Launched By Trump, A War of Cultures Has Begun!!

One has to be blind not to see in the utterances of Trump and his coterie the launching of a war of cultures!! A war against Islam, Blacks, Jews, and all non-whites. Words have consequences, and appointments by Trump underline the gravity of those consequences.

Trump began his campaign for the presidency by calling for "a Muslim ban on entering the U.S.," thus converting Islamophobia into one of the fronts in his war of cultures. From fear of Islam into a declared aggression in the form of singling out Muslims as enemies of America.

The Trump movement did not stop there. His appointee to the post of national security advisor, General Michael Flynn publicly declared that "Islam is not a religion, but an ideology." Elaborating on his Nazi-like pronouncements against the faith of 1.7 billion Muslims, Flynn called Islam "a malignant cancer."

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell described Flynn as a "right-wing nutty." Flynn circulated a video declaring: "Fearing Islam, which wants 80 percent of humanity enslaved or exterminated, is totally rational and hence cannot possibly be called phobia."

As a national security advisor, Flynn is charged with guiding the president on all foreign policy matters. Furthermore, that extreme anti-Islam propagandist is the coordinator of all foreign policy across all agencies.

Soon the cavalry of hate, spearheaded by cultural warriors was given formal recognition through another appointment. That of Steven Bannon to the White House post of chief strategist for the President. Bannon has worked for 11 years as the editor of Breitbart News, a medium for the Alt-Right -a fascist entity advocating that "America is for the whites only." In addition, Bannon is well known for his unalterable anti-Islamic views and prejudices.

So now you have two of the most senior staff positions in the Trump White House qualifying for top aides in the new war of cultures.

Logically, behind the forward leadership of the shock troops come the foot soldiers. People like Richard Spencer, head of the National Policy Institute. To his audience who raised their arms in the Nazi salute on November 20, Spencer declared as follows: "White identity is at the core of both the alt-right movement and the Trump movement, even if most voters for Mr. Trump aren't willing to articulate it as such."

Spencer's audience full throatedly screamed: "Heil the people. Heil victory." It was the perfect environment for hysteria befitting the harangues of Goebbels. In a cultural war, you need first to attack the credibility of the media outlets of your opponent. Thus Spencer pivoted to attacking the American mainstream media which Trump has systematically attacked as "the media is crooked."

The response of the Spencer rally was not disappointing. For he, with the swagger of a winning boxer, demanded an unequivocal endorsement of his racism. Said he: "Perhaps we should refer to them (the media) in the original German." "Lugen presse." To this stimulation, they roared back mimicking the Nazi-era term for "lying press."

Of course, in Trump's newly-launched cultural war, fact-checking is a poisonous tool, as the big lie technique should stand unchallenged. How enraging it must have been for Trump and his cohorts to be challenged by both Fact Check and Buzz Feed. These two organizations have determined that more than 50% of Trump's pronouncements were blatant lies. Including his assertion that he saw "Thousands upon thousands of Muslims dancing in New Jersey at the collapse of the World Trade Center." It never happened.

No exit from the scrutiny of a free investigative press of the stream of lies is overlooked. There are the Trump surrogates to explain that Trump was misquoted or misinterpreted. Or "It was never said." Or, frequently in the case of Trump: "I don't recall," or "I was told," or "why are we focused on this issue" (as in the case of 12 women complaining of Trump groping them). And if all else fails "I shall sue," and "I shall never settle."

Well, Trump was forced to settle the Trump University scandal for $25 million. Refunds were arranged for the thousands who were fraudulently enticed to pay tuition in return for the illusive quest for getting rich quickly through learning Trump's Art of the Deal.

Note that for Trump, the law is a construct of loopholes to be exploited in order to evade paying taxes. For that tax evasion, Trump was described by one of his hired guns, Rudolph Giuliani, "a genius." 

Well, if Trump who claims to be a billionaire, is applauded by a former Mayor of New York City, what do you think of the impact of that spin on the average citizen who is obliged by law to pay taxes in accordance with his/her level of income? Undoubtedly, non-observance of the law would become a national practice!!

Speaking of the law, as Trump thrusts this great country in a war of cultures, let us examine his appointment for the post of Attorney General. It is none other than Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama. An avid anti-black racist who, as attorney general of Alabama had this to say about a defense attorney. "He is a shame to his race!!" That attorney was white, his clients were black. Later, Sessions who later sat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, called a black attorney "boy" -a term reserved in the south for black men.

In no way could Sessions, if confirmed by the Senate, in his capacity as head of the Department of Justice, divest himself from his anti-black past. Jeff Sessions, in 1986, had the dubious distinction of being rejected by that Committee as a nominee for a federal judgeship "due to his racist comments and behavior."

The would-be chief enforcer of the law in America has associated with FAIR (the Federation for American Immigration Reform) which is hostile to immigration and is committed to racial selectivity. Its founder, John Tanton has repeatedly expressed the wish that America remain a majority-white population.

The anti-Islamic, Mike Pompeo of Kansas, is now Trump's nominee for Director of the CIA. He believes that "most Islamic leaders across America were complicit in terrorism."

The election of Obama to the presidency had the effect of baring the racial and religious divides in America. Racism, in particular, has now bubbled in the open, pointing to a sad fact: The South,at least at the local levels, is still fighting the American Civil War by other means.

And Trump, sensing that tilt at the local and State levels, found a wave which he could surf to the top. The Democrats failed, as they focused on the elite, the urban, and the college-degree holders. The blue collar workers, left behind by globalism, and hungry for change, any change, were lured by Trump's "Make America Great Again."

Through Trump's victory, this mantra has become "Make America White Again." A catch-all phrase for a battle cry in the rush toward a war of cultures. A war in which the perceived enemies are local: From Jews, to Muslims. From Blacks to Latinos. From the Brown to the hyphenated names and foreign accents. The early skirmishes incidental to the larger battle are on:

• 31% increase in hate crimes; 701 incidents have already been recorded;
• Swastikas have been scrawled on synagogues;
• "You could kiss your visas good-bye" is now frequently hurled at Muslim taxi drivers;
• False claims by General Flynn and others that Sharia is spreading in America. It is not. In fact, 38 states have either legislated, or on their way to legislating that the word "Sharia" cannot be mentioned in their courts. They, ignorantly regard it as antithetical to American values and the Constitution;
• Now there is Trumpian conversations about registering Muslims in America, and even applying the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Korematsu case to Muslims. That is the Supreme Court's infamous 1944 Japanese internment decision. Approving the herding of hundreds of thousands of Japanese Americans into detention camps following the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
• That decision has not been repealed, thus potentially allowing it to apply to Muslim Americans. Such threats are legally considered an assault, especially when accompanied by "the apparent present ability to give effect to that attempt if not prevented." 

Those fears had, on Friday, November 18 brought together Muslim, Jewish and Christian clergy members and lay leaders to gather in front of a mosque in Washington in a demonstration of mutual support. Sensing the dangers of the Trumpian threatened measures, they formed an inter-faith group called "Shoulder to Shoulder." 

Their call on Trump is clear and simple: "Keep your promise that you shall serve as the president of all Americans."

The question here should be centered on the cultural war. Analyzing Trump from this perspective is challenging. Not because his racial and ethnic preferences are not already clear. But because Trump is showing the face of a normalized Trump in contacts with some of the foreign powers.

Trump who manifests friendship to Egypt, the Emirates, and Japan, is a different face. For the appeasement of the Republican party, the protection of his 110 businesses in 22 countries, including the far-flung Muslim world, and the need to give priority to jobs in America, all combine to give diplomacy a seat at the Trump's table.

As a deal-maker, Trump by core beliefs, practices, appointments to his administration, and to his populist base, is possessed of two personas: the one inside America, divisiveness on the basis of ethnicity and religion is to become the norm. And one for the outside, provided it does not project weakness.

The issue here is beyond diplomacy where negotiations or force may be employed. The issue is that a war of cultures inside America shall undoubtedly have grave repercussions, especially in the world of Islam. His top lieutenants have already withdrawn their recognition of Islam as a religion. Thus enabling ISIS which is now splintering into poisonous units all over the world. But through Trumpian hallucinations are provided fresh oxygen for recruiting, funding, and operating.

In this connection, Trump and his team are reading "The Islamic State" backward. To them, it is "The State of Islam." For the Trumpists, being hostage to social media, the very tool of ISIS franchises, have become brainwashed by the narrative of terrorism.

As such, the Trumpian narrative about Islam, nurtured by the ISIS narrative, is blind to the present New Religious Revolution waged, primarily, by Al-Azhar in Cairo, and its Rector, Dr. Ahmed El-Taiyeb. The tenets of this counter-jihadism are centered on:

• Islamic law is supplemented by legislation;
• Equality among all faiths is built on Islamic jurisprudence;
• "Allahu Akbar" means that all humans are equal in the eyes of the Creator;
• Justice and knowledge are essential to Islamic practices;
• Regardless of variety of practices in the geographic expanse of Islam, gender equality is guaranteed;
• No "holy war" in Islam; only self-defense within your boundaries;
• Removing a dictator is a religious duty, providing that such action would not result in Fitna (self-help without the benefit of law);
• Cooperation within a community and inter-communally must be premised on the public good; and
• Respect for local laws is incumbent upon a Muslim residing in non-Muslim countries.

Just read about that Religious Revolution set forth in four statements recently made by the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar in Nigeria, Germany, France and Russia (Chechnya).

How very alien are these tenets from the false advocacy of the likes of Bin Laden or Al-Baghdadi of ISIS!! And how ignorant is Trump's war of cultures of these principles!!

No wonder that a writer for the Op Ed page of the New York Times, Charles Blow commented in the issue of November 21 on the orange color of Trump's face: "That orange glow emanating from the man is the sun setting on America's progress, however slow and halting, on race and gender inclusion and equity."

Responding petulantly to such assessments, Trump, the king of tweeting, responded angrily: "The New York Times is a failing newspaper." He even chided CNN for only showing bad angles of his face. How pitiful and silly for an American president-elect to be enamored with his facial looks more than with his threatening substance!! 

