The-Not-Voter: 2010

Sunday, October 3, 2010

The outstanding example of power-over is of course the presumption to devote 2% of national income to the building up of military forces and sending of Latvian soldiers to serve in Afghanistan at a time when the country can ill afford such expenditure. The latter surely is better spent on education of Latvia's young and old.

The Not-Voter would like to see that the politicians of the 10th Latvian Saeima make an oath to the nation of Latvia that as a condition of becoming the political servants of Latvia, they become a no lesser self-sacrifice than a soldier on the front line.

As the previous two blogs (34 & 35) point our, one of the critical issues for Latvia in the upcoming years is the reanalysis (by independent historians and anthropologists) of its cultural history. The failure to allocate resources to this end by Latvian governments of the previous twenty years is not only a moral failure, but the source of government corruption at the present.

The previous Latvian governments considered it “nothin’ special” if their ministers sent their children to schools abroad with their left hand, while their right hand was deep in the till of government, and other children suffered from rotting teeth, generally ill health, poor food, poor schools, inadequately prepared teachers and teaching facilities, and had to suffer sacrifices no government official bore in equal measure.

An oath of self-sacrifice on behalf of Latvia by all government officials, elected or appointed, is a must.* Note below item italicized by this writer. It is from the LR laws regarding its Defense Forces:

[10. pants. Karavīra zvērests

«Es, Latvijas karavīrs, apzinoties atbildību savas tautas un likuma priekšā, apsolos un zvēru:
- būt uzticīgs Latvijas Republikai, tās Satversmei un likumīgajai valdībai;
- netaupot spēkus, veselību un dzīvību, sargāt Latvijas valsti un tās neatkarību;
- pēc labākās sirdsapziņas veikt man uzticētos karavīra pienākumus;
- bez ierunām pakļauties militārajai disciplīnai, vienmēr pildīt savu priekšnieku pavēles un rīkojumus atbilstoši Latvijas Republikas likumiem.»

A quick translation of the loath: "I, a Latvian soldier, aware of my responsibility before my nation and the law, promise and make this oath: --to be faithful to the Latvian Republic, its Saeima and lawful government; --without reservation expend my strength, health and life, to protect the Latvian nation and its independence; --with the greatest of consciousness to fulfill my soldierly responsibilities; --without protest surrender myself to military discipline, and always execute the orders and tasks given me by my superiors reflecting the laws of the Latvian Republic."]

As this writer has said before, the economic sacrifices that government will impose on the citizens of Latvia in the near future, the same powered to the nth degree by further declines in the world economy, spells a potential end to Latvia. To survive the economic catastrophe, even to marshal the nation’s will to survive and flower, one cannot continue along the path of least resistance a la Pop politics.

The Not-Voter blog does not expect to disappear. As pointed out by blogs 34 and 35, we will continue to examine the alternatives to the Latvian character that were repressed with the Herrnhuter religious movement in Livonia in the 18th and 19th centuries. We suspect that a neo-Herrnhuter or Children of Johns movement may capture the flag of a 4th Latvian Awakening.

Therefore, we take leave today reminding the reader that the very word “Awakening” originates with the Herrnhuters. While the Children of Johns of tomorrow will not be identical with the Moravian Brotherhood, it is that brotherhood, which, nevertheless, was responsible for Awakening the Children of Johns to their Latvian heritage. With some theological adjustments (the Children of Johns would like to see John returned to Earth), their example continues to be serviceable in our day.

The Not-Voter takes courage in the knowledge that the Children of Johns were removed from the political stage by means of collaboration of Latvian government with orthodox religious churches, because neither the government nor the churches would suffer their willingness to suffer self-sacrifice. The removal of the Children of Johns from the political scene was no accident; it was deliberate. The denial of the essential characteristic of the Latvian community--self-sacrifice--is what ails the community. A reinstatement of the Children of Johns is what will heal the community.

LATE POSTSCRIPT: The following link (click here) suggests that Latvian zionationalism has established a real base. The occasional Latvian AntiSemite surviving today has his-her roots in the AntiHerrnhutism of orthodox Christianity, specifically that of Lutheranism. The Lutherans repressed the Herrnhuters once it became apparent that they would succeed in Awakening Latvians and/or the Estonians, which was counter the interests of Baltic barons. By 1857 the Herrnhuters were effectively shut down in what is Estonia and Latvia today.

The Latvian AntiHerrnhutist movement was essentially a parallel movement to German AntiSemitism, which is why--once Latvians forgot the historic roots of the AntiAwakening forces in their midst--a significant number simply jumped to a parallel running track and became AntiSemitic and allegedly ever more patriotic.

Today the Folk Myth is seeing a revival in the vote count received Saturday by Visu Latvijai. While more about this in a future blog, at this moment it seems that Latvian zionationalism is seeing something of a revival.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic
On the Moravian Brotherhood
http://www.ebooksread.com/authors-eng/edmund-alexander-de-schweinitz/the-history-of-the-church-known-as-the-unitas-fratrum-or-the-unity-of-the-bret-cse/page-33-the-history-of-the-church-known-as-the-unitas-fratrum-or-the-unity-of-the-bret-cse.shtml

Thursday, September 30, 2010

This is why the accusations of fascism that bedevil the image of Latvians continue to contain an element of truth. While Luther is long dead and his anti-Semitism long forgotten, his prejudice against the Herrnhutians (and in so far it has been adopted by orthodox Lutheranism and other Christian sects) continues to strand the spirit of Latvians in shallow waters.

