Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the most corrupt of them all? History is best placed to answer this question but the trouble with history is that it speaks in the past tense. It is therefore difficult to know what history thinks of the present circumstances. But do not despair dear reader because history has given us clues as to how it functions. In its own eyes nothing is more corrupt than the attempt to falsify it and if you try that, you will be regarded as the most corrupt of them all. Consequently, we look for clues in that vein searching for ways to answer the above question and what follows is where we begin.
It was bound to happen that someone would leak a document telling what the government of Canada thinks of America and Israel. These two are torture countries says the document which is something that the World had known for a long time anyway. And so the World has welcomed Canada into the club of the knowing but then Canada said: wait a minute; something is happening that may tell we do not officially know what in reality we do know.
What happened was that America and Israel reminded Canada she is with them in the club of mutual admiration. Being in this club she cannot be in the club of the knowing because mutual admiration is the club of ignorance which is the antithesis of knowing. Therefore Canada must adhere to the rule of the self proclaimed ignoramuses and be a good girl or she would get kicked out of the club and be branded a corrupt entity.
The old timers in the club of the knowing have known for a long time that this kind of monkey business was going on among members of the mutual admiration gang. In fact, they saw cases of humongous corruption explode in America once or twice every decade. They saw the President of Israel admit to being a serial rapist and saw all the Prime Ministers there charged with corruption at some point during their tenure. And this is not to forget that most of those characters were at one time or another street terrorists who now practice torture as well as state terrorism which they do as a matter of routine because they have it in their DNA.
Also, the old timers saw how the corrupt leaders of the Third World were talked about with admiration and described as honest people in the corridors of power while the honest leaders were demonized and branded as corrupt because they would not play the game of monkey business as formulated by the club of the mutually admired.
As for the Canadian situation, we are in this country like a quantum of light to the rest of the World. This is not light in the sense of truth or enlightenment; far from it. Rather we are like a ray of light as it is seen by scientists. That is, in the same way that light is both particle and wave; we Canadians are both reality and fantasy at the same time. We are comfortable living with the fact that we are liars, hypocrites, lawbreakers, insensitive and arrogant, and we readily mix this reality with the fantasy that we are truthful, intellectually honest, law abiding, sensitive and humble. Examples follow that show how these two situations blend together.
On the international stage, let there be a real or perceived corruption in the way that the Olympic athletes are evaluated but as long as the corruption works for us, we accept it as being part of the game and as something that is normal in this vast and complex world. However, let the fortunes reverse and we lose, and you see Canada raise the flag of moral indignation to shout from the rooftops that the Olympics have gone to the dogs. Reform, reform we scream at the International Olympic Committee and we ask for a review of the scores.
Yet on the local stage, nothing surprises us when someone is caught committing the most outrageous act of corruption. The only time we express surprise is when someone says he or she is surprised that we are corrupt. In fact, we pride ourselves for the fact that we cannot be unsettled by what we do to each other however extreme that may be but are surprised by what others might do to us, we good natured Canadians.
When you say fantasy, you mean your preoccupation with the image that the World has of you. In the countries where the leaders have the moral fiber of steel, they lay down the law as clearly as they can, set the penalties for those who break it and enforce the law regardless of what the rest of the World thinks of them. An act of corruption there stands out like a drop of ink on a white page and there are plenty of such drops to see and to criticize but no one tries to conceal the facts.
By contrast, in those countries where the leaders have the moral fiber of jelly but fantasize they are giants of steel, they lay down the loopholes then work out some kind of a rule around them. The result is that nobody in such a society spends time reflecting on how to abide by the law but everyone runs around looking for ways to beat the rules. An act of corruption here looks like just another grain of sand lying on a vast beach where it is difficult to distinguish one grain from another.
To take an example, no one who is not an accountant knows what the tax code says in any given year but most people know what the loopholes are and what they, as taxpayers need to do to take advantage of them. Thus, people structure the year's work and their investment decisions in such a way as to wrap their arms around the loopholes and thus beat the rules. And when a scandal such as Enron explodes in these places, the lawyers, the accountants and the judges spend years sorting out what was legal from what was border line behavior from what was outright illegality; and never reach a consensus.
The same sort of useless and wasteful activities are triggered by most legislations in the places where they live the fantasy of adhering to a democratic system of governance yet slavishly follow the dictates of the lobbyists who have a way of conducting business which makes the autocrats of the bona fide dictatorships look like purring pussycats. If you want to see a master slave relationship don't go to Pakistan looking for the judges who would stand up to power and be dragged to jail; go to Washington and look at the congressional characters being dragged at the end of a leash into a cheap restaurant by their lobbyist trainers.
And so, under pressure from America and Israel, Canada has agreed to review the document which brands them as torture countries. It is expected that Canada will amend the said document to recant what she has said and thus falsify history to remain on good terms with her club mates. But whatever happens in this regard, one thing cannot be changed anymore than toothpaste can be pushed back into the tube, Canada's original testimony shall live forever.
In any case, history will not have been written or unwritten by this one revelation alone because torture in America and Israel were old news by the time that Canada had come around to speaking her mind. But what will go down in history as a result of this episode is the fact that the two countries pressured Canada to recant what she had witnessed.
The truly new element in all of this is that history now has a clear case of an attempt to falsify it. Not only did America and Israel try to fool their contemporaries, they tried to fool history as well and this is something that future historians will never forgive. Historians will regard the attempt as being the highest form of corruption one can commit, this being in line with the historical view that to bear false witness is the most cowardly crime one can ever commit.
Therefore, be advised mirror on the wall that the most corrupt of them all are the members of the club of mutual admiration; those self proclaimed ignoramuses who want to transform the World into their own image. Let them take a good look at themselves as you reflect their image back to them till they get sick of staring at it. Maybe then will they search for a prettier thing to look at and discover that it is the multitude of faces they have been trying to disfigure for such a long time.