The foregoing is not a hateful analysis. It is the analysis of hate. Mr. Trump: Your enmity towards "the other" can be seen through the naked eye. Your first salvo in your war of cultures was the declaration of a Muslim ban.

While Bush junior, even in the heat of 9/11, declared that "we are not at war with Islam." But Donald declared, 15 years after 9/11, that the problem with US Security was Islam. His National Security Advisor, General Flynn, declared that "Islam is not a religion, it is an ideology."

So here is a mini-lesson for those who wish to read about the history of the global Muslim reaction to terrorism from which the Muslim World had suffered the most:

• In 1997, the first head of State to call for a global effort against terrorism was Egypt's former President, Hosni Mubarak. That call came from the rostrum of the US General Assembly.
• Before that 1997 global call from Egypt, which now, under President El-Sisi, is in the throes of combating terrorism on its own territory, was a Mubarak presidential decree of 1996. It was to the effect that all terror incidents should be brought, not before civil law courts, but before military courts. That was Egypt's response to the Saber Farahat terrorist attacks on the Semiramis Hotel (Cairo) in 1993, and later on the visitors of the Cairo Egyptian Museum in 1996.
• Farahat was apprehended, brought before a military tribunal and executed. I was the attorney for the US attorneys who were claiming, for the foreign victims at Semiramis, monetary compensation from Egypt. The Egyptian Court of Cassation offered the maximum under Egyptian law; I counselled acceptance; the US attorneys on the case demurred; an a federal court in New York City gave them zero. Saying: "The case has already been decided by the Egyptian judiciary -a competent judiciary."
• And in 1998, the League of Arab States adopted the first international regional convention on terrorism; followed in 1999, by a similar convention adopted by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (57 States), based in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
• All the while, the U.S., governmental and non-governmental entities were howling "foul" at these timely anti-jihadi efforts. Reason: the wrong reason. They were placing due process for the individual ahead of due process for the community.
• When 9/11 happened, a major crime against humanity, and in which hundreds of Muslims perished as a segment of the 3000 victims, Saudi Prince Walid Bin Talal offered Mayor Rudolph Giuliani $10 million to aid the first responders.
• Giuliani rejected that humanitarian effort for a flimsy reason. Prince Walid, in a TV interview had been asked: "Do you think that 9/11 happened because of US policies favoring Israel?" Bin Talal replied: "I can't exclude it."
• A few years later, Giuliani, now chosen by Trump for a top security post in his administration, went to the Muslim region to make millions of dollars through consultancies and speeches. General Flynn was not too far behind in making lots of money through counselling Turkey -a Muslim majority country.
• Thousands of Muslims are now serving in various American police departments and in the US armed forces. Millions of US Muslim civilians are daily contributing to US advancement. Steve Jobs, the father of the digital age, was a Syrian.

Mr. Trump: Before you open your mouth with assaults on Muslims and other American minorities, know that you yourself seem to have little regard for US laws: Not only on tax laws; on contract law; on due process law; on entitlements law; on anti-discrimination law; on religious liberty laws.

Even in regard to conflict of interest laws, you, at present, are refusing to separate between your personal wealth and America's commonwealth. Your family, which is your primary source of counselling, cannot run your business as of the moment you take the oath of office on January 20, 2017.

Mr. Trump: Your ignorance of the law is documented by your lack of knowledge of your own presidential powers. Were you to stop for a couple of hours in order to read the U.S. Constitution, you shall find that you have only ONE POWER. The power of pardon. (It is a well known fact that you do not read.) The Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution does not mean you, Mr. Trump. It means the States where powers which are not allocated to the federal government become automatically State powers.

Now the cities and mayors are rising up to defy your plans for mass deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants. The United States is fast becoming "The United States of the City States." The States have the exclusive powers on their police forces.

And if you can spare more time for a modicum of studenthood in international trade law, you will find that your bluster against international trade agreements is nothing but ignorant Trumpese.

Rejecting the Trans-Pacific Partnership by you is a hollow threat. China has already cordoned off America through her proposal for a "Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific." Both Peru and Chile are anxious to join it.

Your empty rhetorical nonsense about China, whose steel built your gambling casinos, has been ridiculed by experts who dismiss your bombast. The Peterson Institute for International Economics has concluded that "a full-blown trade with China and Mexico would push unemployment in the United States to nearly 9 percent, in 2020, from 4.9 percent today." What would the millions of working-class Americans who voted for you say to that, Donald? "Defrauded Again!!"

And Mexico has now undervalued its currency. Thus making its products more competitive, and its territory more inviting to American manufacture. The Ford Motor Company is planning to have its small cars assembled, not in America, but in Mexico. Labor in Mexico is paid only 15% per hour as compared to labor pay in the U.S. It is Mexico that has already built its wall, an economic wall, not the Trump wall, at the southern border.

In the New Yorker of November 25, Ali Fitzgerald posted this headline: "Post-Election Nihilist Horoscope." Then predicted: "The new orange-tinted moon of November 8th will usher in an age of extreme darkness -lighting only the houses of racism, misogyny, and gross red hats."

Donald: You often repeated "I love wars!!" Regardless of any Trumpist spin which you and your team might employ, wars shall not "Make American Great Again." 

Because of the holiday season, these blog postings shall be suspended until late December. Happy Holidays!!

Egyptian Mythology Regarding America's Love for the Muslim Brotherhood

Following Trump's non-merited victory in the presidential elections, there was elation in the Egyptian media. A non-merited political victory in America causing euphoria in the Egyptian media. Caused by the faulty assumption that Trump's victory shall diminish the Brotherhood sway in Washington, D.C.

This Egyptian mythology becomes more intriguing as some Egyptian opinion-makers claim that Hillary and Obama "conspired with the Brothers against Egypt." This is a direct quote from a message from a senior former Egyptian Ambassador.

I cannot falsely claim that I am neutral in my assessment of Trump as a post-modern thug, or of the Brotherhood, as a dangerous vehicle of terrorism in the name of Islam. Neutrality in either case would constitute, for me at least, giving my brain and my reasoning a holiday.

Having dealt in my previous blog postings with fascist Donald, my focus in this writing is on the fraudulent assumptions that the Brotherhood had so far held sway in official Washington, D.C. This myth of affinity is nothing more than Brotherhood's propaganda which the unwary Egyptian media and thinkers have come to take seriously.

Never wishing to lecture, except in my classrooms in New York City, as this would be a false self-elevation. I only wish here to share thoughts and observations gained from my close proximity to the American political environment. This proximity is continually enriched by my daily research and writing, as well as by my interactions with a steady stream of thought updating from my own students and interns.

New knowledge is my daily business. Old assumptions are my daily feeding of the trash bins. This has been impressed upon me since my senior year in my beloved high school in Egypt (Zagazig High School) where, in the science section, I nationally competed for the prize in the Darwin theory of evolution. Evolve or perish. I choose the former.

This month of November 2016 marks the fourth abysmal anniversary of former Egyptian President, Mohamed Morsi, declaring himself to be above the law. That declaration of November 2012 marked the rise of Brotherhood fascism subverting the democratic goals of post-Mubarak Egypt.

It also mercifully marked the beginning of the end of Islamist rule in the country of 100 million Arabs, nearly one third of the Arab nation. The demise of that dark rule was also by a popular uprising in June 2013 whose success had to be guaranteed by the might of the Egyptian armed forces. Case closed!!

America's grumbling about those developments, ignorantly calling the June 30 Revolution a military coup, was never due to the influence of the Brotherhood in America. It was due to America's sticking to the false measurement of "every opposition is a form of democratic expression." Not so!!

For the "right to self-determination," a right derived from sovereignty which resides in the populace, implies the right to determine what form of democracy it chooses. There is no global consensus as to what democracy is, or how it should be practiced.

Case in point: Has the choice of Trump as President-elect come about through what should be considered "democracy?" No!! It is a result of the Electoral College, an anachronism in the US Constitution intended to keep the mobs away from having their votes directly counted. My vote for Hillary who got the majority of popular votes (63 million to 58 million) did not register. Swallowed in the bowels of a perennial quirk in American democracy.

There is another anomaly in America's early support for the Brotherhood in Egypt. That support, now vanished, was manifested by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meeting in Cairo and elsewhere with Brotherhood representatives. That was not to assist in the political aggrandizement of the Brotherhood's Guidance Bureau in Egypt. It was to serve national American interests in the largest Arab country.

Those American efforts are legitimate pursuit of national American interests. This is what national sovereignty is all about. There is no love or hate in international relations. There are only national interests. When they converge with foreign national interest, we call this convergence "alliance."

Alliances are not marriages. They are temporary liaison affairs which may sour at any moment. That notion is perennial, the relations with other nations are changeable. The lessons of Darwinian evolution.

This is why outside intervention in national affairs is the riskiest form of relationship. Good fences (they are called borders) make for good neighbors. And that good neighbor might be far away, but brought closer by mutual interests. Another reason why the Brotherhood had failed in Egypt, and ended up marked as "terrorist." In its terrorist acts in Egypt, it kept on looking for support from beyond national borders.

An organization which calls for foreign intervention through diplomacy, arms, funds, or propaganda, is a traitor organization. That is why the most odious and stupid charge that Trump addressed to Obama was to call him "traitor." There has never been any scintilla of proof on that. On the reverse side, it was billionaire Trump who openly encouraged Russia to intervene in the American elections. Through hacking into the emails of the Democratic National Convention. Now Trump (the traitor by these obvious measurements) shall become President over the nation which he had deceived.

Add to the falsehood of the Brotherhood claims of amity with the Democratic party, and its treacherous attempt to subvert Egyptian sovereignty through soliciting foreign intervention, another dangerous falsehood. That is the unfounded claims by the same Egyptian source or sources that "the lady (meaning Hillary) is the worst." And that she and Obama "conspired ...against Egypt and other Arab countries." Mere words without the requisite backing of proof.

My disparaging such reasoning is not based on my being an attorney -searching for proof before I open my mouth. Attorneys do not have that dangerous luxury. It is based on my having taught political science before I taught law.