This is a time of crisis in Latvia and—for reasons stated above—involves to a greater or lesser degree Latvians of all national origins and all political parties. Whatever the outcome of the elections this coming Saturday (October 2), the crisis of Latvian self-consciousness is far from over.

Indeed, one hopes that the crisis of Self continues to gather momentum and forces the government to invite independent historians to do research and reanalyze the history of Livonia whence the Latvians emerged.

This writer hopes that such a reanalysis by historians and cultural anthropologists will place Latvians on a historical stage that has much greater depth and breadth than the present one--the one that has led them to the dead-end of this impoverished day.

Postscript: As most everyone knows, the Latvian media are controlled by political interests and are not independent as they ought to be. It is not surprising therefore that the only media outlet interested in this writer’s point of view has been a Riga Russian newspaper, re Telegraf Click the translate button if you do not read Russian.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic
On the Moravian Brotherhood

Saturday, September 25, 2010

An interesting side effect of the inflected word is that it not only enables conversation to progress more easily, because it tends to avoid speech as a command [for example, “dod man” (give me) vs “pa-dod” (half-a-please give me)], but it may also inflect the word with irony, especially if the prefix “pa-” precedes a name. Thus, if we put the prefix “pa-” before Yahn (John), it suggests that somehow something is not right with John or Yahn.

“Pa-yahn”, thus, suggests that John is somehow not fully John, but only half a John, so to speak. Because the consonant J may slip-slide and be pronounced as a G or Dzh, it becomes possible for one pa-yahn to be pronounced as pagan. Because of this tendency toward different pronunciations, once upon a time the name “Jesus”, in order to avoid being pronounced “Gesus” (or Geez) was written “Iasu”, where “Ia” is sure to be pronounced as a Y.

So, what has this to do with NOT-VOTING?

The answer lies in the fact that to fully participate in the act of voting, you must know a little more than nothing about history, and you must know enough of history not to be blindsided by lies about what happened in the past.

For example, did you know that proto-Latvians—those Latvians who made up a “people” before the Latvians made themselves a nation—also knew themselves as The Children of Johns (Jāņu bērni)? This is not to say that Livonia or Livland went without the Letowici [from the Moravian (Herrnhuter) parishes of the Brethren at Letowic], but that the name of Livonia originates with the Livs and not Latvians. The names Lett or Latvis came in use later, after the Great Northern War (ended 1721, Peace of Nystadt) killed off most of the Livs in Vidzeme, for example, where they were replaced by the Latgalians.

True, this is not the place to write a history book. Nevertheless, it must be pointed out that today the history books of Latvia approximate what actually happened only after 1860 or thereabout. This is one reason why the present government of Latvia is reluctant to allocate funds for a new history book for Latvians, and why the state and church in Latvia are not truly separated, but continue to be intertwined with a reactionary orthodox Christian world view. In short, if a history book of Latvia were to be written today, it would, most likely, be a lie about what happened during the first half of the nineteenth century and earlier.

If you care a whit about the Latvian psyche as it was before a hundred and fifty years and want help the Latvian people to untwist the effects of sad repression that keeps their outlook on the world from developing, cast a NOT-VOTE.

The act of NOT-VOTING consists of going to the voting poll and dropping an empty envelope into the box. All the dire warnings that this is an “evil” act, or sabotage, or lets the Russians or commies come and rule over Latvia are but attempts to pull the wool over the eyes of the Latvian people. Rather, a NOT-VOTE will help the psyche of the Children of Johns free the psyche of Latvians today.
Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
Ground Zero for Thought

http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

33. Based on Glen Gould’s
“So you want to write a fugue!”

If you sing along, please substitute the words
“write” with “create” or “make”
and “fugue” with “nation”.

Herewith, a song dedicated to Latvia’s leaders:
“So you want to create a nation”:

Latvietis uzdzied Prezidentu:
Tā tad, Jūs velaties radīt valsti?

Guntis Ulmanis: Jā, mēs vēlamies radīt valsti.
VVF: Jā, mēs vēlamies radīt valsti.
Zatlers: Jā, mēs vēlamies radīt valsti.
Visi prezidenti: Jā, mēs patiešām vēlamies radīt valsti.

Otrs latvietis: Tā tad, patiešām Jūs velaties radīt valsti?
Visi: Cik patīkami un jauki ir radīt valsti.
Cik mums tas patīkami un jauki radīt valsti. Utt.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2JFgfc7c70
Photo: Ventspils Tūrisma informācijas centrs

Saturday, September 18, 2010

In 1991, at the time that the Soviet Union collapsed, Latvia regained its independence through what is referred to as a “singing revolution”. Of course, no one ever gains or regains--except in fairy-tales--
one’s independence by singing—either singly, or as a chorus, or by blowing trumpets. Much more than that is required. A people have to manifest a will to become independent and a willingness to die to bring about their will.

If one becomes a free nation, it is only because the people of the nation make a life-sacrifice. Latvians bore such a sacrifice during and immediately following WW1. However, Latvians bore no such sacrifice upon the invasion or fall of the Soviet Union.

It is the failure of Latvians to bear such a sacrifice (possibly due to circumstances) upon the fall of the Soviet Union that haunts Latvia today, and why Latvians are haunted by a suspicion that though Latvia is a nation, it is a failed nation. This sense of failure is notwithstanding the huge loss of life that Latvians suffered at the time of WW1, WW2, and the great deportations that Latvians suffered at the hands of the Soviets in 1941 and 1949.

