I was in Paris last week, reporting on the Task Force for Financial Integrity and Economic Development’s annual conference. After a fascinating day hearing how illicit financial flows and tax avoidance are destroying the developing world, American economist Jeffrey Sachs gave an excellent keynote speech over the video link. Particularly interesting were his points on the impact of corporate lobbying and financing on US democracy.

“Our democracies are getting eaten alive by lobbying,” Sachs said.

Sachs argued against companies being allowed to give unlimited resources to parties, and the particular problem of anonymous donations.

“The Supreme Court said corporate money given anonymously should be equated to free Speech,” Sachs said.

He pointed to Obama’s attempts to raise $1 billion for next year’s election campaign and the $35,000 per head dinners he has hosted to help him reach that target.

“What’s the point of that?” Sachs asked. “Maybe a few hundred of it is to get your picture taken with Obama, but most of it is to get access to the President. It’s an issue of financial integrity. It cuts to the heart of our democracies.”

Sachs called for regulation to prevent the growth of companies so large they threaten democracy.

“Corporate money equals free speech? No. It may not be the opposite, but it’s close to the opposite,” Sachs said.

Sachs sees that the role of companies in society should be to make money within an effective regulatory framework, not to try to change that framework for their own ends.

He believes that the reason nothing is getting done on climate change is corporate lobbying.

And he’s right. American democracy relies more on cents than sense. Its fundamental pillars are not built on votes, but dollars. When two billion dollar parties can be bought and sold by the same group of business interests holding both their purse strings, where do the people fit in? Does it even matter whether the Republicans or Democrats are in power if corporate money can throw the clog in the machine of any genuine attempts for change?

Last night, the American House of Representatives passed legislation to raise the debt ceiling and heavily cut public spending – a historic move if you take into account the first has never been conditional on the latter. Today, the Senate unsurprisingly passed it.

This trimming of the budget was inevitable considering the normalisation of neoliberal policies. Horrendous facts and figures regarding the extent of the cuts aside, the focus is on negotiations which took place and the ideological victory won by the Republicans and their Tea Party offshoot who succeeded in their desire to see no tax increases. The Democrats were evenly split in House votes (95 for and 95 against), whereas the Republicans were heavily in favour of the bill (174 for and 66 against).

Talk of a compromise being made flatters to deceive, with even staunch Obama supporters disillusioned by this legislation. Obama’s posturing has been to attract support from the centre of his party and the independents who are worrying about the deficit and its relationship between Wall Street investment for Main Street businesses and services. However, this will not wash when imagining the destruction of public services, social security and education. If people don’t have these things, they can’t get to work, won’t be qualified to work, and won’t be able to afford the rising costs of living in urban towns and cities.

Its easy to say Obama isn’t to blame; that he’s held in thrall to corporate interests and a Republican majority in Congress. However, it is easy to say he is to blame too. It is foolish for anyone to think he has failed because no one person should ever have that much responsibility or power anyway. The criticism will always be easy if it is about him. I am not taking anything away from his agency as president here, but we must not forget the words being whispered into Reagan’s ear to “hurry up” by Don Regan , his policy man, during a speech, or Clinton and the continuation of the Washington Consensus, or Bush Jr. and both the recent invasions. These men, while being the public faces of the problem, deflect away from a festering undergrowth of corruption, corporate collusion, nepotism and class warfare perpetrated by those who wish to maintain the status quo, their own corporate welfare, and social immobility.

Commentators have suggested this outcome is a severe weakening of Obama’s already lacklustre authority and maybe even his re-election chances, but this is all too simplistic and linear. Americans love a narrative, preferably with a soundtrack, of individuals with ideals battling their nemeses and prevailing for the ambiguously greater good.

It is popcorn politics the American mainstream media try and peddle, and it is the American public who start feeling powerless and apathetic because of it.

While austerity will be pushed onto us here and we will fight it tooth and nail, it is the Americans I wish to see rally and fight this new bill once it is enforced. If a large scale movement can be built with the support and enthusiasm the “Save Our Schools” campaign has recently generated there, there will be huge protests in all the major cities in the U.S, which will in turn reverberate around the developed world.

It has been said capitalism would destroy itself for a profit. We may be witnessing the beginnings of America’s implosion. After all, as we’ve seen with Spain’s “Indignados”, a movement which has been virtually ignored as of late despite daily protests and demonstrations held by thousands, “No es la crisis, es el sistema” (its not the crisis, its the system) must come to mind.