And my political science background has kept me a willing ally of national sovereignty. Our world is made up of the nation-States. The United Nations is an inter-state system, not an inter-nation system. Even in Islamic jurisprudence, I teach that Islam did not create a State. It created an "Umma" (a community). What holds a State together is its internal strength.

Thus a State that complains of "conspiracy" is in fact a weak State that blames its misfortunes on others. Competition about national interests is not conspiracy. So when my Egyptian respondents cry about what they erroneously see as an Obama/Clinton conspiracy on Egypt, they in fact convey lack of awareness that the New Egypt is no longer buffeted by outside conspiracies. Not even in its anti-terrorist struggle against the Sinai hit and run criminal marauders.

Where is my proof? Egypt of the present is rapidly transitioning to "The Strong State." That transition is even recognized by crazy Trump. One of his main surrogates, Rudolph Giuliani, former Mayor of New York City, and the author of the foreword to my 1999 book entitled "Government Ethics and Law Enforcement" admitted to this publicly.

Asked on November 13 about Trump's envisaged ban on Muslims, Giuliani, who might be considered for a high post in the Trump administration, his response was a testimony to the effects on America of "the Strong State." In effect, he specifically cited Egypt as an example of the Arab State with which a Trump administration can vet (scrutinize in advance) applicants for immigration to the U.S. Why?: "Because El-Sisi government, a strong ally, has done a good job at combating the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt."

Where in his response do you find the value, any value, of the Brotherhood megaphones in Times Square, New York, or Washington, D.C.? Gone with the wind. In fact where in that early recognition of Trumpian recognition of Egypt as a Strong State is the effect of all the trash that American non-governmental organizations are heaping on Cairo for human rights abuses? None!! Why?

These NGOs are valuable to an interventionist America. They are its cat paws. The Obama administration has reduced their credibility. This is due to the Obama doctrine of  "leading from behind." It also reflects America's pivoting away from the Middle East and shifting those resources to Asia and to trade.

Those claiming that the Muslim Brotherhood is Washington's darling should learn an essential new fact about America and the world, especially the Middle East. That is that the American center is no longer the federal government. The center now is defused among 50 states, calling themselves the United States of America. By the Tenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, powers not given by the Constitution to the federal government belong automatically to the States. (The Supremacy Clause).

And as they say, "the proof is in the pudding." Trump won the presidency by vilifying Washington, D.C., and gambling on his support from the State legislatures, fashioned, through gerrymandering, vote suppression, and the strongest voter ID requirements. All of which are non-democratic methods.

But it worked for him, and for the entire Republican party which now has Republican governors in 38 states, majorities in the two houses of Congress, and now the Oval Office. The party of Lincoln is now owned by Trump, the man who ferociously attacked Hillary, the Yale Law graduate, and cuddled Sarah Palin who could hardly know how to read the U.S. Constitution.

A point of convergence between Cairo of today and Washington of Trump is the emphasis on "jobs and the economy." For the opposition in Egypt claims that more than 25% of Egyptians are below the poverty line, so does the opposition to Obama claiming that 40 million America children go to bed hungry. Bill Clinton, a southern governor from Arkansas, won the presidency twice largely on the slogan: "It is the Economy Stupid." 

No wonder that the chief operating officer of a major American bank (Pharos Investments) spoke optimistically about Egypt which has been approved to receive $12 Billion as a loan from the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Angus Blair, reflecting the attitude of fellow bankers about the New Egypt's floating its national currency, said: "They are pleased that there is new thinking which is what Egypt needs."

Please, Mr. Banker, say this to the doom and gloom sayers in Egypt. Tell them to leave Cairo and go visit the country side. This is where Egypt's pulse is. Even a weak pulse is a sign of life. A life of a new rebirth of the Strong State, now recovering from 60 years of military dictatorship.

The New Egypt should rid itself of the stale thoughts of the past. Replacing those thoughts and resultant mythology by facts that matter. Together with a convalescing economy and a strong army, ensuring non-porous borders, Egypt needs opinion-makers trained in connecting the dots.

They say that camels walk faster at the sound of the flute. Let Egyptian writers play their flutes to help that caravan move forward across even non-chartered deserts.

Opinion-makers in America expect trouble in Trump America. Describing Trump's victory, one of them, David Remnick of the New Yorker magazine, characterized it as "an American tragedy." Then went on to call it "an event that will likely cast the country into a period of economic, political and social uncertainty that we cannot yet imagine."

Uncertainty about America does not augur well for the rest of the world. In fact, within 96 hours of his victory, Trump, on TV, proved that his ultra-right bluster during the campaign threatens to become policy.

In that TV interview he: affirmed that the wall between America and Mexico shall be built, from 2 million to 3 million illegal immigrants shall be the first installment of deportees, and looking menacingly through the cameras, he sternly ordered the anti-Trump demonstrators "Stop It." 

He is already proving those who are writing to me that "his bark is more threatening than his bite," or that "the lady would have been much worse than him" are dreamers.

With internal instability being ushered to the American streets, countries like Egypt should, as of now, double their efforts to rebuild themselves from within. It has always been my belief and advocacy that national deliverance happens from within, and that planning on the basis of reliance on help from beyond the border is a national gamble.

Even Emperor Donald J. Trump has admonished States relying on American defense: "Go Defend Yourselves Or Pay Us."

Observing our world of today, it doesn't take much thoughtfulness to conclude that the world is pivoting to the right. From America to Europe, both west and east, to Russia to India to Japan, the right is ascending. From globalism, our world is, in many ways, returning to tribalism.

That is why the sovereign response at the national level is the Strong State. Alliances between strong states, whose national interests intersect, shall last as long as that intersection lasts.

For the Arab people, following the settlement of their national upheavals, their future as a regional grouping shall only be served by the fulfillment of an old dream: the formation of the United Arab States (UAS). Not a union, but a federation where the internally sovereign State shall go on, with the sinews of foreign affairs and defence are in the hand of a federal council.

This is the Swiss model of cantons, adjusted by the American constitutional model of supremacy for the individual State where powers are not allocated to the federal council. Is this an Arab mythology? Maybe. But it is more logical than the present do nothing League of Arab States where the future of some of its members is being shaped by non-Arab States.

For a United Arab States, the Arabs have the fabric. But so far, neither the will nor the tailor!!

To those who write to me saying that Hillary would have been worse for America than Trump, I say: You don't understand America. Comparing Hillary to Trump, is like equating between experience and demagoguery.

What has occurred in America on November 8, 2016, has been described as "an epic mistake" (Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate in economics). Within 24 hours of that characterization, Trump appointed Stephen Bannon as his Chief White House Strategist and senior counselor. Bannon, the chief editor of Breitbart News, is the guru of white supremacists, the propagator of Islamophobia, and a man who made of hate an industry.

By such indicators, Trump is not embarking upon healing America's wounds. He is launching a reign of racial, ethnic and religious hatreds, thus raising the specter of civil strife.

For now, rage has overcome sanity, and ignorance is about to overwhelm recognizable norms of governance. As the least politically experienced president-elect in modern American history, Trump is especially known for his "I alone can fix it." A most pretentious bombast.

A number of Arab leaders are scampering today to befriend Trump. Trying to get to his boat by climbing over the edges. To them, I offer the following:

• Remember that that boat has a hole in its bottom. Allowing the waters of Islamophobia, racism, war mongering, and the Trump family business, to rush through it;
• Remember that, under a Trump administration, "America First," "deals are people," and sudden changes of mind, are Donald's political persona;
• Remember that Trump's history reflects no lasting loyalties;
• Remember that, by all means, a changed America might still offer opportunities for an Arab renaissance subservient to no outsider.

For in this period of world tribalism and rage, the way to national success is to put diplomacy in the service of clearly defined national goals. Trump is temporary. And Hillary is gone. But prudence calls for expecting a furious return of the Democrats under a new leadership to oust the regime that came to power in spite of the popular vote.

• Remember that under the U.S. Constitution, the federal government is one of enumerated (i.e. limited) powers. The States, and by extension, the cities, are where most of the powers reside. New York City, for example, has already defied Trump on immigration. Its police is not federal. Nor is its educational system. Nor is its voter ID system. 

Because of Trump, the United States may constitutionally be reverting to Athenian democracy: The City State. Back to the future!!

Because of the American Thanksgiving holiday, there shall be no blog posting issued next week.

"Not My President!!" Screamed The Millions Against Trump!! So Do I!!

What the founders of America feared, has now happened. Those greats, 240 years ago, all aristocrats and educated elite, have feared mob rule. So they, in the Constitution, built a firewall to prevent that. Called the Electoral College, it is intended to filter the popular vote.

Though with an attractive name, "representative democracy" is no guarantee that the winner of the popular vote in a presidential election, does necessarily win the Oval Office. What counts here, by today's calculation, is the winner of at least 270 electoral votes. In recent history, it happened in 2000, in Bush v. Gore. Despite losing the popular vote, Bush became President. And now in 2016, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. But Trump is now the President-elect.

On November 8, I voted for Hillary. But this, in America's representative democracy, the candidate whom I opposed, Donald Trump, cancelled my vote out. By comparison, when I, as a dual citizen (Egyptian American), voted for El-Sisi in 2014, my vote was tallied for the Egyptian presidential candidate of my choice. That is because in a country, like Egypt, you have "popular," not "representative" democracy.

With Donald J. Trump expected to be sworn in on January 20, 2017, as the 45th President of the U.S., America is a land of anxiety. Why?

• He has never held public office before. That is where a holder would normally get to such a position. Through the grueling practice of politics. And "politics" is essentially the art of compromise. Donald has never practised that art;
• Trump has worked assiduously, through his own voice magnified by his troupe of surrogates, to inject doubt about the conventions of government. He has weakened the trust in a sitting President, in the legislative and the judicial branches, and in the political parties, including his own party;
• Even before the results of this nasty campaign, he inveighed against the electoral system. Calling it "rigged," is not reflecting the popular will, needs to be closely monitored by his supporters, and is driven by faulty polls and "corrupt media;"
• Donald has used, for his political advocacy, the weapons of insults, smears, innuendoes, and cruel sarcasm, against anyone who dared to disagree with him. An expert in TV showmanship, he put fabrications ahead of facts, fear mongering ahead of "trust in America," violence ahead of conciliation, and bluster ahead of cool-headedness;
• He repeatedly declared "I love wars;" showed more respect for Vladamir Putin than he exhibited towards his own President; threatened to wall off America against immigration; manifested outright Islamophobia; and promised to undo America's alliances and treaty obligations;
• Trump, by his own declarations, has a manifest disconnect with the global fight against terrorism. His claim about his possession of a secret plan to fight DAESH (ISIS) is laughable. And his assertions that he knows about strategy "more than the generals" is lunacy. Especially that he has evaded serving in any military role or capacity;
• He regarded tax evasion and avoidance as adeptness at using the law as a vehicle for manipulation.