The insufferable corruption of government and lack of populist reaction to it is proof of the uncertainty of the people over whether they are in fact capable of maintaining their community.

This is why one may say that Latvians are suffering from a sacrificial crisis today. It also opens space for discussing who will or will not bear the sacrifice.

For a detailed argument of the significance of sacrifice, this writer suggests the works of Professor Rene Girard . Because a detailed familiarity with Gerard’s arguments may be obligatory to politologues, the ordinary citizen (unfortunately limited at this time to he-she who knows English) will find the following Fora.tv (Hudson Institute) interview with the professor (click here) helpful.

To be sure, neither this writer nor anyone else can foretell just how the sacrificial crisis in Latvia may resolve itself. Nevertheless, assuming that the forthcoming election (October 2) will put in office the same clique of elites, the reasons why Latvia is dying as a nation may be even more sharply silhouetted than they are today.
Let us hope that an increased awareness of the crisis their country and community is facing will send Latvians on a journey of discovery of what it takes to create and maintain a community.

If the Latvians meet the challenge, they may discover that from among the last and least, they have moved up and become redeemers, and not only of themselves. To be or not to be that is the question.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Thursday, September 16, 2010

My own experience with the Latvian mindset is similar. My forty-six years in the U.S. (I was born in Latvia and lived there until eleven) were made memorable, for no small part, by my need to “flee” the society of Latvian exiles (trimdinieki) in order to be able to think—at least what I believe it means to think freely—and not live according to a set of unwritten rules transmitted in one way or another by then editors of the exile newspaper “Laiks”, the ex-legionnaire organization known as “Daugavas Vanagi”, the Latvian exile church, and a relentless drill in Latvian “folk symbols” at almost any Latvian gathering. In short, the intra-exile rules of Latvians abroad during the last half of the 20th century demanded a) an attitude of extreme Latvian nationalism; b) fear God as if he were Satan; c) the drumbeat that the bond that bound Latvians into a community was the church; d) the insistence that such a fear of God was necessary to maintain an eternal hate of communism; e) that to remain loyal to Latvia meant to remain in a state of mind imagined other than “normal”, i.e., the state of the mind of the West was believed to “abnormal” (dissolute and Godless); f) that the Latvian media was not to communicate any ideas contrary to a-f, and g) etc.

The above list (and it could be longer) comes to mind when listening to the pre-election vapid and “nothin’special” arguments of the political parties presuming themselves to be able to form the next government of Latvia. This lock-brain approach has been described by the Latvian politologue Ivars Ījabs as a process which “step by step leads Latvia to abandon the civilized orbit of Western Europe for a trip that may not have a return ticket”.

Though Alvis Hermanis and Ivars Ījabs statements appear to contradict each other, they are nevertheless part of the critical mind, which for a century and a half (I begin the count at about 1860) has been forced to suffer repression. In other words, the threat to Latvians as a free people does not come from Russia (though I lost eight family members to Soviet deportation), but as Ījabs says: “Indeed, the feared Russia exists rather in the heads of the political elite, where (every head) contains a small kreml [?grinch] and lubyanka [rather than fact]”. See link to Ījabs.

Somewhere in my various blogs, I have mentioned that many Latvians suffer from the Turret’s Syndrome. The most obvious manifestation of this syndrome appears in internet posts, where ad hominem arguments, various forms of insults, open anti-semitism, and other forms of slurs are a common occurrence. While Turret’s Syndrome is a universal marvel in our time, it is a particularly strong involuntary tick-of-speech among Latvians. My own theory is that this is the result of the above mentioned brain-lock, which the unconscious mind, unaware of the causes of the brain-lock, attempts to correct by screaming insults to gain attention. What is gained in reality is, unfortunately, a substitution of insults for a critical mind.

How to be cured of the Turret’s Syndrome?

One answer is to NOT-VOTE in the coming elections. I see a large turnout of a NOT-VOTE as Turret’s Syndrome in reverse. If the NOT-VOTE were to become reality, it would clearly defrock politicians of authority.

However, the closest Latvian variant to NOT-VOTING that is gaining popularity among Latvians (in e-postings) is to suggest participation in the elections, but to drop in the voting box an empty ballot. Herewith, this site accepts the EMPTY BALLOT as a worthy successor to the not-vote. For a full if prejudiced discussion of the pros and cons, click here. Note that the chairman of election reform Valdis Liepins presumes to call an empty ballot (tukša aploksne): "... an evil invitation, one that can be called for only by one who wishes to sabotage the elections". Actually, an EMPTY BALLOT is to express distrust in the Saeima as it is currently constituted, force a rewrite of an outdated Constitution, and, yes, it means to force a corrupt government to face up to the crisis it has created.

See nullification for relevant arguments from the U.S. that may find application in Latvia.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
Electronic polls
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10102126.stm
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
British Government Attempts to Bracket the Constitution
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/election_2010/8681624.stml
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
Why Forced Positive Thinking Is A Lot Of Crock?
http://www.alternet.org/story/146940/barbara_ehrenreich%3A_why_forced_positive_thinking_is_a_total_crock?page=2
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Continues Hermanis: “That the majority of Latvians may be called ‘stupid’ (mulķi) was proven when the referendum to dismiss the Saeima [the 100 member parliamentary legislative body of the Latvian government—blogger] did not pass for a lack of sufficient voter participation. In this sense, Latvians have been put in hawk by the majority.”