I think, or rather hope, more Americans act on the realisation that it is not Obama who they are now feeling increasingly alienated from, but the sacred system which both major parties defend and maintain with very little deviation.

Following Obama’s 45 minute speech about the Middle East and North Africa, I am left predictably bored by it all. We were told the U.S. would be “turning a new page” regarding its relationship with these states which are experiencing great upheaval right now.

Hillary Clinton took the stage first and said “new” about 38 times and left. President Obama then stepped on and began an emotional narrative regarding the rightful internal overthrow of (previously supported) dictators (who he didn’t apologise for supporting). “It should come as no surprise”, he gushed. It didn’t.

Obama then explained that America’s interests are not contrary to the peoples hopes and ambitions in these troubled countries, but are intrinsically tied to them, even inferring that they depend on them, as we will see later. Iraq was mentioned as if were a previous drunken adventure they have now learnt from. Still, he insisted that Iraq projected a “promise of democracy […] a multi-ethnic, a multi-sectarian democracy”. Still only a promise? This after 8 years and hundreds of thousands dead. I think the invasion was based on a promise too.

He woke from the malaise and was sterner when mentioning Syria. He declared that Assad and his regime must either “lead the transition [to reform and democracy], or get out of the way”. What is mystifying is how there is even an option here as Assad has already killed hundreds of protestors, much like Gaddafi, who is now branded an illegitimate tyrant. A bit of convenient inconsistency then. Moreover, “get out of the way” was not his most detailed and explanatory comment regarding Syria since the uprising. Softening again, he spoke of Bahrain as a “long standing partner” who had a legitimate right to exact the rule of law and maintain its sovereignty and integrity. He blamed a lot of the strife on Iranian influence, but did say the Bahraini regime must conduct a dialogue with the protestors, and can’t if they keep throwing them in prison. It seems the Saudi tanks were incredibly well disguised.

Moving on to Egypt and economic policy, he said that America were prepared to “relieve up to $1bn in debt” Egypt owed, and “ensure $1bn was made available for borrowing” for various infrastructure projects. This was seemingly part of an economic plan which involved, as quoted, “trade, not just aid” to the countries in the region. His idea was that “protectionism [would give] way to openness”. Convenient if you’re America, I’d say. You know, after you are done with being protectionists over your own economy in the past in order for it to develop so it doesn’t become destabilised by flaky and unreliable foreign investment. But nevermind that.

After all of these periphery, drawn out comments, Obama came to the meat of the speech everyone was waiting for – Israeli/Palestinian relations and America’s role in and around them. As both peoples become more shrill in their indignation, the U.S. has not provided anything resembling an assertive turning point in the mediation of the affair:

But what America and the international community can do is state frankly what everyone knows: a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples. Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people; each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

So while the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, and a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.

The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

Now, this prelude to anything meaningful already positions the Israeli argument as the driving one. Obviously, Israel will be controlling the conversation because it is already a state and any negotiations are negotiations regarding Israeli concessions. However, calling for a “viable Palestine” shelves any notion that one has been dreamt of yet by the Palestinians, and damages their bargaining power when the U.N. General Assembly convene later this year in what could be a historic moment in this war of attrition.

The lacklustre speech slowly unravelled its deceptive purpose:

These principles provide a foundation for negotiations. Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basic security concerns will be met. I know that these steps alone will not resolve this conflict.

Two wrenching and emotional issues remain: the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees. But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians.

This is important on two counts. Firstly, Obama positions the issues of territory and security before the issues of Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugees right of return. What remains to be seen is if these issues do in fact come before the more sensitive ones he has placed afterwards. Is there even a solution to security and borders without addressing the massive hurdles of Jerusalem and the right of return for Palestinian refugees? It is almost a non sequitur. This subtle infraction will have neo-cons and the American Israeli lobby sit back contented with the speech. By way of this deft positioning, Obama has reiterated U.S. hostility towards Palestinian aspirations by delegitimising the seemingly inevitable declaration of Palestinian statehood in September, and harming the on-going reconciliation of Fatah and Hamas, which is key to it and proves quite a problem to an Israeli dominated discourse.

Secondly, Obama has solidified the role of the U.S. in these negotiations. By identifying the conditions of peace and stability as such, he is putting a deflated ball back in the court of the Palestinians, while “unshakably” supporting Israel as it “must defend itself” and its borders. All of this can only be said and done from a position of leadership and demonstrative power. The U.S. has strategically reasserted this. As we have seen with the recent and isolated veto in the Security Council relating to Israeli settlements, the American administration is not changing its policy or its position in this conflict and will remain a staunch defender of Israeli interests.