Keeping all the above in mind, to which we should add his disdain for women, his uncontrolled propensity for unwanted and offensive sexual advances, and his refusal to pay those who work for him, in violation of his contracts, how can Trump lead America of the 21st Century?

The danger of a mobocracy which produced a Trump presidency cannot be over-stated. He can have his way for "America First." But how can he be trusted with the nuclear code, with treating his political adversaries with respect, with the issues of climate change, the sanctity of treaties, free trade, and bolstering international institutions such as the United Nations family of organizations, about all of which he invented stupid accusations?

"Making American Great Again," his battle cry, implies that America has been on a slippery slope due to a dysfunctional system. Any system of governance is always in need of change, because circumstances keep on changing. But how can President-elect Trump walk back from an ideology of "making America hate again?"

His unpredicted and unmerited victory has been due to an electoral system in which he does not believe. It  was also due to the rise of the poorly educated white population in the industrial belt who blamed economic unequality on the wrong party -the immigrant. The browning of America (by the year 2030, the white demography shall be at 45%). The culture of fear was Trump's daily tool which was allowed a cost free microphone 24/7. And the length of the Clintons exposure on the American stage for 3 decades entailed the negative cost of over exposure.

An era of American history has just ended on November 8, 2016. And an uncertain era of anxiety has just begun. The writing is on the wall:

• Through gerrymandering, the Republican Party, the party of war and foreign interventions, has built institutions at the state level. The result: 38 out of 50 state governors are Republican; both houses of Congress have Republican majorities sent through State elections;
• Since the passing of Justice Scalia, the US Supreme Court has been functioning without its full complement of nine justices. Votes of 4 to 4 means non-revision of the judgments of lower courts. A defacto nullification of the Supreme Court's role of judicial review. Now a Republican President, with expected support from a Republican majority in the Senate, can name and appoint conservative justices. Thus tilting the highest court of the land further to the right;
• Undoing the historic Obama signature legislative achievement, "The Affordable Care Act." Providing health insurance so far to nearly half of the 40 millions Americans who cannot afford health insurance; 
• Cutting income taxes for the top 1% of Americans (the billionaire class);
• Threatening to deport en masse 11 million undocumented immigrants, before "allowing them to re-enter America legally." Thus tearing the fragile fabric of poor families whose adults have invested their energies in jobs not preferred by American citizens;
• Supporting the National Rifle Association (NRA), under the deceptive mask of supporting the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. There are 350 million guns in the hands of 9 million Americans. Annualy causing 30,000 deaths by gun violence all over America;
• Pretending to be charitable to worthy causes, such as the American veterans, when in fact hardly any contributions were made; and
• Threatening to sue all women (so far the total of 12) who have come forward accusing him of criminally assaulting them sexually.

Trump has called President Obama "a traitor;" threatened to institute criminal prosecution against Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for what he has fabricated as her "gross negligence" in Benghazi. That is where the U.S. Ambassador and 4 other Americans were killed by marauding Libyan militias. It was the Republican's in Congress who had refused to fund diplomatic security arrangements abroad. And the unfortunate death of that Ambassador was due to his decision to travel from Tripoli to Benghazi where no security at that US facility was up to par.

Trump's presidency shall undoubtedly reflect the deep chasms in American society; the decline of conventional norms of governance in Washington, D.C.; the absence of the citizen's trust in law and order measures and institutions, including the FBI as a neutral investigative arm of the Department of Justice; the resurgence of torture of individuals suspected of terrorism. Thus upending the legal principle of "you are innocent until proven guilty by court of law."

Even the appointment of top experts to make up for the inexpertise of Trump in governance, shall prove to be a futile remedy. The Donald's span of attention is very short; he digresses instinctively; he failed 3 times in debating Hillary; he gets bored with details; and he has repeatedly declared that he relies only on his gut feelings.

Snakes have the natural capacity of changing their skin. But not their nature. "Healing wounds," declared by Trump upon securing 278 electoral votes (for Hillary's 208 votes), shall be an impossibility for Trump, a racist who has befriended the stalwarts of the Klu Klus Klan.

Even Trump's battle cry "Make America Great Again" is plagiarized. Its original author is James Fallon, national reporter of The Atlantic magazine. That is the title of his book published in 1989.

Yet there may still be a ray of hope of this USA -United States of Anxiety. In the Senate, the Republicans have 54 seats, not the majority of 60 needed to overturn important items of Obama's legacy. Neither the so-called Obama Care, nor the right to abortion (Trump has threatened women seeking abortion with punishment), nor existing treaties which are already the law of the land since 1832.

In her concession speech, Hillary Clinton urged her supporters to "continue to fight for what is right." She added "we must defend the American dream which is big enough for everyone." So the battle for the soul of America is not an end.

But the message of Trump's victory to the outside world is that as America has turned to the right and inward. So should other States, looking for an American global role, seek their salvation from within. "The Strong State" is the logical answer to the Trump so-called movement.

It is catastrophic to see Obama, a professor of constitutional law, be replaced by someone who was publicly challenged by a gold star father, Khizer Khan, a Muslim whose son, an American army officer was killed in Iraq. His words addressed to Trump shall live on for a long time: "Have You Even Read the U.S. Constitution!!"

Trump's elevation to the presidency of America is akin to the peasant rebellions of medieval Europe. The periphery, for long neglected, rising, avenging their neglect from the center.

In multiple cities, anti-Trump demonstrations broke out. By the thousands, they marched through the streets from coast to coast. Their slogan was "Not My President." This is a reverse echo of the chants by what those who could not accept a black man, Obama, to be their president. An early sign of a deeply divided nation.

Calls are now filling the air. Calling on the Democratic leadership to step aside. Its ineptness in ignoring the backwoods where "the forgotten" either voted for Trump or stayed home on election day, shall undoubtedly be punished. This now looks like a form of an "American Spring" where the Millennials, the minorities, the women, and the blacks are lashing at both Trumpism and the old guard of the Democratic party.

What makes America America are not only the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution. To these, one should add underlying but vibrant concepts. These are freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, equality before the law, no formal State religion, no formal language, no king, freedom of movement, openness to immigration, civilian control over the military, freedom of the press, freedom of choice, an independent judiciary, and enforced respect for privacy. Above all, a peaceful and orderly transfer of power.

This entire fabric of what makes the U.S. an attractive place to live and prosper shall be severely tested by Trump -a racist and a xenophobe. An unqualified, narcissistic, lying bully, against whom a popular majority has voted on November 8, shall be sworn in on January 20, 2017 as the 45th President of the United States. A magnification of the failures of democracy -a term which has no precise definition in any legal dictionary.

November 8, 2016 marks a huge turning point in American history.

• It shall be the date on which a con man, a charlatan, was made President-elect;
• His elevation to lead this great and powerful country was not through a popular vote. It was through a dysfunctional system which delegates my vote to electors who can direct it to their choice, not mine;
• His victory is a defeat for an inclusive America, a post-racial America, and America which by its own constitution must separate between religion and the State, an America whose strength has been partly due to immigration, and partly through innovation;
• Regardless of present feverish attempts to make him act presidential, he shall always be what he has been for his whole 70 years of life -a rich man with no social conscience. You cannot make a pig attractive by applying lipstick to its mouth.

So, America, from now on, you have no claim to advise the world as to what democracy is, or how human rights might be observed; or how to run their national life.

The News Desk of the New Yorker magazine wrote: "The rest of the world is now at leisure to stand back and ponder the astounding dereliction of the American Presidential election."

Mr Trump: Like all the millions of Americans now planning to demonstrate against your presidency on January 20, 2017, I shall chant: You Are Not My President:

• For you have no faith in the principles under-girding the U.S. Constitution;
• Your presidency has happened through deceptive promises to masses which fear the future; and
• Your gutter language about "a rigged system" has made the teaching of national civics and respect for the law a real challenge. For it was an idiocyncratic system which made of you, a crooked billionaire who defied every norm, a president-elect.

The America which I have inhabited for 64 years has never elected for the presidency as vile a person as Trump. This shocking development has come about for a host of complex reasons. Not the least of these is that Obama soaring favorability could not be transferred to Hillary Clinton. The Latino-Black coalition exists in name only. One third of the Latin vote went to Trump, for the alluring promise of jobs. The threat of a wall on the Mexican border did not scare them off. And sizable numbers of the blacks did not vote. A non-vote, in effect, was a vote for Trump.

Now the only ray of hope for the de-Trumpization of America is in Trump's impeachment for any illegal act by him as President. Or in his voluntary resignation. Trump's removal, if it happens, would come at a much cheaper cost to America than threat of possibility of civil war.

In The Nile Valley, Two Heroes of Unity: One, Since 3100 B.C., Is Celebrated; The Other, Since 1954 A.D., Is Ignored.

History can be kind to some great leaders, yet unkind to other similarly great leaders.

In Egypt, there was Pharaoh Narmer (Mina) who united the two geographical parts of Egypt: the Delta, in the north, and the Valley in the south. Around 3100 B.C., Narmer, not only established the First Egyptian Dynasty. He also brought Egypt, both Upper (meaning South), and Lower (meaning North) under one crown -His!!

The Narmer tablets, depicting that historic and enduring unity, are well known to Egyptians, especially those who, like myself, taught the History of Egypt in Cairo.

Our late Egyptology professor, Dr. Ahmed Badawi, drilled in our heads the name Narmer, at the University of Heliopolis. He even exhorted us to stop by the historic hotel called Mina House, located till today at the foot of the Giza Pyramids.