This blogger takes issue with Alvis Hermanis with regard to only one item (which issue may, however, lead to other issues). This is Hermanis' suggestion that the ‘educated’ Latvians will vote for Vienotība (Unity) and that it is necessarily an educated or smart thing to do, or that the ‘stupid’ people from the countryside have tied the hands of the ‘educated’ ones. As this blogger sees it, it is rather the ‘educated’ Latvians—from whose ranks apparently come most of those who have turned the Gulf of Riga yellow with their piss—who have reneged on any responsibility as far as leadership of the Latvian nation is concerned.

At least the traditional point of view about leadership is that leadership earns its druthers by leading by example. The current vogue of leading is to first stuff one’s pockets with public monies and other public resources, then throw up hands (look, ma, they are empty) and declare themselves helpless. Such helplessness manifests itself in all quarters of government, but is especially noteworthy among the ranks of past and present members of the Saeima, and the ranks of former and current Prime Ministers and Presidents of Latvia.

In short, the leading body of the Latvian government does not lead by example when it comes to the example of self-sacrifice. It must be emphasized that the point being made here is not over sacrifice per se, because the government has no hesitations about sending Latvian soldiers to Afghanistan. The point is that the unselfsacrificers in government offices occupy their offices on the basis of the presumption that the office requires no sacrifice, least of all an actual sacrifice of life or career. What a horrible, barbaric, and vulgar thought! Imagine VVF, and GU (in his new King Lear role), and VZ all moving to live in an abandoned peasant shack (there are many to chose from) in Latgale instead of their posh apartments by the Full of Piss seashore, aka Jurmala?

A large segment of the Latvian public media is also in full support of anti-self-sacrificial government ruling over a ‘stupid’ Latvian public. [Incidentally, if my memory serves right, the Latvian voter was first called “stupid” by a former Latvian Prime Minister now living and playing golf in the State of Florida, USA.] In my previous blog (29), I pointed to the charade knows as “100. pants preses clubs” on Friday evenings on LTV1. This is not to say that LNT’s Monday evening show “Latvia, we hear you” (Latvija mēs tevi dzirdam) led by Haralds Burkovskis, attended by the chairman of the neocapitalist party (PLL) campaign manager, advertiser Stendzenieks, and PLL party chairman Andrejs Ēķis is anything other than pure propaganda...

The question of leadership through the charisma of self-sacrifice is of course not only a Latvian people’s problem. The whole world is suffering today governments entirely lacking charisma. The idea of modern government—introduced by the so-called Age of Enlightenment, that Reason would create and maintain democracy—has fallen apart. The United States of America is the most obvious ruin of Democracy. Suffice to point out its attempt to export “freedom” by means of violence.

Thus, while agreeing with director Alvis Hermanis about the Gulf of Riga being full of the piss of politicians, my question to him as an imaginative director of theatre is: “Can you choreograph a scenario in which a politician turns himself into an object of charisma; or failing to find such a politician, stage a street theatre performance where a group of like-minded ‘stupid’ countryside Latvians come together, and under the eye of television commit seppuku?” Might this not be a way for your intelligence to liberate your fellow countrymen from your curse on them? [Long ago I watched a street theatre group from the U. of Minn. perform anti-nuke theatre on the streets of Boston.] For a “classic” scenario, I can offer “Tiresia’s Revenge”, my interpretation of the Oedipus story at http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ , blogs 41-47.

DO NOT FORGET TO GO AND NOT-VOTE! This is to avoid being among the “stupid”. A NOT-VOTE means a vote for change of system; for provoking a crisis that will call forth a Constitutional Assembly to rewrite the Constitution (Satversme); that will most likely institute a four-year long authoritarian government (under the supervision of the EU); etc.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
Electronic polls
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10102126.stm
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
British Government Attempts to Bracket the Constitution
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/election_2010/8681624.stml
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
Why Forced Positive Thinking Is A Lot Of Crock?
http://www.alternet.org/story/146940/barbara_ehrenreich%3A_why_forced_positive_thinking_is_a_total_crock?page=2
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Monday, September 6, 2010

29½ THE NOT-V0TER

This post in response to a post on LOL by Bruno the Left. It is no doubt difficult to make a response to a theme discussed in blog 28, when 29 is on line. Nevertheless, it is worth a try.

The Wars of Religion (1562-1598) severely tested the concept of government that “une foi, un loi, un roi,” (“one faith, one law, one king”) could any longer hold the kingdom together. One of the rebels against the former hegemony was Martin Luther, who made the Pope his special enemy. Nevertheless, while Luther initially supported a German Peasant Rebellion, he wished them to remain under the tutelage of temporal authorities. When Lutheranism came to the Livonia, it had a priori submitted to the German authorities there. Most of the Lutheran ministers did not speak the native language, not even by the time when Livonia was reached (1729~1736) by Graf Zinzendorf and his Herrnhuter movement. Thus the Herrnhuters were the liberators of the Livonian peasants de facto, that is, they taught them how to read, become politically self-aware. Not surprisingly the peasants became demanding of their rights, which was not an attitude much appreciated by the tsar, the German barons, or the Lutheran preachers.

After the Lutherans had repressed the Herrnhuters (1860), they consolidated their hold on power, even as they had to acknowledge many of the changes brought about by the Herrnhuters. The latter had actually started into motion the national awakening, which soon became a secular and militant movement. It was under the pressure of the secular movement that Lutheran barons admitted Latvian Lutheran ministers to preach to their own. Still, even the Latvian ministers found certain things in the proto-Latvian past with which they prefered not deal with. One such figure was the figure of “John”, a figure of the ancient European forest, who had survived the Crusades in Livonia.

