Asymmetrical use of power is facile, mobile, uncensored and relatively spontaneous from its inception to completion of mission. Democracy is cumbersome, labor-intensive, deliberative and slow. freshrant.com
Nine years ago America’s multi-trillion dollar security apparatus was penetrated by 19 young men armed with knives and box cutters. Considering the nation’s investment in defense and its subsequent response, there has never been a more disproportionate example of attack and counter-attack in the history of warfare.
The Bush administration and others, post 9/11, laid out the "failure of imagination" argument positing that no one could have possibly predicted such a catastrophic event, in spite of the first Twin Tower attacks in the early 90′s up through multiple warnings ending just days before the al Qaeda attack.
Our national failure of imagination carries on to this day. We are stuck in a defense posture that includes treasury-draining traditional warfare. Ongoing TSA countermeasures for asymmetrical plots include the nixing of plastic water bottles and shoe removal-all a vapor trail to past threats.
By their very nature, asymmetrical assaults on our nation do not remain static and, if effective, contain the element of surprise. What is surprising as much as it is disappointing is how so many of these disproportional attacks against democracy are emanating from within.
The Asymmetry of Malcontents, Misanthropes and Misfits
Terry Jones, pastor of the deceptively-named Dove World Outreach Center, performed less world outreach and more world throat grab, garnering massive press ogling for his hate-filled bonfire of self-absorbed vanities. His malicious antics blew up into an epic press firestorm, the flames of which continue to spread around the world with deadly result.
That this pathetic buffoon might have leveraged his malevolent intent into negotiations with Imam Feisal Abdul Raufm over the Manhattan Islamic Cultural Center controversy is stunning in its asymmetry.
Because of the worldwide notoriety Jones corralled, with media awaiting breathlessly for his schizoid pronouncements, he will surely become the poster wild child for society’s publicity-seeking copycats waiting to tout fringe causes once relegated to YouTube as hysterical curiosities, or worse, dangerously divisive and incendiary dogmas.
The Asymmetry of New Media
What happens when a misanthrope is able to leverage misinformation through a blog? Right-wing commentator, Andrew Breitbart, was able to effectively smear Shirley Sherrod by his jujitsu of the mainstream media from a single misleading blog post. The intensity of the volume and echo in the media led to a major crisis in judgment in the Obama administration as well as in the top leadership of the NAACP.
As was the case with Terry Jones, Breitbart would not have been able to accomplish denigrating Sherrod as a racist in his edited video without the service of the mainstream media. The Breitbart example illustrates an ominous cascade of lapses in fact-checking and the ensuing rush to judgment fueled by a single fringe member of the blogosphere.
The Asymmetry of Money
So what’s new about money in politics? Not much. Just how much. More than ever we are witnessing a disturbing trend toward the wholesale purchase of political office by growing numbers of singularly rich, inexperienced political candidates.
Florida multimillionaire, Rick Scott, upset his GOP primary opponent in the governor’s race, former US representative and Florida attorney general, Bill McCollum, by spending $50 million of his own wealth. Would this political novice have come out on top if he had not been able to blanket the airwaves to drown out the fact that he had overseen the biggest Medicare fraud case in U.S. history? Scott had served as CEO of hospital giant Columbia/HCA causing a record $1.7 billion in fines, penalties and damages.
Scott looks like a piker compared to former Ebay CEO, Meg Whitman, who won the California Republican primary for governor using 70 million large from her own personal $1.4 billion stash. Her latest spending totals for her run against former Governor Jerry Brown now top $100 million.
Why this particular stash of mega money makes the asymmetrical list is that it is being spent by a small number of mega rich to gain power. We might call this final asymmetrical category, M3, or M to the third power. Because someone is a multimillionaire running for high public office doesn’t make him or her a misfit. But such enormous sums of money does allow a candidate to bypass the normal screening mechanisms of the democratic process. And unlike the Jones and Brietbarts of the world, the super rich don’t need to leverage their cause into big media through a blog or obscure website. With their money, they just buy it.
Add to the asymmetry in the money equation the donations of the two $35 billion strong Koch Brothers who fund the Tea Party movement with their fake grassroots Americans for Prosperity organization. The other major Tea Party sponsor, Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks, received $12 million of Koch money under its original name, Citizens for a Sound Economy.
According to Jane Mayer’s recent comprehensive New Yorker piece on the brothers’ use of their fortune to advance their corporate interests, "Koch-controlled foundations gave out $196 million from 1998 to 2008, much of it to conservative causes and institutions. That figure doesn’t include $50 million in Koch Industries lobbying and $4.8 million in campaign contributions by its political action committee."
Add to this disproportionate money/power mix the recent landmark Supreme Court ruling, Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, allowing unlimited spending on elections by corporations and one is left to wonder who will be left standing in Congress to represent the interests of the people.
This intense assault on our democratic system requires our attention. It requires an informed electorate capable of critical thinking. And it requires a media that is capable of doing something it has long criticized the blogosphere for not doing: editing.
Asymmetrical use of power is facile, mobile, uncensored and relatively spontaneous from its inception to completion of mission. Democracy is cumbersome, labor-intensive, deliberative and slow.
Evidence suggests there is much to fear, not just from the direction our country is heading, but from the speed of the approach and the volatility of the landing.