Postscript

Postscript

Between January 1 - January 17 2004, the two civilian Europeans, Nielsen & Rasmussen, had followed the Americans on foot, crossing the border from Kuwait into Iraq while carrying The Democracy in a box between them (Parallel Action #3.3.046). Together with their Iraqi counterparts, engineer and wannabe-president Adnan Alshamari and his cousin Emir Abu Ali, they traveled through Iraq in an old German Opel. In the trunk of the car was The Democracy. The content of the box was a question: What is democracy? This straightforward question was posed all the way up through Iraq - from Basra, through Amara to Baghdad. Everywhere they went, they unfolded the 'Nomadic Parliament' and staged dialogues with Iraqi citizens from all walks of life: men, women, artists, politicians, doctors, academics, journalists, engineers, workers and students. Finally they handed over The Democracy to a group of young artists at The Academy of Fine Arts in Baghdad, hoping that this would mark the beginning of a new democratic century.

Arrival in Iraq Jan 1, 2004

When they returned to Europe, Nielsen & Rasmussen introduced a plan for the democratic future of Iraq and subsequently the world. In April 2004, the Royal Danish Foreign Ministry granted an amount of $350.000 in support of our plan. But only a few weeks later History stops in its tracks: Images of American soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners in former Saddam-prisons are revealed. The American model for a democratic world suffered irreparable damage through the loss of legitimacy. Concurrently, the security situation in Iraq deteriorated, and the Royal Danish Foreign Ministry decided to withhold the money indefinitely - spelling the end of the Project for a New Democratic Millennium. It was then decided that Nielsen & Rasmussen had to bring the Democracy back to the USA; from where it had to begin from anew if the democratization of Iraq and the world should have any chance of success.

THOMAS ALTHEIMER

Taking off

Taking off

Tomorrow we will go on another epic journey in the service of democracy. This time we leave Denmark without The Democracy to catch up with it in Iraq. We will travel six hours from Amman through the Syrian Desert to meet with Emir on the Iraqi side of the border. Rumour has it that the Nomadic Parliament is in a sorry state. No one has seen the Democratic Flag since it was briefly displayed at the exhibition on the Academy of Fine Arts in January in Baghdad. Furat Zahroon, our trusted factotum, is supposedly working as a translator for the American military somewhere in Baghdad. Security and military are the only growing trades in Iraq at the moment. Do we have the power to change that? Emir will get 800$ for driving the box past Falluja to the border. He intends to buy a taxi for that money. I wonder what would happen if he was stopped at an insurgent road block and they found the box with THE DEMOCRACY written all over it. - What kind of ransom would we be prepared to pay to set Emir and The Democracy free?

The shirts have been cleaned, the fragmentation vest dusted, the lawn has been mowed, and the kids have been fed. Im not sure if I should bring Tocqueville's Democracy in America, or gear up for another round of Robert Musil and Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften again. I should probably lay off on the belletristic for a while. For one thing excessive reading of fiction tends to fixate me in these particular, non-universal moods. I should focus on theory. Musil was probably one of the reasons I flunked the final exam this summer for the second time in a row at the Institute of Political Science at the University of Copenhagen. Tocqueville would probably be the best preparation for the third and final attempt in January next year. And then again - theory in the form of Slavoj Zizek is presumably the main culprit in upsetting my scientific discourse. I don't know – judge for yourself – here's a link with a pdf-print of it: The Democracy – Destination: Iraq - On the road with Slavoj Zizek

The Iraqi-Jordanian border

The Iraqi-Jordanian border

It turns out that my choice of boots for the democratization of the US presents a security hazard in the Middle East. When we arrived on the Iraqi side of the border, my boots were the focus of much attention. We had to wait for several hours, hanging around a control post, smoking nervously, trying to control the mounting paranoia. For some reason I had the idea that there would be many American soldiers to safeguard Western civilization when it arrived to meet with its Iraqi counterparts. We saw no American soldiers anywhere. Adnan pointed towards some point on the infinite desert horizon and assured us that they were out there somewhere. There were two Iraqi soldiers to check the steady stream of cars passing through ‘the customs control'. After a while, they noticed us, came over, and told us to move closer to them. Right at that moment, I felt like an American. This was different from the last time in Iraq; here we went under the motto ‘we are all Iraqis'. Now, together with the concept and the make-up of our action, this clearly has morphed into ‘we are all Americans'. The Iraqi soldiers was clearly still worried for our security, after a short discussion, they again came to us this time pointing to their eyes and then my boots. They wanted me to hide in the car. The boots seemed to signal that I belonged to the coalition troops.