When in 1873 “John” reemerged from the forest by appearing on the cover of the first Latvian book (other than religious) as krivs or vaidelotis, names of the proto-Latvian priest, not only did the Russian tsar have most of the copies of the book burnt, but encouraged the removal of “John” from the stage as a Latvian hero.

Thus, when in 1888, Andrejs Pumpurs, a Latvian poet serving in the tsars army, wrote “Lachplesis” (Jawbreaker of Bears), his book was eagerly received by the tsar and Lutheran preachers alike. Though Lachplesis was a pseudo epic hero promising to rise again from his defeat by the black knight, his introduction definitively allowed the removal of John. A number of cultural muggings followed. Writes Emils Melngailis, Latvian componist and ethnologue: “When in 1900, I published my first collection [of folk poems], which contained exclusively songs of Johns, I followed the practice of the ‘new language’ and replaced the name [of Johns songs] with ‘Ligo songs’. Unfortunately, my new invention has stuck, and Johns Eve and Johns songs are now replaced with ‘Ligo’”. The removal of John was cemented into place by the Latvian leftist poet Rainis in 1905 through his play “Uguns un Nakts” (Fire and Night) by making Lachplesis the sole representative figure of the Latvian hero. John was—for all practical purposes—dead.

Needless to say, the Lutheran church encouraged these perversions of the proto-Latvian character by the “new language”. Indeed, the Lutheran church even managed to become the state sponsored religion—just as it was in Sweden. The vogue today is to separate religion from politics, which is why the Lutherans in Sweden as well as in Latvia are a little laid back. Still, the multitudinous presumptions of the Lutheran archbishop in Riga and the influence of the Swedish Lutheran church in making the anti-drug movement in effect an anti-narcotic movement by excluding “soft” medicinal plants such as marihuana, attempt to reintroduce dogma in the social life-style of their respective peoples.

THE NOT-VOTER believes that the current phase of “religion” in Latvia is part of the problem of this nation. Rather than help the people fight against corruption in government and reintroduce religion as a tool that is helpful in forming a critical mind, it encourages passivity through unhelpful pietism and social dissention by focusing on such issues as a ban on gay rights and lumps marihuana with hard narcotics, even as the latter find increased acceptance elsewhere in the world.

It is possible to think that if the Herrnhuters were still around, they would be encouraging Latvians to NOT-VOTE for government that has become a stain on the spiritual fabric of the nation and which in collaboration with orthodox religious sects disables the radical changes necessary to bring forth a better tomorrow.

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Full or partial entries of my blogs may be found at LatviansOnline http://latviansonline.com/forum + Forum Home + Open Forum – The-Not-Voter. If you copy this blog for your files, or copy to forward, or otherwise mention its content, please credit the author http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ , http://melnaysjanis.blogspot.com/, or http://the-not-voter.blogspot.com/

I suggest you look at the links imbedded in these blogs or at the end of the blog as an integral part of my argument.

THE-NOT-VOTER
29 Latvia Left For Dead

Last Friday evening I took yet another excursion into the Latvian Kingdom of Boredom on the Air Waves.

Not that reaching Boredom was my intent. “100. pants preses klubs” (The Press Club of the 100th Commandment), led by Mareks Gailitis, the news director of LTV1, announced in a pre-show on-air blurb that his guest will be Ainārs Šlesers, the vice-major of Riga, the same who has often been portrayed as the “bulldozer” of Latvian politics.

Granted, the only “bulldozing” Mr. Shlesers ever does is drive his tractor back and forth over a pile of rubbish of nothin’ special, then jump out of the caboose, and goes home reciting rubishy poetry for the ears of the Latvian electorate. Such a precedent does not encourage one to listen to “the buldozer” again.

Even so, this listener and viewer, though not a die-hard optimist, always hopes that there will appear a journalist, an interviewer worth his-her salt, who will sit up from his-her chair (usually of red cloth or plastic in Latvia) and ask a question with a bite. If the bite is deflected by a question arriving from God on an unrelated matter, but inspires the politician interviewed to speak in a babble of tongues immediately, the reporter will be hellish enough to ask the same question again.

The layout of the stage for the “100. pants” interviews is an inverted V, with the host sitting at the point of the V, while on his right hand sit three reporters, but on his left three interviewees. Of the latter, Ainars Shlesers (Šlesers) was the center of attention on Friday night. He was flanked by two partners from the political coalition known as “Par Labu Latviju” (Favoring A Good Latvia). These were Andris Shkhehle (Šķēle), three times former PM, and Maris Riekstinsh, former foreign minister.

The interview began with a hem and a ke-ke-rex from the host Gailitis. It signaled that the nothin’ special drive over the compost pile may commence. It took off immediately. First went Mr. Shlesers. The tractor, located at the bottom of the heap, went straight to the top, executed a dazzling turn toward nowhere, then passed the sticks and levers to Mr. Shkhehle, who did a somersault without the tractor losing its chains. The came Mr. Riekstins turn. The question from the reporters was on a foreign relations matter. As Riekstins made the answer (he fumbled at the levers a bit), it did not sound quite right to Mr. Shlesers, who interrupted him and quite extemporaneously commenced to expound on Latvia’s foreign policy. No reporter pointed out that then and there Shlesers had taken over the role of the Latvian Foreign Minister (now one Mr. Ronis). This vapid nothin’ special conversation went on ad nauseaum. While the news director (Mareks Gailitis) appeared to be in his element, the other three reporters were, for the most part, quiet as mice.