What Narmer accomplished for Egypt in regard to that geographic unity, the British, during their heinous occupation (1882 - 1954) could not undo. Trying to create North Egypt and South Egypt (Divide and Rule), they utterly failed. Unity, one could assuredly say, is in Egypt's DNA.

From Narmer, a celebrated unity hero for the past 6000 years, to another Egyptian hero, Muhammad Naguib, first President of Egypt (1953 - 1954) who, until now is totally ignored. His dream of unity, though not attained, would have brought the Nile Valley, from the Mediterranean to Uganda into one proud entity, with the great Nile as its spinal cord.

Naguib's failure in accomplishing that breath-taking mission was not for lack of trying. It, as could be seen from his memoirs, was due to the Nasser coup of 1952, with its participants turning against one another. It boiled down to Naguib, whose mother was Sudanese, and Nasser, whose family hailed from Upper Egypt. Near South versus Deep South. A historic catastrophe which changed the entire history of the modern Middle East.

The Naguib vs. Nasser split had to do with different outlooks, personal, political and geostrategic. Naguib, the fatherly face of the Nasser Coup, was in favor of democracy in Egypt and of Egyptian/Sudanese unity. But Nasser, the young photogenic face of the army rebellion against the monarchy of King Farouk, guiding Egypt east (Nach Ost -as they say in German) for leadership of the Arab World.

The result: expulsion and imprisonment of General Naguib; the declaration by the Sudan of its independence in 1956; thrusting of Egypt in non-winnable Middle Eastern wars; the destruction of Egyptian democratic institutions until the revolutions of 2011 and 2013; and the unintended consequences of the growth of Islamism in Egypt, especially under President Sadat.

Returning now to the question which should haunt, if not all Egyptians, at least those who care about the full projection of Egyptian history and politics. Thus I turn to the memories of Muhammad Naguib, published in Arabic under the title of "I was President of Egypt" (Konto Raiisan Li Misr).

For fairness, I have no means of verification of what Naguib argues in those memoirs. Except for two circumstantial pieces of evidence: The outcome of the Nasser/Naguib conflict; plus my personal knowledge of President Naguib when he was alive.

I was his son's teacher in the early 1950s at the Model School of Al-Naqrashi Pasha at Qubba Gardens, Cairo. His character was stellar; spoke modestly  and sincerely; and was attentive to the quality of education in post-war Egypt. He was also loved by his troops forming the Frontiers Battalions (Selah Al-Hodood).

These were reasons why the Free Officers, led by Nasser in that historic coup against monarchical Egypt in 1952, chose him to front that rebellion.

Without summarizing those 420 pages, published in various editions from 1984 to 2003, my focus in this blog posting is the junctures of that rift whose consequences are still present. Even within the scope of that limited material, I shall focus on the manifestations of that rift as they impacted the destruction of the Naguib dream of unity between Egypt and the Sudan.

As an army officer and a patriot who participated in the Egyptian uprising of 1919 against British occupation, Naguib, throughout his life, called himself "Son of the Nile." 

His maternal grandfather, Muhammad Othman Bek, was a senior Army officer stationed in Khartoum., the Sudan. The Mehdi rebels in the Sudan in the late 1880s spared his life in recognition of Othman's commitment to Nile Valley amity.

Naguib's entire family lived in the "Anglo-Egyptian Sudan," named as such by the diktat of the British occupiers of Egypt. A major stratagem of Great Britain in the Nile Valley was of dual nature. To separate Egypt from the Sudan, and to separate the Sudanese north from the Sudanese south.

That divide and rule approach was premised on ethnic and religious lines: North of Malakal was "Arab and Muslim;" south of that point was "Negroid, and either Christian or animist." 

Following on his father's footsteps, Naguib graduated from the Cairo Military Academy in 1918. As with his father, his early service was in the Sudan. That is where some members of his family still live, and where his father was buried. Fondly, Naguib recalls his childhood in the Sudan, his camaraderie with the Sudanese, and his mother being Sudanese.

A total immersion which provided Naguib with a purely Nilotic outlook which did not recognize the line of demarcation between Egypt and the Sudan.

Such outlook was deepened by Naguib's early education in the Sudan. From Wad Madani, south of Khartoum, to Wadi Halfa, south of the Egyptian border. His icons were Sudanese officers and educators looking for British departure and for unity with Egypt.

So were Naguib's experiences in the Upper Nile region (south Sudan) as he had to travel with his family to wherever his father was transferred throughout the huge expanse called the Sudan.

At that time, the Sudan was geographically the largest African country, endowed with unlimited resources: water, land, diversified agriculture, huge animal resources, and a population full of pride and passion for being Sudanese.

Orphaned at the age of 13, following his father's death at the age of 43 in Khartoum, Naguib, though impoverished, was admitted into Khartoum's Gordon College. That was an exception, as the British occupation prevented Egyptians in the Sudan from applying for admission. But Naguib's father, though an Egyptian, was a senior officer in the service of "the Government of the Sudan."

His studenthood at Gordon was marred by his loyalty to Egypt. The sovereign in Cairo was "The King of Egypt and the Sudan." Not the British, a foreign occupier who saw to it that even the railroad from Cairo to Aswan would not be connected to the railroad in the Sudan -a few miles from that connection.

While being a student at Gordon College, Naguib's loyalty to that natural and historic unity caused him trouble. He refused to take down a text dictated by a British professor. In part, the text said that "Egypt was ruled by the British." 

Standing in protest, Naguib was defiant: "Sir!! Britain is only an occupier of Egypt. Egypt is internally self-ruled, but is a part of the Ottoman Empire." His punishment was 10 lashes administered to his back. "I submitted to that degrading punishment, without even opening my mouth out of personal pride."

Naguib was in fact an Egyptian Sudanese, not fitting in the mold of Nasser whose gaze was not South, but East. His fronting the Nasser coup and becoming Egypt's first president proved to be a painful ordeal.

• He felt that the Free Officers caused more harm to the cause of democracy and party politics than those opposed to the coup;
• He posited that "We dismissed King Farouk but replaced him with 13 other kings;
• He bemoaned his inability to stand up to "the increasing Nasser dictatorship;"
• Out of disgust with the direction of the Nasser's coup, Naguib submitted his resignation to the "Revolutionary Command Council," made up of members of the Free Officers who submitted to Nasser's authoritarianism.
• Before submitting that resignation on February 22, 1954, he confronted the entire Command Council accusing them of influence peddling, financial corruption, and other deviations, such as the establishment of "an Egypt as a State ruled by central intelligence."
• His options were: either to exercise his authority as president, or to resign and let Nasser have his way. One of Naguib's central complaints was that he was forced to sign off on decisions by the high military command which were issued and then brought to him afterwards for a pro forma endorsement.
• As to the Sudan, Naguib who felt the inner pulse of the Sudanese more than any other member on the Revolutionary Command Council, saw that the complaints voiced by the Sudanese were on the upswing. Especially after the plebiscite on unity with Egypt, where the vote was seven for unity, and one for independence.
• Naguib was convinced that Nasser felt that "the Sudan was a burden on Egypt, and should be jettisoned." One of Nasser's side kicks was Salah Salem who advocated that "the Sudan was definitely lost;" a shock for Naguib!!
• Naguib's bottom line was that the Revolutionary Command Council sacrificed the unity of the Nile Valley, and acted accordingly, causing protests in Khartoum where the crowds chanted "Sudan is for the Sudanese."

Imprisoned till his death, Naguib bemoaned that his name was expunged from schoolbooks in Egypt; that he was beaten and insulted by officers who were encouraged to disregard his prior status as a patriot, and his having been the first president of Egypt.

In his memoirs, he expresses his deep pain for the rising Nasser dictatorship, the loss of the unity of the Nile Valley, and the conversion by Nasser of Al-Azhar to a mere department for religious affairs.

Naguib's championed the unity of the Nile Valley. To him, it was a means of bolstering the backbone of the Arab homeland through the creation of a strong State at the Arab geographic midpoint. He is more than deserving rehabilitation, though posthumously. That would be a means of rectification of that gap in the history of modern Egypt.

If Narmer is celebrated as the unifier of Egypt after 6000 years of his rule, so should Naguib who, in the early 1950s, saw in Egypt a fulcrum for a larger unity.

When I was sent as legal counsel to Darfour, the Sudan, in 2006 by the UN Security Council, I experienced sudden pain for what had been lost by the destruction of that unity. It was as if Naguib, from his grave, was whispering: "See what has become of this beautiful land once that unity vanished."

With the Fall of 2012, Legitimacy of the Muslim Brotherhood Had Collapsed!!

In the New Egypt, the legitimacy of the Muslim Brotherhood had fallen within only six months of their assumption of the presidency. Morsi came to power in June 2012 through popular elections. The Muslim Brotherhood, for whom I had in error voted. Soon the Brotherhoodization of post-Mubarak Egypt began in earnest.

But out of illegitimate over-reach, their legitimacy through the ballot box, even if verifiable, was gone with the wind. Within only 6 months!! Their collapse had nothing to do with El-Sisi. It had to do with structural and ideological defects which brought their reign, in June 2013, to ultimate ruin.

Here is how!!

• Having joined the January 2011 Revolution late, a lateness due to their fear of an ultimate Mubarak triumph, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) made a premature announcement. "The MB will not field any candidate for the Office of President."
• But later "the Guidance Bureau" (Maktab Al-Irshad), their politburo, changed course. Their Deputy Supreme Guide, moneybags Khairat Al-Shatter was to compete for that highest office against General Shafik.
• A quirk, or a quibble, or a twist in Egyptian electoral law, affecting the qualification of a presidential candidate, disqualified Al-Shatter. Constitutionally, the candidate for that post must be "an Egyptian born to Egyptian parents, none of whom nor the candidate have the nationality of another State." El-Shatter's mother had held an American citizenship, hence the disqualification of her son.
• The near equivalence of this Egyptian constitutional provision is to be found in the American Constitution. Its Article II, Section 1, paragraph 5 begins as follows:

"No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President." A provision which prompted crazy Donald J. Trump, the Republican Party presidential candidate to try to delegitimize the Obama presidency. By the nefarious efforts of "the Birther Movement" which claimed that Obama was born outside the U.S.