Hearing “new this” and “new that” repeatedly at the beginning by a hype-woman does nothing to frame the speech as something it isn’t. It was anything but new. What it was was another dressing down of Palestinian aspirations with eyes firmly fixed on September.

Massachusetts was not won by the Republicans, it was lost by Obama

Yesterday’s big news from the far side of the Atlantic was the loss of one of the safest Democratic seats to Scott Brown, a man who represents possibly everything that should make us very worried about the Republicans. In Ted Kennedy’s former seat, which has been blue since 1952, it was the Democrats’ to lose. And they lost it.

They didn’t lose because their opponent drives a truck, because his daughters were available or because it was, after all, the people’s seat and not Ted Kennedy’s as was far too confidently assumed. By all accounts, it was not the number of Republicans voting which swung it, but the number of independents backing Brown and the number of Democrats staying at home. It might be tempting for observers this side of the pond to blame the unerring potential for American political stupidity in falling behind a resurgent GOP just one year after the worst president in living memory retired to Crawford. Obama’s ratings are now lower than any president since Eisenhower at the same stage. But for all the fire and spittle and mad dog hysteria thrown at him by the likes of Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity, the largest part of the blame has to lie with himself.

He is perhaps a victim of the power of his own voice. Obama could probably recount what he had on his toast this morning and turn it into a dazzling charismatic performance that lifts the spirits of the world. But the problem with hot rhetoric is that it does not sit too well with cold pragmatism. Only a fool would have thought Obama’s election meant a fundamental change in the nature of American politics. But he has played too close to the centre to truly capitalise on the yearning for ‘yes we can’. He was never going to appeal to the right in America. But with his lukewarm proposals for reform failing to match up to his lofty words, as speechcraft gets bogged down in statecraft, he is increasingly alienating his left-wing base.

It’s a tragedy for the poor in America that Scott Brown will likely derail even the tiniest table scraps of health care reform that are being thrown to them from Washington. It is a greater tragedy for the poor across the rest of the planet that Obama’s meagre proposals for emissions cuts will fall flat. But it’s a tragedy that Obama has brought on himself. There’s no guarantee that a left-ward swing will prevent him from becoming a one-term president. But at least he could say he tried. At least he could say ‘yes I did’. Because one thing’s for sure. If you sit on the fence, you get splinters.

Michael Moore says absolutely everything that needs to be said on Obama’s decision to send 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan.

Hat tip here goes to Leon on Pickled Politics. Sunny, writing on the same website, makes some good points, but I continue to believe his support for the war and for the additional troops is misguided. Time will tell which of us is right (and I sincerely hope he is), but I have an eight year head start.

It goes without saying that a leader’s first judge will invariably be his or her own people. Presidents and prime ministers live or die, come election time, by their policies, by how well they have adapted to events beyond their control and by how effectively they have handled the three most rudimentary tasks of government: protecting the population from external threats, maintaining law and order and handling the economy. But there are times when certain momentous decisions have much further reaching consequences, when a leader must look beyond the short-term popularity and practicality of a policy, because it is not just their people who will judge them, but history itself.

In seven days, the leaders of the world’s nations will meet in Copenhagen to agree a framework for tackling climate change. As George Monbiot told me in an interview with The Third Estate in September, “The chances of preventing a two degrees rise in global temperatures are now pretty slight and diminishing rapidly.” Quite simply, he argued, the damage has already been done. To understand the gravity of the situation, a two degree rise in global temperatures is all that is needed to destroy half the rainforest and with it one of the largest carbon sinks on Earth.

Even at present, 13,000 sq km of sea ice in the Antarctic Peninsula have been lost over the last 50 years, Bangladesh is suffering floods that make Cockermouth look like a dry day in the Sahara and entire glaciers in the Andes, upon which millions depend for clean drinking water, have vanished. There are some who would bury their heads in the sand, pointing to the ill-chosen words of a few scientists discussing methodology, arguing that the tens of billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide we are pumping into the atmosphere is having no effect on our climate, whilst ignoring the dramatic changes that are happening here and now all around us. History will judge the inane outpourings of Melanie Phillips too. But if we are to prevent the catastrophe of runaway climate change, resulting from growing emissions and shrinking carbon sinks no longer able to offset them, then we have to act now. Copenhagen may well be our last chance to make a difference. That can only happen with America on board.

