Archive for March 21st, 2009


Why Qutb is not Marx, and bin Laden – Lenin, or How Much Should We Fear Somalia’s Islamists

Liubomir Topaloff on March 21, 2009 in Terrorism and Security Commentaries No Comments »
political_philosophy1A Specter roams through the world, the Specter of Global Terrorism.

Many politicians and commentators keep warning us of the imminent threat of Islamic extremism and terrorism. They lump together bin Laden’s global jihadists, various radical Islamists with clearly national agenda, and devout Islamic fundamentalists with no political agenda, all under the same broad umbrella labeled militant Muslims, or simply ‘global terrorist networks.’ These same commentators then take this heterogeneous groups with at times contradicting goals, and bundle them together in what I would call securitization of terrorism, to borrow a popular now term from the financial sector. Then just like the bad mortgage security assets they sell them to the general public, raising the expectations of Armageddon any minute now.

You don’t know what I am talking about? Did you see Dick Chaney last week on the TV? America, he said, is less secure now with the current president than before. Really?! Well, I guess then we need an army of rough agents of the Jack Bauer type to go postal on our enemies, but (more…)

Shit Shares and Wind Trade, or Why Madoff is not Law

Liubomir Topaloff on March 21, 2009 in US Foreign Policy Commentaries No Comments »

If, in the rarity of quasi-scientific historical frivolousness, one tries to assign specific cause, or ‘blame,’ or simply ‘a major contribution’ for such a complex event and with such profound implications for the posterior evolution of Europe, and indeed the world, as the French Revolution of 1789, neither Voltaire nor Rousseau can top the unintended consequences from the grandiose ambitions of the Scottish financial jack-of-all-trades John Law. When his financial adventure for selling shares of what appears to be among the biggest financial enterprises in the beginning of the 18th century – la Compagnie d’Occident – came to an end, the French treasury, and indeed the French crown, were plunged into deep financial recession, which culminated with a spontaneous social revolution.

No one really expects that one such contemporary collapse of another financial empire built on lies and avarice that of the American jack-of-all-trades Bernard Madoff, will cause a social revolution commensurate to the French one. But, there is (more…)