• So the MB in Egypt, searching for a replacement for the disqualified El-Shatter, found in Mohamed Morsi the person who would lead the New Egypt through the elections of June 2012. And Morsi won.

End of the story of legitimacy of the headship of the New Egypt? No!! In fact that beginning was woefully defective. President Morsi was elected while the new Constitution was still being drafted. The cart was thus placed before the horse. With Al-Itihadiyah Palace (equivalent to the American White House) now occupied by a leader of the MB, the Brotherhood's appetite for garnering more power through accretion became insatiable. Inordinately greedy!!

Fancying Egypt, at that point, an Islamic Emirate in the making (Supreme Guide Mahdi Akef said "To Hell with Egypt (Toz Fi Masr)," the constituent assembly began to frame an Islamic Constitution. What began as a group, on whose membership were all shades of post-Mubarak political thinking, soon turned into an Ikhwan rubber stamp of the Bureau of Guidance. The MB, with Morsi ensconced at Al-Itihadiya Palace, saw to it that liberals, Copts, women, and any secular thinking individuals were impediments to their long march to the Islamic Emirate of Egypt.

And with the non-MB elements abandoning the efforts of keeping Egypt a secular habitat, the Islamic Constitution was readied for a plebiscite a few days before that vote in December 2012. No national debate; no transparency; no voicing of any opposition to that illegal take-over by the Brotherhood under the guise of Islamism. The battle cry of "Islam Is the Solution" became the entire ideology of a movement. A movement which felt emboldened by one important fact: The Armed Forces, as seen as of January 25, 2011, shall not intervene.

In spite of the MB confidence in the ultimate success of their coup (from the ballot box to an Islamic dictatorship), Morsi declared himself in November 2012 that he was immune from any accountability before the law. His move, reminiscent of Hitler becoming Germany's Fuhrer, as an epitaph of the Weimar Republic, was not contested by even the moderate elements of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Not even the judiciary, a venerable institution with a glorious tradition based on a sophisticated fusion between Islamic law (Sharia) and the Napoleonic code. That institution was smitten into submission by the instrumentality of hordes encouraged to, among other things, besiege the Supreme Constitutional Court.

That Court had committed an act unforgiven by the resurrected Islamists: the nullification of the legitimacy of one third of the Egyptian parliament, convened as a vehicle for the recalibration of Egypt to fit in the Brotherhood mold.

By the time the Islamic constitution, which had no provision for the eventuality of recall of the President, was rushed for approval, other moves have been put in place by the Muslim Brotherhood:

• The de facto lease of eastern Sinai to Hamas which, through tunnels as well as porous borders, had begun to shift its armed confrontation with Israel to Egypt;
• The borrowing of the Iranian pattern of the Revolutionary Guard to create an Egyptian military institution as a parallel to the regular army;
• The increasing hostility towards the Copts and the Shiis, which expressed itself in attacks and hooliganism;
• The changing pattern of Egypt's foreign relations in the Middle East through enhanced amity towards Ordogan's Turkey, and Pakistan which was being increasingly Talibanised (apostasy laws; harsh treatment of women; and anti-minorities practises);
• Threat of military intervention in Ethiopia for its plan to build Al-Nahdha Dam on the Blue Nile;
• The downgrading of Al-Azhar as the historic citadel of Islamic learning framed into the ideology of tolerance, inclusiveness, and outreach to other faiths and creeds;
• Declaring Egypt's historic monuments as un-Islamic idols which cannot be tolerated by an Islamic State; and
• The systematic weeding out of Egyptian diplomats and consular officials for being "insufficiently Islamic;"
• Tourism was discouraged;
• The arts, the film industry; the vibrant music, the theater were looked upon as suspect cultural deviations.

Against this background, whereby Egypt of 7000 years was being turned on its head, 35 million Egyptians rose as a human wave of protest. The motto of the June 30, 2013 revolution was: "Go!!" (IRHAL).

But the Brotherhood had a different perspective: legitimacy (Shariyah) was being challenged, and its claimed majority among Egypt's nearly 100 million was the nuclear option to be used against the crowds in Tahrir and all over Egypt.

By this calculation, the Brotherhood wrote its own phasing out certificate:

• Morsi refused the entreaties of El-Sisi, the Defense Minister, to accord Egypt a new start: A new plebiscite on the presidency; rejoining the broad national secular forces to avert the horrible spector of civil war; and the avoidance of military intervention to keep the peace, especially that the Police forces have been maligned by the Morsi regime;
• A Road-Map aiming at having all sectors and ideologies in Egypt come together, had to be put in place even with the Brotherhood opting to stay outside the broad national consensus;
• The launching of a transitional government, headed by the jurist Adly Mansour, President of the Egyptian Supreme Constitutional Court. This was met by the launching by the Brotherhood of the occupation of two main public squares in the heart of Cairo: Rabaa and Al-Nahdha. Those locations were declared by the Brotherhood "mini-emirates;"
• For 6 weeks (from July 3 to August 14, 2013), the appeals by the new transitional authorities for the sit-in participants to peacefully disband went unheeded. 
• In both Rabba and Al-Nahdha, crimes were committed, weapons were stored and at times used, foreign intervention was invited, and the banner of "Shariiyah (legitimacy)," though false, was unfurled.

Finally the new authorities had to move on these two locations, where exits of safe passage were repeatedly declared. Those defensive security measures were manipulated by the Brotherhood in its deceptive cry of victimhood.

The battle lines have thus changed as of August 14, 2013. Terrorism in Sinai, Cairo, and the western desert began in earnest. Yet the secular Constitution was enacted in 2014 followed by presidential elections which produced a winner: El-Sisi.

Facts are facts, hard to ignore, and impossible to contest. The Secular Constitution of 2014 provides in its Article 5 that: "The political system is based upon political and parties membership diversity, the peaceful transfer of power, separation of powers with checks and balances, the authority as based upon accountability, and respect of human rights and freedoms as provided in the Constitution."

None of these provisions has equivalents in the Islamic Constitution. The only provision stressed by the Muslim Brotherhood was: An emblem of two swords framing the Quran. With the words "Get Ready" at its base. Get ready for what? For so-called Islamic rule which limits the freedom of expression and the practice of faith to only Brotherhood adherents?


Egyptian laws and regulations whereby the Brotherhood was banned and declared a terror organization were enacted. But only after that organization had decided to take matters in its own hands. Regardless of the popular will, manifested massively from June 30 to July 4, 2013. Prior to those fatal dates, the Muslim Brotherhood stubbornly refused to join the process of Egypt's rebirth after 60 years of military rule.

Nothing can ring more hollow than the claim that "legitimacy" resided only in an Islamist dictatorial rule. A rule raising false facades, impugning the legitimacy of the New Egypt which had brought peace to the Egyptian street, and a new sense of urgency to make up for lost time.

It is not by the constant repetition by media that the present Egyptian government is the outcome of a putsch. It is the result of the vanquishing of a putsch by the Brotherhood in whose terrorist revanchist face one could only see an ISIS affiliate.

The Muslim Brotherhood has no claim to legitimacy in Egypt as of the Fall of 2012. That is when it first put Morsi, its symbols, its ethos above the law. Such collapse is nearly impossible to repair. For it goes to the real core, beyond the facade of the mere use of faith for sordid ends of power.

Viewing the U.N. And Its Charter From the Perspective of Realism

Not by lamentations, but by congratulations, should a former UN staffer like me, greet the appointment of the new Secretary-General. I have served under four of his predecessors: Dag Hammarskjold, U Thant, Kurt Waldheim, and Javier Perez de Cuellar.

Antonio Guterres, now the 8th Secretary-General, deserves to succeed. He, a former Prime Minister of Portugal, and a former UN High Commissioner for Refugees, has the right tools for UN leadership. However I am not questioning the worthiness of the new captain of the UN ship. I am not sure whether the ship itself is still sea-worthy.

Born in 1945, the UN is governed by a charter born out of the smoldering ruins of the Second World War. Its elements were taking form as early as 1942, following the entry of the US in that war. A war whose human casualties are estimated at 40 millions. Its founding members numbered, in San Francisco, 51 States. That number has now grown to 193.

Over the past 71 years, the world has changed several times over. Issues of war, peace, and development are no longer the same. Even pen and paper, except for old hands like mine, are no more. The State is now competing with the non-State actor for hegemony. Even globalization has lost its luster. Digitization has become the medium, and landing on the moon might soon be eclipsed by landing and living on Mars.

Yet the Charter remained the same. Not because of its resilience and relevance to the vastly changing circumstances. But because it is nearly impossible to revise. Article 109 provides for that remote possibility. That possibility cannot become a reality due to two impossibilities: unanimity amongst the Big Five Powers in the Security Council (U.S./U.K./France/Russia/China); and the super-majority of two-thirds approval by the entire membership.

So the U.N. is blanketed by too much ice to make it a sea-worthy ship for its new captain, Antonio Guterres. And there is hardly anything that he could do about it. That is although the UN Secretary-General is, under the Charter, two in one: Chief Administrative Officer (Article 98), and, at his discretion, a political entity (Article 99).