It is abundantly clear that Barack Obama paints himself as a transformative figure. His rhetoric, his sloganeering, his grand speeches all look to history and his place in it. Unfortunately, his policies point no further than the next election. At present he is doing little more than papering over the cracks of the worst injustices of the Bush administration. Necessary steps to be sure, but still just tinkering around the edges. His pledges to close Guantanamo, pull soldiers from Iraq and his piddling lukewarm proposals to reform America’s barbaric healthcare system will, in the long run, prove fairly irrelevant. When history looks back at his place in it, what will it see? A leader who was better than George Bush? Not exactly hard to find. The slightly more humane face of American Empire? We’ve seen it all before. America’s first black president? Not enough.

Obama will travel to Copenhagen on December 10th, the day before he collects his Nobel Peace Prize (awarded, unlike most prizes, for potential effort rather than attainment) in Oslo. Whether he deserves that honour will depend on what he brings to the table. At present he is offering a 17% cut to the carbon emissions of history’s greatest polluter by 2020. Far too little, far too late – not least because, whilst the rest of the world is pledging cuts to 1990 levels, Obama’s are only to 2005 levels. Since US emissions have risen by around 15% since 1990, what Obama is effectively offering is little more than a 2% cut over the next ten years. Hardly the stuff of which history is made.

As Monbiot, a keen supporter of the 10:10 campaign, said: “We need a 10% cut in the coming year. And then a 10% cut in the following year. Otherwise the cumulative emissions will push us above two degrees and more without any question.”

Obama will struggle to get these radical, but necessary proposals through Congress. He will take a beating from American business leaders; he’ll face an onslaught from the attack dogs of FOX News and a backlash from Middle America’s families whose gas guzzling SUVs will be prised only from their cold dead fingers. But it is time for the man who once told the world ‘yes we can’ to make a stand. If he truly sees himself as a transformative figure, he cannot afford to look no further than the next election. Because, in the long game, when all is said and done, it will not be the electorate that judges him. History is already watching.

The Obama administration will be breathing a sigh of relied today as the House of Representatives narrowly approved the President’s flagship health reforms. A battle still remains in the Senate, of course, and amongst the crazed zealots in the country crying ‘freedom’ whilst attempting to deny millions of the poorest Americans the right to basic health care. But this is the first victory for progressives in what, for anyone on this side of the Atlantic who isn’t a slapheaded idiot like Daniel Hannan, is one of the most bafflingly incomprehensible arguments in history.

It was Sun Tzu who, all those centuries ago, argued that to achieve victory, one must know one’s enemies. But I simply cannot understand anyone who refuses to recognise health care as a universal human right. Not least those FOX News fanatics opposed to a bill that does not even come close to free state-run health care, which should be a basic requirement for any developed nation, and indeed is a treasured asset of many developing nations. Whilst proclaiming their right to choose – an utterly irrelevant criticism in light of Obama’s reforms – they would deny hundreds of thousands of people any choice save death or bankruptcy. And that is not just for the poor and uninsured. That goes for all those whose policies just don’t want to pay out, who pick holes in every claim, because saving money is more important than saving a life in this most inhumane of models.

I can begin to understand the neo-liberals of the New Right who believe society should be orientated around a free market philosophy. I can even begin to understand social conservatives opposed to abortion and stem cell research on the grounds of their own moral compass. But I can never understand anyone who argues that human life should be left to the naked principles of the market. But then, perhaps Glenn Beck will be able to draw me a map of the retarded right-winger’s mind on his blackboard. It’s the only way I’m ever going to get it.

Interview by Dan Swain and Lorna Finlayson

"Revolution isn't rational anymore, but a breath of fresh air would be"

Ted Honderich is Grote Professor Emeritus of Mind and Logic at University College London. Since 9/11 he has written several books on the subject of terrorism and war, most recently Humanity, Terrorism, Terrorist War, and has become a vocal advocate of the right of the Palestinians to a state, and to the means of achieving that state. We interviewed Honderich following his paper at Cambridge University’s Moral Sciences Club – their anachronistically named answer to a departmental seminar – where he laid out his views on Zionism, neo-Zionism, Gaza, Iraq and Afghanistan, arguing that support for the Palestinians includes acknowledging their right to terrorism. The discussion was mostly cordial, though it was clear that most of the philosophers and students present were sceptical.