I went to the car and dozed for an hour or so. Adnan left us to find Emir and the box of democracy, which somebody told us, had gone through to the Jordanian side of the border. Meanwhile Nielsen was outside the car talking to curious by-passers. I was lying flat in the backseat with my dangling legs clearly visible to the audience outside. In my dream state, I heard Nielsen try to explain that my boots was perfectly ordinary in Denmark and that we weren't Americans. All the while the atmosphere grew more and more tense. The questioner was from Falluja, and thought it funny to praise Zarqawi for his deeds in Iraq. Over and over again, Nielsen was kept to the topic of the boots. How ironic that these boots, bought from a store in rural Millinge in the south of Denmark, should become a determining factor in our interaction with Iraqis. Nielsen was becoming increasingly uncomfortable and tried to wake me. The soldiers had left the control post and we were suddenly left alone with our friend from Falluja and our driver who was sleeping in the front seat. With no sign of Adnan, Emir or The Democracy, it now felt like a very bad decision to have gone to the Iraqi side.

Alas, as I was sitting, staring out the window on the very desolate surroundings, trying to come up with an escape plan and Nielsen could be heard repeating for the nth time that we weren't from the coalition forces, Adnan and Emir appeared on the other side of the control post with The Democracy. The sense of relief was overwhelming and I promised to myself at that point never again to go to Iraq as an American.

The Transfer of The Democracy

The Transfer of The Democracy

The democratic void

The democratic void

The transfer of The Democracy was carried through in a slightly hurried atmosphere. Emir and his co-driver had to hurry back as it is not particularly safe to travel the road to Baghdad in the dark.
We on our side were at first in a somewhat elated mood. The fact that The Democracy had succeeded in traveling from Kuwait to Baghdad, from Baghdad to Jordan and is now bound for Washington DC was exciting. It was a gripping moment when Nielsen replaced the Iraq-tag with a ‘USA' instead, thus marking the change of direction: ‘The Democracy – Destination: Iraq' had now become ‘The Democracy – Destination: USA'.

The exuberance quickly subsided and was replaced by the familiar paranoia and fright, as two GMC SUV's filled with grim looking men drove slowly past our improvised photo session.
As we walked back to our car, one of the cars followed us at walking pace, resulting in yet another outbreak of inner panic and its concurrent stream of images of orange jumpsuits, Arabic words, and headless bodies.

We made it to the car and drove to the customs control, where Adnan tried to explain the nature of the contents in the box to an officer. They went to the trunk. Adnan was told to open, all the while talking about the general nature of democracy and the urgency of democratizing the US. When he surrendered and opened the lid of the box, the officer exclaimed ‘But there is nothing in it!'

Universal Declaration of Consumer Rights

Universal Declaration of Consumer Rights

It has proven itself to be difficult to discuss the US and world democracy with people here in Amman. The political outlook of many is reduced to a vertical hierarchy with one or two Jews at the top, who are pulling strings attached to the US Government. Further down the line, above Yasser Arafat but beneath Israel, Europe plays its feeble, hysterical geopolitical role.
This somewhat fatalistic approach to history asserts itself across all levels of society. From taxi drivers to professionals and academics, this fact appears in every debate and seems to close off any real exchange of hopes for the future and real visions for a different organization of world politics.
Only difference between the fatalism of taxi drivers and Academics is when it will appear during a discussion. The latter tend to close discussions with it, where the former start right off with it.

Then, when the topic touches on the question of democracy export and democracy in the Middle East, everyone will talk about the way democracy and foreign values are imposed upon them. Often they will go on to stress the need of a system which takes local traditions and culture into consideration;' the revolution' should be slow and come from ‘within'.

Yet, it will never stop to amaze me how readily they accept the products of this very same ‘Jewish system'. Many hope to be able eventually to buy an oversized Suburban Chevrolet produced in the land of the free, and in their cafes and homes they all log into their Yahoo accounts with software produced by the Jewish Bill Gates. Asked about this paradox our very affluent host, Hanan, emphasizes that it is possible to differentiate between values in an eclectic manner.

Products you choose as a customer, thoughts and ideals as...a customer. So, maybe instead of Universal Human Rights, we should fight for a charter of Consumer Rights.

This is not Iraq!

The Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Jordan was not pleased to receive us without prior appointment. She gave us a very stern lecture on etiquette and how one conducts oneself in a civilized world. My attempt to save the situation was not particular successful. I contributed with a beautiful faux pas, as I said that Iraq had taught us always to improvise. ‘This is not Iraq!' she yelled, then grabbed a phone receiver and slammed it down again. ‘We have phones! We have computers! Everything here is not Iraq.'
We were dismissed with a wink, referred to a secretary and told to ‘get our act together'.

Final alterations

Thursday was our last evening in Amman. This was the final chance to add the final suggestions and alterations to the new model of democracy we were going to present to the American people tomorrow. With no invitations from anyone, we jumped at the chance when a man approached us in the lobby of our hotel and invited us to a ‘popular cultural centre’ somewhere in Amman. After an hours drive we finally got to our destination which turned out to be a UN funded sports centre in a Palestinian refugee camp. As we waited for the arrival of the Vice-President of the club, we were given a tour of the site; complete with an introduction to a basketball team, and a show of trophies in the office of the club president. Woefully, he didn’t turn up before 10 pm. By that time I was already fretting a great deal about the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA which we were going to enter tomorrow afternoon. Adding to a mood of growing despondency, the meeting quickly deteriorated into the usual endless flaming of Israel. The Vice-President – one of those proud peacocks one finds across all upper echelons in the Middle East – did all the talking and presented the by now very familiar worldview featuring the Big Jew as the spider in the centre of the web. We made some feeble attempts to suggest more complex causal connections but were instantly repulsed when the vice-president outflanked us by raising his voice to drown out our protests. – What should have been the culmination of European-Middle Eastern cooperation was quickly turning into a travesty.

Assistants and trainers of the club keenly listen to their Vice President

Summit in Queen Alia International Airport

6 am, five hours after a rather ungraceful retreat from the Palestinian Sports Club we leave the Middle Eastern Space of Place to enter the Western Space of Flows. As we go window shopping in the duty free stores of Jordan’s Queen Alia International Airport, we run in to Torben Getterman – the Danish representative to the CPA and the Council for International Coordination (CIC) in Baghdad. We decide to hold a brief improvised summit next to a Christian Dior perfume stand.
The high level meeting between these major players in the reconstruction of Iraq promptly looses any significance for political developments in the Middle East when it turns out that Getterman is the cousin of Nielsen’s father. The two men revert to an exchange of pleasantries; Rasmussen looses interest and continues his window shopping spree. The summit dissolves soon after.

Touchdown

6 pm, touchdown in New York’s JFK Airport in the United States of America. For the second time in the history of The Democracy, the box is held back because of security procedures. We have a meeting in some New York gallery in less than two hours but the star of our show has disappeared. The democratization of the US is postponed indefinitely. The empty-handed carriers of the democratic mandate – fatigued and bereaved – enter a train, a “subway” that will take them to the heart of the metropolis.

A fatigued servant an hour before our big US premiere

US-premiere

9 pm – 20 hours after the meeting with the Palestinians – still discussing how to address the American people without the democratic trappings, we are led through a back yard into a dark room filled with locals, there’s a stage in one end, a bar along the wall. I’m approached by a tall woman in an evening gown who tells me that we are “so very post-modern”. She calls herself a “Billionaire for Bush”. Two microphones are handed to us. Then we’re onstage.

(…)

I have no idea what we actually did in the 15 to 20 minutes onstage. It’s all a blur. I just remember tottering down offstage at one point. At the bar I’m offered free vodka and I say “thank you”. And the girl behind the bar says “no, than YOU for being YOU”.

I continue my tottering and totter outside as I’m not allowed to smoke my Gauloises inside. Outside someone exclaims: “You guys are so great. I’m throwing a party one of these days. Will you bring the democracy?” Dizzy from the culture shock, I give up communicating with the locals. I concentrate on vodka and cigarettes until I’m dragged into a taxi by a wobbly Nielsen. By then it’s 23 pm.

The European Founding Fathers - addressing the American silently from the window of a gallery on Third Avenue


The Democratic Fathers address the American People

Démocratie perdu à NYC

Démocratie perdu à NYC

Suspended in a void without our props and thus no mandate, with no possibility to act whatsoever, it has been left to us to register fragments of political discourse, which have surfaced in encounters with the American people over the past two days:

"This country is governed by men."

