

As much as I'd like to read Stratfor's 2007 Annual Forecast, I just can't come up with the $399 to buy a copy right now. However, I thought some of you might be interested in the company's sales pitch summary of some of its key preditions:

• Russia and China will rank at least as high in importance as the U.S. conflicts in the Muslim world.
• The United States and Iran are blocking each other's ambitions in Iraq. This will open new possibilities for political arrangements. The war in Iraq will not end in victory for anyone. That will become the basis of all negotiations.
• The United States is the world's leading power. When it moves toward political paralysis, others grow bolder. Aggressiveness will continue from Venezuela to Asia. But the most important moves will come from Russia and China.

Sometimes the best plan isn't a plan

The big story this news cycle is the White House's rejection of the Democrats' "plan" for a phased withdrawal from Iraq. To be clear, this is not really a plan, but the gist of comments from the Sunday morning news shows.

But even that may be too much of a plan for where we stand today.

Say, anybody out there have a plan for solving our Iraq problem? Anybody think that if we just do X, everything will simply fall into order and we'll march out to smiles and waves from our new Iraqi allies?

I don't have a plan and I don't believe in any magic X. My advice to Democrats is simple: Don't trust any simple solutions. This is why it never bothered me that Democrats didn't offer any detailed plans for fixing Iraq in either 2004 or 2006: Solving complex international problems by centralized political planning is seldom a good idea.

Original White House intentions aside, it is safe to say that we are in the mess we face today because America's political leadership didn't listen to the voices of wise counsel within its professional ranks. Jay Garner was replaced by the disastrous Paul Bremer. Dissent among senior officers was squelched to such an extent that otherwise loyal generals found themselves in revolt against the stubbornly wrongheaded edicts of Donald Rumsfeld. Democratic critiques from Capitol Hill were not heard at all.

Solving Iraq will take more than grand political plans and arbitrary deadlines. The best thing the Democrats can do right now is to make sure that the White House opens its ears to the voices it has long ignored. Bring in the mavericks and heretics from Spookworld, the State Department, the armed forces and both parties. Empower the smart people who have been ignored for the past four years. Try diplomacy and reach out to other nations as well. Remember that we have an executive branch for a reason.

A general direction change is fine, but I hope the Democratic plan for Iraq goes something like this: Rescue America's smart professionals from the political wilderness to which they have been consigned, and use what clout you have to make sure they get a chance to help us steer our way out of this tricky passage.

Sad day

I've read the defenses, some of them from people I consider well-intentioned, but I cannot escape the overwhelming sense that yesterday was a sad, sad day for the United States. I suspect history's verdict for this short-sighted failure will be harsh on both the Administration and Congress, but far worse, I expect that American soldiers will suffer horribly for this act of retroactive political ass-covering.

...the bill immunizes U.S. officials from prosecution for cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of detainees who the military and the CIA captured before the end of last year. It gives the president a dominant but not exclusive role in setting the rules for future interrogations of terrorism suspects.

Written largely, but not completely, on the administration's terms, with passages that give executive branch officials discretion to set details or divert from its protections, the bill is meant to provide what Bush said yesterday are "the tools" needed to handle terrorism suspects U.S. officials hope to capture.

And yes, I understand that the terrorists who oppose us are often sadistic, remorseless butchers. But the fact that our enemies commit far more heinous acts doesn't mitigate the fact that the Congress of The United States of American just authorized state use of more "humane" forms of torture.

If the cost of security is that we must become more like our enemies, then I guess I don't care that much about safety.  Honor is priceless, and these actions have sullied it. If you feel differently, that's your right, but I doubt that you'll be proud of that position five years from now. So I guess we'll just wait and see.

But today? Shame on us.