Honderich is, in fact, very critical of the institution of academic philosophy and its role in politics: “The contribution of the overt and the more common covert conservative political philosophy is the same. It is to pretend that the political tradition of conservatism, as in the case of New Labour as much as the Conservative Party past and present, does actually have an arguable principle of what is right and wrong to support the self-interest of an economic and social class. In this, the tradition of conservatism in general is different from the tradition of the Left and of old Labour. Liberal political philosophy, as in the case of John Rawls, escapes the viciousness of conservatism, but lacks resolution in thought, feeling and action, and seemingly always will.” His interests haven’t always been in this area – and he continues to work, for example, on the philosophy of consciousness – but he sees a connection between a wider commitment to philosophy and his recent focus on politics: “These interests arose more or less accidentally, but maybe less accidentally than I have supposed. I take it that all decent philosophy is a concentration on — not sole ownership of — the logic of ordinary intelligence. That comes down to clarity, usually in the form of analysis, and consistency and validity, and completeness. What goes with that has to be generality, and truth as against convention. Any philosopher aspires or pretends to aspire to that logic, whatever his or her area.”

“I wouldn’t come now.”

The observation that New Labour is now firmly within the tradition of conservatism is clearly a saddening one for him. He calls the old Labour party “the great party of humanity and civilization in British history”, and the reason he came to Britain from Canada: “I wouldn’t come now.” But what about the hope over the Atlantic, Obama? “Chomsky, the great reality-judge of our age, is not hopeful. I myself think we can still expect more from Obama than from anybody else you could have dreamed would be president. Certainly I haven’t given up. The plain fact is that he is the president of the most powerful of the hierarchic democracies. Its national strength, it seems, is or contributes greatly to the power of the economic and social classes near and at the top. Surely it is also clear that as an astute and morally decent politician, so appallingly superior to our criminals against humanity Blair and Brown, he is judging what is possible and going forward in that rationality.”

For Honderich the modern democracies presided over by Obama and Brown are profoundly hierarchic. We ask what he sees as the alternative: “The alternative is real or realer democracy, of course, where not only two heads are better than one and more heads better than two, but the heads are equally free in expressing their judgements and wants. The question brings back to mind Colonel Rainborough’s moral truth in the Putney Debates in the time of the English civil war. ‘Really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he….’ Are there tanks in those army barracks somewhere around Pimlico? I think some successor to Rainborough should think on him, and on our society, where not only the poorest but at least the six bottom economic deciles are being cheated of fuller lives. He should arrange for his tank to break down in Parliament Square for a while, only long enough for our political class and the telly to become aware of it, and then take himself back to the barracks, and also take his punishment for his civil and other disobedience. Revolution isn’t rational anymore, but a breath of fresh air would be. It might have a little effect on our coming election . Maybe remind some of our low politicians that the response to a question isn’t an answer, that selling isn’t their proper line of life, that the House of Commons isn’t the Student Union in Oxford, and that our elections shouldn’t be Afghanistan with drapery.”

Turning to the questions of terrorism. Words like terrorism, radicalism and extremism have developed a strange currency in recent years. As we are learning, one can be a domestic extremist merely for attending a demonstration or going to the wrong meeting. Honderich is struck by the speed of this development: “It has surprised me that transparent terminological means, such as persuasive or loaded definitions, or indeed the pretence of actual definition, have been so successful in the forming and manipulating of public feeling and opinion. This has something to do, presumably, with a new and larger role of the media in society. The effect is more pervasive than supposed, far wider than the effect of such organs as The Daily Mail.”

Precision in terminological definitions is crucial here. ‘Zionism’, defined as the project of establishing a Jewish state in 1948 and within those borders, is a project Honderich defends. It was justified in part by the horrors of the holocaust, he says, and the reality of that state now requires the defence of it. He is an implacable enemy of what he calls ‘Neo-Zionism’ – “the taking from the Palestinians of at least their liberty in the last 5th of their homeland”, and is critical also of ‘semitism’ – “the prejudice in favour of Jewish people right or wrong.” Whilst justifying the creation of the Israel, and therefore a commitment to what is commonly called a two-state solution, is a common (though far from universal) opinion amongst the Palestine solidarity movement, one of his reasons for it seems odd. In Humanity, Terrorism, Terrorist War… he attaches considerable significance to the question of whether the Palestinians were ‘fully a people’ in 1948, arguing that they were, but that it was reasonable to believe otherwise on the basis of the best information available at the time. Why is this so important? “I have the feeling that you have hit on the weakest point in that book, as some others have. But I still stick to it. The Principle of Humanity, in short, is that we should take rational steps to get and keep people out of bad lives — with bad lives defined in terms of deprivation of the great human goods, these being length of conscious life, bodily well-being, freedom and power, respect and self-respect, the goods of relationship, and the goods of culture. A people not organized into a state and society, I take it, not well-defined as a group, are not open to a kind of insult, a kind of disrespect. They are also less likely to have already achieved the other great goods. That is a beginning of a reply.”

