I would like to explore today the nature of civil strife, both violent and nonviolent, and how it comes about, I will also try to relate this is particular to the 'War on Terror' and the rapid shift in values. The premise is that people during times of extreme crisis exchange the valuation of words. This means that during civil strife words retain their agreed-upon meaning but the value assigned to them, that is, how their meanings were enacted in society, changes. During civil conflict, society's values have been transformed: the value of "courage true to the party" for example has changed from a constructive to a destructive one, illustrating how the relationship between words and reality, which rests on convention, is undermined.

Strife is also characterized by people's actions: political allegiance to faction outweighs loyalty to family, personal advancement (under the veil of collective interest or 'the national good') trumps all other considerations, intelligence is used to outwit an opponent by violating his trust, moderates are eliminated, oaths are meaningless, violence reigns supreme, the ability to destroy is taken as good in itself. In this case it is demonstrated that nations are organisms as much afflicted by strife as individuals.

In America for example, certain groups, namely 'Conservatives' or 'Liberals', seek to redefine the community of 'America' in their favor, I argue that these political groups (the left and right) "invent new conceptual boundaries" by redefining oppositions and affinities. Both sides see America as distinctive, yet for different reasons. Conservatives redefine the America in such a way as to exclude the Liberals by equating them with 'unpatriotic' and 'foreigners'. Liberals also do this in favor of an America based on their values of 'equality' and 'fairness'. This, of course, is rhetoric -- a way of defining the world -- and it is worth noting that many political analysts of America these days question the idea of such inherent differences in society.

I think in America this is a "failure of communication" between the two groups, through astounding misperception these two groups have completely distorted the reality of American politics. But also, due to "a fundamental disharmony and collapse of shared values and world views," they have lost the ability to communicate with other other at all. What is left is a combative and bitter situation in American politics in which all politics is in 'stasis' and nothing will move forward.

Just in all civic life, the exploitation and abuse of religion form a central part of the narrative of the collapse of common values and shared institutions in America. The attempt to use absolutist condemnation of political enemies is also very destructive, instead of a harmonious civil political discourse, what supplants this a stalemate and polarization of politics and thus society generally. For what America was founded on, the model of civic virtue, contains just those qualities which in the stasis model are replaced by distorted, harmful forms or disappear: moderation, civic devotion, political talent and 'intelligence' are displaced by extremism, greedy attention to one's private interests and a kind of obtuseness which cannot see beyond the immediate moment.

The solution I think is surprisingly simple, America must return the moderate center of politics lest nothing will get done for the common people. What we need to realize is that civic America is not Conservative or Liberal.

I agree!
Although I could never vote for a character like Obama, I do like some of the things he is saying. America is not extreme liberal or extreme conservative. Those are just the only two choices we have been given in recent years.

In this election we have McCain who is the only fairly centrist candidate, and that position in ideology may be the very thing that wins him the election!

Actually my central argument is that membership in a political faction in America has been changed from a constructive role to a destructive role. Before politics was about civil harmony and collaboration to get things done, but now the absolute polarization of the two camps has made it impossible to get any policies achieved except through having one dominant one and the other suppressed.

From my analysis of American politics I think the 'division' is also not as evident in the actual people as in the political 'class', most common people maybe Democrat or Republican but they are capable of cooperating with each other etc.

Andaras, you raise a very interesting question. Linguistically, during war, you will find that language often loses its true meaning and what is said from the position of power is in truth the opposite of the meaning of what is being conveyed. So for example, the war on terror that catch-all Bu(*)(*)(*)(*)e euphemism, has effectively become appropriated by its chief exponent for his own political purposes. From the perspective of power then under no circumstances can war ever be deemed to become the terror. Conversely, the terror can never be deemed to be the war. In other words, wars are always deemed to be necessarily conducted by the rich and powerful as a response to the terror undertaken by the weak and dispossessed.

The proclamation of an act of war (even if the prefix 'pre-emptive is added) presumes a retaliative response to an act or acts of terror by somebody else. That 'somebody else' is almost always weaker both militarily and economically. But irrespective of this fact, the mainstream corporate media will invariably imply that it is a war between two equally balanced powers. Of course, we all know that when America is involved in any conflict, the notion of an equally weighted economic and military balance of power is simply absurd as those on the receiving end of them will undoubtably testify. No, the truth is that war implies evenness between one side and another, which is an illusion. The truth is that such scenarios usually amount to wars of aggression conducted upon particular nations by more powerful nations.

So not only are wars falsely assumed to be even conflicts between nations when the great powers are involved, but those who the powerful define as terrorists, are deemed to be the catalysts of acts of Western aggression (war) against them. Wars undertaken by "us" - the virtuous enlightened and benign - upon "them" - the medieval savages - are invariably justified by the time-honoured recourse to humanitarianism and democracy. Whilst those who defend against the wars being conducted upon them, are considered to be the terrorists. By any measurement, this represents a truelly Orwellian twist on the language. John Pilger spoke the truth when he said, "In reality, the war itself IS THE TERROR - the war ON TERROR ought to be called the WAR OF TERROR". In truth you see, war and terrorism are interchangeable notions as I hope I have illustrated.

Peter Ustinov famously put it like this when he said: "War is the terrorism of the rich and powerful, and terrorism is the war of the poor and powerless." Not so long ago we used to have a government department here in London called 'The War Cabinet,' which has now been re-named 'The Ministry of Defence'. Language is a powerful weapon in the propaganda offensive. Orwell was a visionary, albeit a flawed one.