Here are selective lamentations in regard to the shackles built into the Charter:

• To begin with, let us overlook the anomaly of calling the organization, "the United Nations." Nations? The membership is made up of States, not nations, immersed in the daily struggle for upholding their sovereignty. 
• In fact, once in a while, we get the entertaining spectacle of two delegations, each claiming representation of the State. The Dominican Republic, China, Mali, and Tshad are examples.
• The right of States to self-defense is relegated to Article 51;
• That basic sovereign right is expressed at the end of Chapter VII, the main tool of the Big Five hegemony expressed as sanctions against other States.
• The preamble of the Charter in regard to the fundamental right of every individual to dignity, and to gender equality is vague and exhortatory. It took 3 years for the General Assembly to amplify those rights in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948).
• The rights of civilians for protection from war-faring combatants found their way to expression in 1949. In the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (1966). Genocide, that mass murder for any reason, was a later invention of the early 1950s.
• Article 2, paragraph 7 forbids the intervention by States in the internal affairs of other States. Great!! But that basic principle of sovereignty is made subsidiary to Chapter VII in sanctions where the Big Five (the permanent members of the Security Council) hold sway.
• It is in the General Assembly (GA) where that equality of sovereignty is expressed. The GA is considered the Parliament of Man/Woman. Yet nearly all its resolutions are non-enforceable. They are a wish list of "please, would you be so kind as to...!!"
• The only exception to the above is the budget. But the arrears have for far too long overwhelmed payment of assessments on time. One country once paid $40 to avoid voting deprivation. Just to remain a hair-breadth under the arrears accumulated over 2 years.
• As to the Security Council, which has "the primary" (not the exclusive) responsibility for the maintenance of peace and security, well..? We have the veto power in the hands of 5 States from among 15 States, 10 of which are non-permanent members. The latter category satisfies the scenery of geographic representation by regions (by caucuses), but with hardly any impact on the decisions of war and peace. Only the resolutions of that body are enforceable.
• With decolonization virtually accomplished, one of the 6 main organs of the UN, namely the Trusteeship Council, has no job. Its ornate hall at UN Headquarters serves as a meeting space. Attempts to rename that Council "The Human Rights Council" have failed.

The above is beginning to look like the Martin Luther list of grievances pinned to the door of that church in Gutenberg, Germany, in the 16th Century. So we shall stop here to turn our lamentations towards the misperceived concepts and the cancerous impediments to the growth of that universal organization:

• Where is the UN today in the global problems of terrorism, safe havens for internally-displaced persons, and genocidal wars waged by leaders internally? Not to mention the horrors of Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya and of death by drowning of immigrants young and old.
• "Internal affairs" are to be designated and protected from outside interference by the State itself. The UN is shut out, unless through resort to the recently developed laws of human rights and of humanitarian intervention.
• That UN absence is now filled by States, or by regional defense arrangements. Bringing these issues to the UN Security Council is akin to the fig leaf of legitimating what sovereign powers have already decided to do outside of the UN.
• The term "peace-keeping" does not exist in the UN Charter. It was a Hammarskjold invention which was embarked upon in regard to the first Suez War of 1956. OK. We shall take whatever we get to help our troubled world through our only universal organization -the UN. 
• But the national contingents volunteered by States at their own volition, need two main strategic elements: freedom of movement (which can only be granted by the States on whose soil the peace-keepers are stationed). And prior training in joint exercises to at least learn the communication code of that array of multi-national forces.
• That pre-training does not exist. Except in two or three of the Scandinavian States. For how can the UN membership agree on planning for peace-keeping, say, in the Philippines? The Philippines would be the first to angrily object saying: "Who is the UN to anticipate a crisis in our country? This is nothing but fomenting a crisis. In any case, we shall not sign a status of forces agreement (SOFA)." And the matter dies.
• In that regard the UN, being an inter-State system, has no role to play in civil wars. It was not designed for that purpose.
• From where did the UN Security Council get its legal authority to ban individual citizens of sovereign States from travel out of their localities? That Council is not a court of law; the banned persons are not put on advance notice; when I represented a travel banned victim, I discovered that the UN investigators used as evidence irrelevant indicators; and the expert reports on the need to end that system of "you are guilty until you prove yourself innocent" went nowhere.

Add to the above selected list that up to now there are terms which lack precise definition through international inter-State consensus. Terms like "democracy," and "aggression."

So Secretary-General Guterres, we wish you well. You shall have your hands full. But you still have at your disposal tools which have proven their functional effectiveness.

Primary among these are the 30 specialized agencies and programs within "the UN Family of Organizations." Including, of course, your old office, "The UN High Commissioner For Refugees."

There are also the more than 2000 non-governmental organizations around the world. Representing what is referred to in the Charter by "We the People." Above all, you are perceived worldwide as endowed by an unarticulated moral authority of the rare type -its neutrality.

Let us not forget the central role of one of the 6 principal organs of the UN itself. Namely, the UN Secretariat. Under Article 98, you are the decider over that main organ which is in session 24/7. You, or your representative, hire and fire. Through this vast bureaucracy, the entire equivalents within the Family of the UN Organizations are also influenced.

In 1960, Hammarskjold has planted the flag of "the independence of the international civil service." His clarion call, which rattled the Soviets and troubled the British, was broadcast through his Oxford University speech of that year. Written for him by my late friend, the legal mind of the UN at the time, Professor Oscar Schachter.

On the other hand, your powers under Article 99 are discretionary. That article separates your capacity of executive from that of being empowered to raise issues of war and peace. Issues you can submit to either the Security Council or the General Assembly for their consideration.

Thus it is an illusive power on which decisions are not within your hands. Nonetheless it is a recognizable moral authority which may have consequences. In this regard, even symbolism can be a factor for good.

You also have on your side the Charter interpretation in ways never expected before. In the absence of revision, broad interpretation has accelerated decolonization. It also gave birth to imaginative ways to leapfrog over the veto power. An example on this is "the presidential statement" on behalf of the Security Council.

As an engineer and a mathematician, you, Secretary-General Guterres may, in spite of the assessment above, be able to navigate this unwieldy UN ship through these troubled waters towards harbors of safety. Your Portuguese ancestors, in the 17th & 18th Centuries, proved themselves as experienced mariners!!

In Trumpism I Can't See The Face of The United States

The more outrageous Trump becomes, the bigger and louder his rallies become. Like a train hurtling over a weak bridge toward a wreck, with the passengers elated by the inevitable catastrophe. These are largely white men, mostly with no more education than what they got in high school. Dismissive of the rules and values of a constitutional system of 240 years on which they have turned their backs as "politics as usual."

Donald has tapped into this lode of rage against globalization, immigration, foreign alliances, freedom of trade, foreign sovereign immunities, and international organizations. The internal governance system, he claims, is rigged. So are the media, the political parties, the judiciary, the Obama presidency. And even the microphones through which he extols the dark face of the United States. As for the military, Trump says that he, as president, shall select his own generals. The prospect of a private Trump militia.

A thug who proclaims the greatness of Putin as compared to "the worst President in the history of the U.S. - Barack Obama." A con who is suspected of having paid no taxes for nearly two decades (because "I am smart").

A war horse who threatens to wage war on Iran, usurp the right of the Arabs to their oil, spread nuclear weapons world-wide, bomb the families of suspected ISIS terrorists, and condone Russia's territorial grab in the Ukraine and its cyber intervention in the U.S. elections.

What he says today, he denies the following day. His anti-minorities and Islamophobic utterances are depicted by his surrogates (Governor Christie of New Jersey and former New York City Mayor, Rudy Giuliani) as "misunderstood." Why? "He is not a politician!!" So why is he in the game in national politics? "Because he is an agent of change who shall make America Great Again!!" How crazier could this get?

Here follows a horrific panorama of that dark side of America, as could be seen in Trumpism on and off the stage of presidential debates:

• Amid national uncertainty and fear arose Trump. So did Hitler in Germany of the early 1930s. You don't have to take my word for it. Read the book by the latest biographer of Hitler. The historian Volker Ulrich in his amazingly detailed book entitled "Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939." Ulrich focused on Hitler as a politician who rose to power through demagoguery, showmanship and nativist appeals to the masses. In all of this, Trump is a replica.
• Donald is all about Donald. Not about America. The earth spins on an axis called Trump. One can see that love of self in Trump's performance, a losing one, in his first debate with Hillary Clinton. To hell with politics and the issues, he had insinuated. Described by Frank Bruni of the New York Times of September 28, in these words: "He just pumped air into his hair and more air into his head and sauntered into action as if the sheer, inimitable wonder of his presense would be enough." Thus the Donald interrupted Hillary 51 times in the space of 90 minutes.
• A Republican woman of 51 confessed her dislike for Hillary. But she noted that Trump's answers during that first debate lacked details of substance. "I don't think he has the experience...His behavior is unpresidential, unkind, un-everything." 
• Others who remain sympathetic to Trump attacked his questioning whether Obama was born in America. "The Birther movement." A woman texted her husband that Trump had lost her when he dodged responsibility for stoking the birther movement.
• When it comes to being Commander in Chief, Trump, believing that he could outsmart the whole world, espouses the concept of "strategic ambiguity." Meaning that he never wants to show America's hand to its adversaries. But during his debate with Hillary, that tough looking guy appeared utterly confused. For when asked about "the first strike option," he deflected the moderator's question. "I think that once the nuclear alternative happens, it's over." Yet Trump is not reluctant to build nuclear weapons and have others acquire them.
• Trump keeps on repeating that he was against the war on Iraq. A blatant lie!! Trump is on record as supporting that losing war which has cost trillions of dollars and much blood-letting. Donald has supported that disastrous war in September 2002. That is when Congress was still debating whether to authorize military action. 
• And when Obama failed to get Iraqi approval to keep sizable American forces after 2011, Trump has continued to castigate the President and Hillary for that failure. From there, he stupidly jumps to insanely charging both of being founders of ISIS.
• His racism is like neon signs in Times Square. From the ban on Muslims from coming to the U.S., to his description of Mexicans as rapists and drug dealers, to his denigrating not only Afro-Americans, but also the historic symbol of Afro-American achievement, namely electing Obama not once but twice. 
• While the polls show that Trump is winning virtually no support from Afro-Americans, he full-throatedly propagandizes a proven lie. "You see what's happening with my poll numbers with Afro-Americans. They're going, like, high!!"
• More of the dark side of America is Trump's big lie about the economic and social status of the Afro-Americans who make up 15% of America's demographics. "Our African-American communities are absolutely in the worst shape that they've ever been in before -ever, ever, ever." 
• No quantifiable measurement supports that characterization of black America. But the record shows that Trump and his father had in the 1970's and the 1980's forbidden renting apartments to people of color in Trump buildings in New York City.
• In the State of Pennsylvania, a woman in West Chester voiced an opinion prevalent among women in America whose support for Trump is pivotal for winning the presidency. She said: "I truly want to like him. I keep looking for something in him. But I can't have my children grow up and look at him as someone to respect." She faulted him for refusing to release his taxes, for his shallowness, and his unwillingness to learn from experts. He claims that he knows it all.
• The Trump Foundation has been ordered by the New York State Attorney to "cease and desist" from raising money in the State; the Trump University has been found to be a big fraud; and the money claimed to have been raised by Trump for American veterans seems to have been a pie in the sky.
• Is it any wonder that the Wall Street Journal has recently reported that not one chief executive among the "Fortune 100" has donated money to Trump's campaign? Many companies won't do business with him either. This robs Donald of his claim that his alleged success in business, in spite of three bankruptcies, qualifies him to lead America into a new gilded age.
• Commented the New York Times of September 27 on Trump's performance in the first presidential debate watched by nearly 100 million Americans: "It's absurd that the fate of the race, and the future of the nation, might carom this way or that based on a 90-minute television ritual so dominated by fear and falsehood." 
• This evaluation came after that paper's editorial lamented: "There was a fundamental emptiness to the ritual (the debate), because of the awful truth that one participant (Trump) had nothing truthful to offer." 
• His anti-feminism has become the talk of America on the eve of the second Clinton vs. Trump debate. A tape has been discovered demonstrating his infidelity to Melania, his present wife (and third spouse). The tape heard over and over again on public media as of October 6 had Trump describe his sexual advances towards a married woman. Including "You can do anything to women when you are famous." Causing a Republican Senator to describe that presidential candidate "a malignant clown."