Yes, it occurred to me to wonder just why the viewing public was having all this cotton candy blown its way through their screens.

Here is the answer.

LTV Ziņu dienesta vadītājs ietekmē raidījumu saturu par labu Šleseram un Šķēlem
5.augusts 2010
Latvijā vairs nav brīvu mediju. Iespējams, šāds apgalvojums ir pārspīlējums, bet šajā rakstā mēs piedāvājam pierādījumus, ka pirmsvēlēšanu laikā politiski angažēts ir ne vien privāto mediju saturs, bet arī sabiedrisko mediju, šajā gadījumā – LTV Ziņu dienesta (ZD) raidījumu saturs.

Mūsu rīcībā ir nonākusi kādas vakar no darba atlaistas LTV ZD žurnālistes vēstule, kurā viņa norāda uz ZD vadītāja Mareka Gailīša politisko angažētību. Iespējams, šī vēstule ir tapusi aizvainojumā par atlaišanu, bet ir vērts ņemt vērā vēstulē izklāstītos faktus. Tie, savukārt, liecina, ka Mareks Gailītis jau ilgākā periodā tīši ietekmē LTV ZD žurnālistu darbu, lai pēc iespējas labākā gaismā parādītu politisko apvienību Par labu Latviju. Mūsuprāt, minētie ietekmēšanas gadījumi klaji pārkāpj sabiedrības tiesības uz vārda brīvību un degradē sabiedriskā medija jēgu, padarot to par viegli manipulējamu ieroci oportūnistisku politiķu un viņu līdzskrējēju rokās.

Izvilkums no vēstules:

“izrādās, ka (Mareks) Gailītis ir dedzīgs Par labu Latviju (PLL) atbalstītājs un ietekmē žurnālistus. Lūk, daži gadījumi:

1. kad tika dibināta šī organizācija, tad sestdienas rītā mans kolēģis, kuram bija jāveido par to sižets, saņēma vairākus telefona zvanus no Gailīša, kuru nolūks bija izkontrolēt, vai sižets tiešām tiks taisīts un īpaši piekodināts, ka mēs (LTV ZD) neesam ne par, ne arī pret šo organizāciju. Tas ir īpatnēji, jo, pirmkārt, citu organizāciju dibināšanu viņš nemaz nepiemin, otrkārt, tas bija sestdienā, kad Gailītis vispār neatceras, ka vada Ziņu dienestu, un, treškārt, tik aktīva interese par to, kas bus sižetā, ir neredzēta.

2. Pagājušajā svētdienā vispār bija nedzirdēta nekaunība – viņš lika žurnālistam veidot garu interviju ar (Juri) Savicki, kurš ir (gāzes kompānijas) Itera pārstāvis Latvijā un viens no lielākajiem Par labu Latviju ziedotājiem. Un burtiski – lika, lai gan žurnālists norādīja, ka, pirmkārt, šis bus reklāmsižets par Iteru un, otrkārt, arī par intervējamā politisko piederību. Tomēr Gailītis nelikās to dzirdam un uzdeva izveidot materiālu. Lai gan tikpat labi tagad citas partijas arī var pieprasīt raidlaiku un šādu interviju. Kāpēc gan ne”?

The above a quote from http://revolucija.eu/. Scroll down to the 5th of August entry to read the full text.

Oh, yes. DO NOT FORGET TO GO AND NOT-VOTE! A not vote means a vote for a change of the system; for provoking a crisis that will call forth a Constitutional Assembly to rewrite the Constitution (Satversme); that will most likely institute a four-year long authoritarian government (under the supervision of the EU); etc.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
Electronic polls
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10102126.stm
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
British Government Attempts to Bracket the Constitution
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/election_2010/8681624.stml
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
Why Forced Positive Thinking Is A Lot Of Crock?
http://www.alternet.org/story/146940/barbara_ehrenreich%3A_why_forced_positive_thinking_is_a_total_crock?page=2
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Full or partial entries of my blogs may be found at LatviansOnline http://latviansonline.com/forum/ + Forum Home + Open Forum – The-Not-Voter. If you copy this blog for your files, or copy to forward, or otherwise mention its content, please credit the author http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ , http://melnaysjanis.blogspot.com/ , or http://the-not-voter.blogspot.com/

Photo: The "Suicide Shack"

I suggest you look at the links imbedded in these blogs or at the end of the blog as an integral part of my argument.

THE-NOT-VOTER
28 Responsible Democracy Anyone?

Without going into detail concerning the reasons why rational democracy is failing in the United States, Europe, and indeed everywhere, we must nevertheless take a close look at the consequences of the Age of Enlightenment and rational Democracy in Latvia.

The advent of rational democracy in Latvia was greatly furthered by the Herrnhuter religious movement. Led by a farsighted German nobleman, Count Zinzendorf (he understood that natural democracy among the princes and barons had come to an end and wished a peaceful transition to a democracy shared with all people), the movement encouraged uneducated Latvians (as well as Africans and Americans) to learn how to read. By 1897 an estimated 92% of inhabitants of Livland (later Latvia) were literate.