"As for the pro-Palestinian student occupations, I am absolutely for them"

Over the past few years the question of Palestine has played a controversial role in universities. There is anger over the government’s requests for lecturers to spy on students, the way in which Islamic societies are being monitored and clamped down on, and controversy over strategies for delivering solidarity. There has been much concern over the desire of the government to channel funding towards such ‘key issues’, with terrorism being a primary one. Honderich puts this in perspective: “In a society as morally stupid as ours, nearly always a stupidity owed to ignorance and the success of keeping people in that ignorance, I am tempted to have the feeling that research funding should not be at the forefront of our concern. The cosmeticism of New Labour comes higher. So does not forgetting about the estate agents and the private schools along with the bankers. So does Noam Chomsky not having a Nobel Prize.” What about two of the most controversial solidarity strategies on campuses? “I have not myself joined the academic boycott of Israel, which so to speak has left me with a bad conscience as well as a good one. The main difficulty, as always, is a factual one. Same as with terrorism. Will a boycott serve the end of the Principle of Humanity and more particularly the cause of the Palestinians? There are arguments both ways, but maybe I am moving towards the boycott. As for the pro-Palestinian student occupations, I am absolutely for them. They don’t come to much, incidentally, against the neo-Zionist and semitic activities in the universities.”

“I suspect my view is easily the majority view in the world, however quiet people are about expressing it”

This year we mourned the death of Marek Edelman, the heroic resistance leader of the Warsaw Ghetto. The widespread respect for him surely shows that the notion of legitimate armed resistance is something people are, at least historically, happy to assent to. Why, then has Honderich’s position made him such a controversial figure? “I wonder if the explanation has partly to do with a perception of philosophy, not only a popular one. It is a perception, even in this degraded society, that carries with it respect, even in the midst of our monstrous plague of the celebrities. That a member of a respected profession and line of life, not gone over entirely to journalism, holds particular views, gets him or her attention. The explanation also has to do, of course, with the convention that we leave such judgements to governments, and in particular our hierarchic democracies. I suspect my view, on Zionism and neo-Zionism and Palestinian resistance to or self-defence against neo-Zionism, is in fact easily the majority view in the world, however quiet people are about it, however reluctant to express it.”

The Moral Sciences Club meets Tuesdays during term time in St. John’s College Cambridge.

Humanity, Terrorism, Terrorist War is published by Continuum. Ted Honderich’s personal website is here.

America will not prove its openness through hosting the Olympics, but by engaging in diplomacy

It must be difficult for Barack Obama to hear the words ‘no you can’t', but that was exactly what he had to face today as the IOC chose Rio de Janeiro to host the 2016 Olympics over his hometown of Chicago. Earlier this morning the US president made a characteristically charismatic speech, telling delegates the games would show that “America at its best is open to the world.” It’s a curious sentiment. Last year’s Beijing Olympics didn’t exactly demonstrate China’s openness to the world, anymore than the 1936 Berlin Olympics gave the globe a nice big hug from Hitler. It’s not through sporting co-operation that America will turn its back on the brinkmanship and dogged unilateralism of the Bush years, but diplomacy.

Yesterday’s meeting in Geneva marked the highest level talks between the US and Iran in 30 years. And whilst the headlines talked of signs of a breakthrough in Iranian co-operation, with the Islamic Republic agreeing to permit international inspections and export a sizeable portion of its uranium for outside enrichment to render it unuseable in weapons, the real breakthrough was seeing America come to the negotiating table. Of course, the US approach to the issue of nuclear proliferation remains one-sided and hypocritical, not least in its double-standards over Israel’s known, but never acknowledged warheads. But whilst the agenda remains the same, the new multilateral approach offers signs of hope for a safer world where simplistic, dangerous sentiments like ‘axis of evil’ give way to a more nuanced approach. Where imperialist aggression, bullying and sanctions give way to talk.

As Latin America celebrates the Olympic Games coming to the continent for the first time in history, its northern neighbour must do more to make its newfound goodfaith clear, building on the turning point it reached when it refused to endorse the Honduran coup by listening to the demands to end the unjust and inhumane embargo on Cuba. America will not, afterall, prove its openess through discus, but discussion.