The tragedy of a possible Trump presidency lies in denying the healing power of compromise. In any system of governance, the settlement of disputes by mutual concession is a powerful elixir. It is the very opposite of the adversarial system of producing winners and losers. Half of the loaf is better than none. Trumpism is so polarizing that it looks as the very face of paralysis.

When you add the compromise deficiency element in Trumpism, to the damage already inflicted on the trust in the system of governance, you will find an America which is hardly recognizable as a robust democracy. For the U.S. Constitution itself has been the product of compromises. Thus enshrined as a resilient document of 240 years!!

In this age of rage, the most outrageous prospect is to imagine that megalomaniac, Donald J. Trump standing on January 20, 2017, taking the oath of the office as the 45th President of the U.S.

"I Donald J. Trump, do so solemnly swear... that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will do to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

May we never hear the air waves carry these words stipulated by the U.S. Constitution.

An oath is a formal calling upon God to witness to the truth of what one says or to witness that one sincerely intends to do what one says.

For how can Trump, if elected, take that oath? Throughout his entire life of 70 years, he has not kept any promise, or stayed the course of what he promised to do.

His own cult of personality makes him think that when he builds a tower, he is building a bridge. Reason why I can't see in Trumpism the face of the United States which proclaims "In God we Trust." Fortunately for America, and the world, Trump is not a God.

Where Has the Majesty of Law Gone? Contributing To the Pain of Nine-Eleven By Abra-Cadabra Legislation!!

This measure, JASTA, which caused Obama to veto, and caused Congress to over-ride it, is practically a legal hoax!! We are talking law, not politics. Defending the majesty of law. Not the criminality of 9/11 by 19 crazy jihadis of whom 15 claimed to hold Saudi passports. Led by an Egyptian who drank vodka before guiding his band of misfits into the killing of 3000 innocent civilians. Including 600 Muslims.

A hoax (from hocus) is to trick others into believing or accepting as genuine something false and preposterous. That act of Congress, now law, fits that criteria, but with dangerous global ramifications. This abra-cadabra measure demeans not only the term law, but also the U.S. Senate. Why? Totally unenforceable. Any suit based on it, if ever, shall automatically fall in the category of vexatious litigation.

As an international lawyer who has no business relationship with the Government of Saudi Arabia, I have never accepted to litigate a case in which I cannot find my way to a probative proof. The law of evidence, as well as criminal law, require a nexus, a causality, between the accused and the criminalized act. In this regard, how can that requisite be satisfied?

Where is the magic which can link between the Government of Saudi Arabia and a specific and proven instruction or direction to that band of crazies? Telling them "Go and attack America!!" Even if by some magic, a litigant, in this case a family member who lost his/her beloved on that horrible day could find a member of the Saudi governmental hierarchy who is implicated, the corporation or authority, namely the Government, cannot be proven liable.

And suppose an American litigant might claim someday that funding of terrorism have at times been traced to a charitable foundation in Saudi Arabia. You still, as an attorney for the American plaintiff, have to prove in an American court that that foundation is a government front.

And let us say that you are able to prove that with documentation whose veracity and authenticity can be established (the foundation is acting on behalf of the Government). How are you going to serve process on such a presumed defendant, and haul them from Saudi Arabia to an American court of law with appropriate jurisdiction. Kidnap them?

In addition, how can the rightful claims of the Saudi Government that its sovereign land has also been attacked by the same maniacal ideology, be handheld? Is the American plaintiff's attorney going to say: "We are only concerned about America's victims of terror?" The argument that terror is a global phenomenon, and that America and Saudi Arabia are partners in fighting it would be enough to debunk the plaintiff's argument establishing a credible cause of action.

This is a sad day for US Congress as it legislates, not only for a patently magical (thus losing) case. But also for its ultimate effect on the respect of the Rule of Law. As well as of the respect owed by Congress to the Executive in matters of foreign affairs.

This is politics at its worst, painting America, once again, into a corner. Especially when Guantanamo is still open with Muslim detainees who, since 2002, have been neither charged nor released. Except for Khalid Sheikh Mohamed. Only one!!

With terrorism becoming a global phenomenon, so is the growth of the concept of universal jurisdiction. A judge in Spain (Judge Jarson) was able to subpoena Pinochet, a former president of Chile, for human rights abuses affecting Spanish citizens. But Pinochet at the time of that action was no longer head of State. Was a mere senator, seeking medical attention in London.

The International Criminal Court (ICC), established on the basis of the Rome Charter of 1998, has become the image of ineffectiveness. That is although it acts on the same principle: universal jurisdiction. Its woes stem from its complicated procedures; the lack of an agreement between it and the U.N. Security Council; the inclination to focus more on African officials than on others.

To all of this mix, add the fact that the U.S. has not yet become a member of the ICC. Here again the law against Saudi official culpability in terrorism is weakened by the U.S. non-ICC status.

And since the U.S. is committed to the principle that no outside authority could legislate for the U.S., so is the position of all sovereign States around the world. State sovereignty remains supreme.

Along the same line of legal reasoning, the doctrine of foreign sovereign immunity shields sovereigns from the reach of foreign courts. You cannot impel a foreign sovereign to appear before a court unless that sovereign agrees to waive that immunity. Such a waiver happens once in a while in cases of diplomats committing an unlawful act while in foreign jurisdictions. Even in such cases, the capital of that erring diplomat could bring him home because the offended government would exercise the right to have him/her recalled.

No Saudi Government shall ever surrender that principle of international law, particularly when it is wrongly targeted for what is clearly an offense in which it has no role.

In fact the late King Fahd rebuffed the efforts of Osama Bin Laden in 1990 when that Saudi national offered to defend the Kingdom from the aggressive moves of Saddam against Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

It is ironic that it was Chief Justice John Marshall, of the US Supreme Court who, in 1812, was the first to authoritatively render the doctrine of foreign sovereign immunity. (The Case of The Schooner Exchange v. McFaddon).

Note that foreign sovereign immunity does not deny plaintiffs all relief. It only shuts them out of their own national courts. The families of the victims of 9/11 may legally avail themselves of the Saudi judicial or diplomatic channels. A decidedly non-promising prospect.

The American law now known as "The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA)" unhappily, shall not help the families of the 9/11 victims to find either solace or closure. Congressional machinations in this troublesome presidential election year could only advance the search by those legislators to keep their congressional seats.

Any attorney representing the Saudi Government could find plenty of ammunition in the report of the independent American commission which found no evidence of Saudi Government involvement of any kind or form. Obviously any Saudi holder of American assets or accounts shall have to consider the danger of an illegal seizure of such accounts.

With this law, the US global presences (military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, educational..etc) are now in danger of counter litigation all over the world. The European Union has warned that if JASTA is passed, other countries could adopt similar legislation defining their own exemptions to sovereign immunity.

As a starter, Riyadh has not only vehemently denied any involvement in 9/11. It has threatened to take counter-measures of various kinds.

The fabric of international law, especially in the area of sovereign immunity, the corner stone of the law of treaties, is now being subjected to wear and tear. Even US laws, such as the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) needs now to be revisited.

The cautionary approach taken by the co-sponsors of that impossible to enforce act, (Senator Schumer of New York and Senator Corker of Tennessee), shall effect no damage containment.

Said Corker: "I do want to say I don't think the Senate nor House has functioned in an appropriate manner as it relates to a very important piece of legislation... I have tremendous concerns about the sovereign immunity procedures that would be set in place by the countries as a result of this vote."

So, I ask Senator Corker in his capacity as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: "Sir!! Then why co-sponsor it and vote for it?" It was President Jackson who hailed from Tennessee who objected to a ruling by Chief Justice Marshall. Jackson uttered an objection which we, as students of American constitutional law, memorized. He in effect said: "John Marshall made his ruling. Let him enforce it." Senator Corker: What cannot be enforced, should not be legislated.

9/11, for Saudi Arabia and the whole world was no "Act of State." So "the effect principle" (the effect of a sovereign act on another sovereignty) has no place here. JASTA is nothing more than the politicization of law. This is why I can't find any majesty in that legal hoax.

Hitting Saudi Arabia, while seeking its cooperation in anti-jihadism, and at Obama, by rendering his veto ineffective, and at the entire fabric of the principle of friendly relations among nations, are nothing but legitimating the charge against America of becoming a super power with an ineffective rudder to its ship of State. JASTA is born with a boomerang destined to hurt these United States.

The Romans, through Latin, were way ahead of the U.S. Congress. They bequeathed to us, lawyers, an exit from bad laws. Phrased it in these words: "Modus et conventio vincunt legem." (Custom and agreement overrule the law.)

Sadly, the exit here is to ignore that silly JASTA. A law which tantalizes but shall not deliver. Which prompted the Saudi Crown Prince to declare in Ankara, Turkey, on September 29: "Our Lands are being targeted. Up with our defenses."