Unfortunately, there was an inherent conflict in Graf Zinzendorf’s movement. Inspired as it was by the Age of Enlightenment, the nobleman championed individual freedom and a personal relationship with God. Zinzendorf’s goal threatened not only the authority of the Catholic and Lutheran churches, but the tsar of Russia. In 1742 the knighthood of Livonia with the help of the Empress Tsarina Elizabeth (in 1743) shut down the movement, and forced it to go underground. It recovered in 1764, when Empress Tsarina Catherine II restored (said to have occurred inadvertently) their religious rights. The Lutherans continued to impede the development of the movement, until Tsar Alexander I proclaimed them complete liberty in 1817. Still, the Lutherans persisted in their repression (they insisted that the state eliminate the Herrnhuter choirs, the movement’s core organizing unit (disallowing recruitment of new members), and eliminating elections by a lottery system. By 1860 the movement was for all practical purposes eliminated, and its near 70,000 members in Livland muted.

As Estonians and Latvians ought to know, if there had not been the educational effort of the Herrnhuter movement, which increased the literacy of the people, their nations would not have come into existence.

The above conclusion is one of the reasons to remember that the Herrnhuters first came into being in 1727, when Count Zinzendorf came to the aid of the Bohemian Brethren, a religious group originating in Taborite movement (originating in the Hussite movement) by granting them land (called Herrnhut). Tolerance for their faith came with it. Interestingly, the originator of the Hussite movement, Jan Hus, martyred by the Catholic church in 1415. The martyrdom of Hus occured a mere two hundred years after the elimination of the Cathar movement in Languedoc and the humiliation of the proto-Latvian leader, king Visvaldis of Jersika, both killing events taking place in 1209. The repression in Languadoc was so severe that according to some estimates nearly 500,000 people were killed. Military operations against the Cathars ceased in 1255. They ceased against Jersika in 1214, when a rebellion against the imposed peace by Visvaldis was repressed. All the same, opposition to the Catholic church, which was supported by secular princes, did not cease. Various religious movements other than Catholicism continued to exist. In short, a study of the Protestant movement sans doctrinal dogma leads discovers us among the heretics of the 13th, 12th, and earlier centuries. As this writer has written in other blogs, the Latvian Children of Johns, an almost meaningless designation today, were once upon a time the very essence of proto-Latvians.

Notwithstanding the repression of the Herrnhuter movement by the Lutheran church, the repression did not occur without resistance to it. The very first flag of the First Awakening of Latvians is the famous “Līgo” flag. It shows John as “vaidelotis” (priest) before a sacred altar. In the original drawing by Baumaņu Kārlis, we can still see in the background the Children of Johns. The original drawing (see “Jāņu Foto Albums”, Norden AB, 2007; also the archive at LNB) appears in a book published 1874. It features a collection of songs, some nationalistic in sentiment. This edition was destroyed almost in its entirety by then ruling regime of the Russian tsar. However, an even more devastating blow to the existence of the Children of Johns was the publication in 1888 of the pseudo epic called “Lāčplēsis” (literally, Destroyer of Bears) by the Latvian poet Pumpurs. Pumpurs by design (conscious or unconscious) replaces John with a pseudo hero. There is nary a protest from the gallery. Everyone is taken with the age of industrialism and has little idea what to do with the natives, the Herrnhuters. It seems that the Lutheran church has won.

Today (2010) a hundred and fifty years have passed since 1860, the year the historian marks as the end of the Herrnhuter movement in the Baltics. Almost no one on the internet sees history on the other side of the Soviet occupation as something real. 1860 incidentally happens to be the year of birth of my grandfather. I mention him, because my grandfather’s father (1804-1868) was a Herrnhuter. He was also “starasts” (an overseer of the works, a manager) of the local baron. He held Herrnhuter meetings at his inn on Sundays. Yet grandfather’s paternal half-sister, Evelina-Līze, is buried in a Lutheran churchyard, and buried not just anywhere, but beside the (now wrecked) “kaplicha” or graveyard church. Round and about goes history. Was the Lutheran pastor sympathetic to the Herrnhuters? Those who were sympathetic had to cease being so. All this happens in the vicinity of Valmiera, once the center of the Herrnhuter movement in Livland. Valmiera and vicinity also became the very center of the movement of national awakening. The very first national Song Festival occurred in the small town of Dīkļi, about 10 km from Valmiera.

What does all this have to do with my calling for a NOT-VOTE (come October 2) for the government of Latvia? I must ask the reader to refer to my letter (see: Jaņdžs) here. I write among other things that “The sacrificial victims of the ritual in Latvia—the Latvian soldiers of WW1 who were then compromised by the illegalism of Latvian legionaires of WW2—have become a no longer relevant sacrifice. The proofs of this are the acts of Latvian government during the last twenty years.” I realize that some grammarians will dispute my use of the word “illegalism” (it does not appear in the dictionary), but I use it to make a reference to the fact that the Latvian legionnaires, now accused of being part of Hitler’s SS, were not so, but were trapped into being so-called through the absence of legal advice before joining the battle against the Stalinists.

The illigalism of the legionnaires and the ignorance by the present of the past suggests that Latvians are in fact caught up and hurled into the maelstrom of the hapless. The crisis we are in is not just any crisis, It is a systems crisis. The repair of this broken engine is not possible. We need a new motor. To go a step beyond pop culture, this writer suggests that you go and vote the NOT-VOTE.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
Electronic polls
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10102126.stm
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
British Government Attempts to Bracket the Constitution
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/election_2010/8681624.stml
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
Why Forced Positive Thinking Is A Lot Of Crock?
http://www.alternet.org/story/146940/barbara_ehrenreich%3A_why_forced_positive_thinking_is_a_total_crock?page=2
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

Saturday, August 28, 2010

However, Greece is a hilly place, which means that once the forests growing on its hills were cut down erosion set it. One may imagine that the erosion was furthered by King Laius’ goats and sheep. Here is the rub: the democracy that was practiced by the people living in the woods in Greece and elsewhere (because while there were forests there also existed a natural subsistence economy that allowed a wholly natural democracy) became subject to rational manipulation anywhere people lived without or few forests.

