‘The challenge to the empire’, an interview with Tariq Ali and Anthony Arnove for Socialist Worker, October 20, 2006
After Hugo Chávez’s United Nations (UN) speech in September, the U.S. media either denounced him or treated him with derision. Does Chávez deserve to be dismissed as a madman?
Tariq Ali: In a world deep in neoliberal sleep, any person who tries to disturb this sleep and to wake people up is denounced and traduced. Hugo Chávez, who I have met and talked with on several occasions, is an extremely intelligent and enlightened political leader. In the public arena, he uses a language that is no longer considered acceptable by the proponents of the Washington consensus. The U.S. media has, in the main, been so slavish toward the Bush regime that Chávez appears extreme.
What he says, in fact, is the …
‘Bhutto’s Bloody Return’ by Tariq Ali for Counterpunch, October 20, 2007
The massacre in Karachi had been widely predicted. Benazir Bhutto herself has stated that she was aware of the dangers. The government pleaded with her to delay her return. Jihadi leaders, angered by her slavish support of US foreign policy, had publicly threatened to kill her. She survived but a few hundred people have been killed without reason.Her husband, who decided not to accompany her, has accused Pakistani intelligence of complicity in the attacks. Benazir Bhutto herself has preferred to attack the followers of a dead military dictator.
Once it had become obvious that something was being planned, she would have been better advised to make a quiet return, but she insisted on a show of strength. The planning had been going on for over a month. …
Masters of Money, a new three-part documentary series on how the work of Keynes, Hayek and Marx shaped the 20th century. Tariq Ali will be contributing to the episode about Karl Marx.
The series begins on September 17th, 9pm on BBC2.
Corruptions of Cricket
‘Corruptions of Cricket’ by Tariq Ali for the Guardian, August 30, 2010
Whether in cricket or in politics, corrupt leaders—bar notable exceptions—are often all Pakistan has …
Poor Pakistan. Floods of biblical proportions; millions homeless; a president who pretends to be shocked by cricket’s latest betting scandal when his own persona is the embodiment of corruption. A prime minister shedding crocodile tears because of the cricketing “shame” rather than tending to allegations that flood-relief money has gone missing. And now a sleep-walking cricket captain attempting to deny the ugly truth, but without real conviction, hoping against hope that he will ride out the crisis like others before him and that his bosses in Pakistan’s cricket establishment will cast a veil over this one as well.
Even if guilty, Salman Butt and his vice-captain Kamran Akmal will try to give the appearance of having no idea of the seriousness of the allegations and will try to talk their way back, hoping, as in the past, that after a few gentle raps on the knuckles they can revert to business as usual. That would be a real tragedy, a green light to semi-legalise match fixing, and not just in Pakistan.
The Pakistan Cricket Board is a long-standing joke, its chairmen replaced with every change of government. The current boss, Ijaz Butt, is the brother-in-law of Pakistan’s defence minister, a crony of President Zardari. The International Cricket Council and the England and Wales Cricket Board—somewhat pathetic bodies dominated by political and financial interests respectively—should not fudge this one. Whether Pakistan batting collapses were psychological or based on material interests we still do not know. But the moral collapse of this team stares all cricket-lovers in the face. Any perpetrators should be on the next plane home and the ringleaders given life bans. If guilty, the teenage bowling sensation Mohammad Amir should be banned for some years. His idol, Wasim Akram, is not the best role model on this front.
Some of the media comments on this affair are interesting, but irrelevant. Yes, WG Grace was a cheat on and off the field. Yes, captains of other teams—India and South Africa—have engaged in similar practices. Yes, the betting syndicates are a major part of the problem. So what? Since when has one crime justified another? How many times have I heard apologists for corrupt Pakistani politicians justifying their pillage by arguing that Europe and America also have corrupt politicians. The problem is that in Pakistan that’s all we have, with few exceptions—one of whom is Imran Khan, who was also Pakistan’s finest and most incorruptible captain. read more