"SDI, the Stellar Defense Initiative, was conceived in Roswell 1948 after they shot down a transporter with extraterrestrials. Read more in 'Voyagers vol. 1 and 2, written by Dean - D-E-A-N"

"The Iraqis are not prepared for Democracy."

"My father lives in New Hampshire. He's a republican because he owns a small business."

"Who is this Paul Bremer?"

"Kerry will definitely not leave the Iraqis to themselves."

"The Bush and Kerry campaigns are sending thousands of lawyers to Florida."

"You really feel you can do anything in this country."

"There is no segregation in America."

"Humans were genetically engineered by extraterrestrials."

"The Red Sox is Kerry's team."

"America is the center of the world."

"Dick Cheneys daughter is a lesbian."

Democracy trouvé à Washington DC / Désespérance

Democracy trouvé à Washington DC / Désespérance

The tidal wave of monumental architecture, a geography of power, a museum of power, thousands and thousands of officials and professionals with security clearances hanging from their necks. Here, everything violently works to reduce the individual to an ignoble statistical entity. The disciplining effect of the carrier grid, which fastens the individual to the vertical lines of upward and downward mobility. No action is possible outside the grid.
(Only the mujahedeen squirrels, which are cleared to go wherever they like in the garden behind the White House, have a chance to go horizontal)
And even if the restraints of the carrier grid should somewhat lessen, America is utopia achieved, which means that no one is able to appeal to action by mobilizing the generally human longing for utopia.

Utopia achieved signifies the absence of any revolutionary potential in the societal fabric. Thus everywhere, across all layers and classes, one encounters a remarkable complacency. For a revolutionary romanticist like me there is no work to do in this country.

The Democracy at Georgetown University

The Democracy abandonnée à Washington DC / espérance

The Democracy abandonnée à Washington DC / espérance

Wednesday 3 - post Election Day - we're caught in throngs of joyous republicans milling around a Fox 5 News reporter outside the Ronald Reagan Building, three blocks from the White House. Just across from us, at the intersection of Constitution Avenue and 14th Street a screaming presidential motorcade is passing by. The incumbent has just held his victory speech inside the Reagan Building and is now on his way back to the house which will be his home for four more years.

My default inner European social democratic self is utterly disgusted by the masses of loud, smirking, incomprehensible American men, women, and children - that push us up 14th Street. They all carry some sort of garment with the colours of the American Flag, sporting Bush-Cheney badges, all the while hysterically waving the ominous large, dark blue Bush-Cheney '04 signs. I feel more estranged here among these people than I ever felt among Arabs in the Middle East who supposedly should constitute my radical Other.

We went to the East Mall to seek out the fissures in the American society where the revolutionary energy was thought to manifest itself in face of this massive victory to the side of the religious fundamentalists. But on this strangely warm, sunny melancholic afternoon - we found only joggers and an occasional tourist walking the paths among the scattered elm trees on the Mall strip. Strange, this country is so strange, even an army of Anthropologists couldn't begin to approach the truth of this continent.

I called Patricia in New York to hear if a revolt was developing in downtown Manhattan. She was crying, talking about how she hoped that the island of Manhattan would cast its moorings and drift off towards Europe. 'I will start drinking,' she said. She had been on the phone all day consoling and being consoled in turns. I asked her what they would have done if they didn't have phones. 'Go powershopping,' she replied.

This is a country of monads. The burden of action rests on the shoulders of the individual. There is no communal response possible to the imperative of action. Confined in their monad cubicles, the disaffected must settle for the options determined by the matrix of the individual - shopping or blogging, rolex or fontex, biological reproduction or biological termination.

But there is hope. Absolutely. Luckily, I am able to suppress the factory settings which came with my parochial Danish model of a mind. The strengthening of a moral world order which follows with the re-election of the Republican president, gives new impetus to a demand for a cosmopolitan world order where no man can be left to suffer because of his confinement behind contingent national borders. With the majority of the American Electorate defining the most important political issues as moral, a universe of opportunities opens up where the fictions of ethics can be countered with the fiction of fiction. All the monads of the world, which are now more than ever fixed in the 'robinsonade' of liberal citizenship, will be able to write their own individual world history. The merging of fact and fiction which truly accelerated during the Clinton-era and is now completed with the re-election of George W. Bush, spells true hope for our grand Parallel Action which will reinvent a new world fiction - a new utopia - parallel to the present-day fiction of reality.

Commemorating Election Night in
Georgetown, DC, Nov 2 2004:
Dianne 21, a student from the
Georgetown University School
of Foreign Service