Deforestation in ancient Greece may be traced back to the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. This is to say, the natural democracy that prevails among forest dwellers (we can take as an example the early inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego or prehistoric Latvians who may have invented the grammar for the endearing word) disappeared and was replaced by a rational system of an in-group of “voters”. For all the appeal that “rational democracy” may have, it did not survive for long because it is subject to rational manipulation. Though a number of experiments in democracy were made by the agriculturalists who succeeded the forest dwellers—the most notable of which experiments was the election of a sacrificial king, who through his sacrifice was to remind naked humanity of the spiritual and charismatic components that being human makes possible—the temptation to tax the agriculturalists (if you have 2 sack of grain, I will take one of them, add it to my 2 and have 3) was too great for the sacred king to survive the aggressions of kings who succumbed to the temptations of becoming secularists. The transition from sacred king (King Arthur and his Round Table is a good example) most probably happened around the 9th century of our era.

The secular king had many “friends” who envied him. Among these friends-enviers-enemies (some would call them “freedom fighters”) were the king’s vassals, the princes. The latter had the power of arms, and while the secular king could rule by practicing the tactics of divide-and-rule among his vassals, the latter were, so to speak, natural democrats when in their own company. The best example of a princely democracy overthrowing the king turned secularist is the Magna Carta (1215) of England. Incidentally, we may note that the name of the king who signed the Carta is John, a name that in this writer’s opinion links him with the sacred kings of the past.

The natural democracy of the princes did not all evolve at the same time. For example, “democracy” was far less defined by a code of law in France, where the secular king (and the vassal princes) hung on to absolute power until the Revolution in 1789. This is one of the reasons why King Louis XVI lost his head (1793). While the people, often called “the populist mob”, still remembered something of the once sacred nature of kings by rushing to smear themselves with Louis blood, Louis XVI death is all the more remarkable because his corruption allowed the commoners to forget his forebears once sacred political role.

Both the American and French revolutions brought into being “modern democracy”, i.e., the democracy of the merchant class soon expanded to include what we know as the middle class. It is the vastly expanded natural “democracy” of the middle class that has brought civilization to the point of economic and political catastrophe.

Without going into detail about the failing political order in the United States, Europe, and indeed most parts of our planet, we can see the consequences of the so-called Age of Enlightenment and Reason in Latvia. In Latvia the demise of political charisma is especially painful, because not only did Latvia come into being as a last ditch effort by its inhabitants to overthrow oppression, but then suffered enormous loss of life for the sin of its success.

Today, stripped down to the naked body as a tree is stripped of its leaves and branches, the charisma of political self-sacrifice has been turned into a dirty word. Indeed, the word does not dare to reconstitute itself other than an anachronistic entity that everyone recognizes as such and no one really wants. The dying of the body is delayed only by the vampire ticks (ērces) trying to prolong the body’s life by singing of hope and heaven. The psychological damage caused by the rhetoric is palpable. On the one hand it creates hubris among the political elites; on the other hand it creates mass emigration of the population to parts where jobs replace empty words.

The re-adoption by post-Soviet Latvia (1991) of Latvia’s Parliamentary Constitution of 1922 is not only a late attempt to rehash the glories of the expansion of democracy to Latvian middle classes (in effect creating them out of former Soviet bureaucrats), but proof of the disorientation caused by a failed Western civilization attempting to lie its way out of its demise. While one may excuse the nascent communist middle classes for mistaking the fall of the Soviet Union for the “victory” claimed by Western capitalism, the failure of Latvia’s political leadership to bring about a true middle class should (by 2010) have brought enlightenment to the fact that the hopes of the Age of Enlightenment have not only failed, but are founded on a failure to understand the limits of rationalism.

Logic would suggest that the Latvian voters take the risks implicit in NOT-VOTING in order to activate the default button of the 2nd Republic and reset it for a new start with as 3rd Republic.

Alas! At the time of this writing, the collapse of the financial and economic system of the West is still a hair’s breath on this side of bankruptcy and enables the ruling elites of Latvia to claim that the tremors are a negativist’s illusions and no major earthquake is in the offing. While this writer suggests that the voters NOT-VOTE in order to put the authority of “natural” oligarchic democracy into question and force it to call a Constitutional Assembly to discuss and rewrite an outdated document, there are enough professors-politologues brainwashed by Western ideology to lead the urbanized public into the bric-a-brac of deforested countryside and promise it wild strawberries in October.

Asterisks & Links of Interest
Compulsory voting in the EU Parliamentary elections
http://www.ceps.eu/files/book/1886.pdf
The abstentionist elephant
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8783/
Electronic polls
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10102126.stm
On the Meaning of Voting
http://www.strike-the-root.com/92/bylund/bylund1.html
British Government Attempts to Bracket the Constitution
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/election_2010/8681624.stml
Ground Zero for Thought
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/146989
Why Forced Positive Thinking Is A Lot Of Crock?
http://www.alternet.org/story/146940/barbara_ehrenreich%3A_why_forced_positive_thinking_is_a_total_crock?page=2
The Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAluyt5_kic

The-Not-Voter