Quirk

Drinking and Fighting: A Collection of Essays on The Geopolitics of Viticulture and

Terrorism
Molly Quirk

Senior Seminar
Dr. Derek Stanovsky
Interdisciplinary Studies Program
Appalachian State University
December 2010
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“A Little Less Conversation”

My ideas are indeed the bastards of curiosity and ignorance. At the point where

my curiosity with terrorism and viticulture gained authority I approached a single

question, "What have you learned as an undergraduate?" The right by which ignorance

named the dance was the very same right that asked me to take another step.

While the origins of interests are never so clearly marked as a fire hydrant, I can

faithfully say that a spark turned blue with heat in a white, 15-seater van en route to a

Purdue Chicken Processing Plant during one of many Georgia summers. Buckled inside

were 10 young Iraqi men—all fresh with leather shoes, starched collars, and manicured

hair—1 older man from Sudan, 2 teenage Nepalese siblings, my superior—a beautiful

Kenyan refugee—and myself. The mission was resettlement and self-sufficiency by way

of employment. We were in the car no more than 2 hours, a time lost between Rockabilly

and Arab pop music, and the day was ours for spending. Once within a 5-mile radius of

the chicken compound we no longer had the lung-capacity for music. The smell was foul

(literally), lingering in the city’s summer haze, and it wrapped around everything—your

grocery store and friendly, neighborhood ‘Mick-a-dee’s’ included. I then became

conscious of how strange it was to engage those Iraqi men in particular as refugees in a

resettlement plan of The United States—the invading and occupying republic of their

homeland. The sentiment, “I’m sorry about the war, but we’re glad you’re here” was

washed over with contempt. Watching the confident, sharp-looking Iraqi men walk into

the processing plant for casual job interviews while the last shift filtered into the parking

lot adorned in plastic smocks and fitted knee-high galoshes was awkward to say the least.

While my interest in international relations extends in many other directions, an

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occurrence of this sort was most poignantly felt and raw.

The vineyard on the other hand is the aesthetic outlaw of my academic career.

After spending nine months upon the French terroir, four of which spent under the

instruction of my university in Paris and Bordeaux, I preserved interest in one insight:

Wine is alive, and believed to be only little other than the sustenance of its soil. Never in

my adolescence had I considered wine to be of any great consequence—spare, of course,

for bad breath and the occasional headache. But never mind that—wine is geopolitics

incarnate! The distinction between a Cabernet produced in the same country on different

terrain in different soil amidst different vegetation and animals stimulated a very cordial

setting of relationships. In a way very much like, “Oh, so this is how it works,” I set off

to envelope the ambiance of this setting in that of my topic to follow. The Expansion of

Battleground Into The Environment

My beginning will originate at the seams; at the very basic stitch that maintains a

quilt. If ever my beginning should conceal the patterns of its creation then that beginning

and that creation do not coincide. In the event that a kinship should escape the pact of

beginning and creation like light eludes the sun, then the relationship may persist with

parts only common to the history of the organism of study; not, rather, as a point of origin

commensurable to the organism itself. For instance, one could not excavate the Iraq War

by brushing the rubble of the World Trade Center. The motivations for declaring

“Conflict!” precede the rubble and its heyday. Beginning in this way will allow a familiar

introduction like producing a birth certificate before the Department of Motor Vehicles.

The primer of my print registers under the number and year 1914.

Peter Sloterdijk makes an obvious correlation between industrialized farming and

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the use of chemical gas as weapons during WWI (1914-18), noting how the production of

chemical gases such as Zyklon B continued under the justification of parasite

extermination.

During WWII, The German army experienced typhus en epidemique that resulted

with a 10% mortality among the infected. Condemning cloth lice as the carrier of this

disease, parasite extermination was still clearly sited as a cause for concern. Insomuch as

they were common to the Germany army, parasites were also a consistent fixture on the

farm.

“The principle base idea, after peace has been restored, is to make, in addition to the

hydrocyanic acid, other combat substance that the war produced useful for the

advancement of farming through the struggle against parasites.” Fritz Haber (Sloterdijk

50)

More, the term ‘parasite’ spread to embody the stronghold that the Jew, the gypsy, the

homosexual etc. had on German society. The enemy of the farm and that of the human

race were one and the same in all matters—extermination included.

Its principle lies in surrounding the enemy long enough—which in practice meant

at least some minutes—with a cloud of polluting materials, with a sufficient ‘tactical

concentration’, until he would fall victim to his own need to breathe.

The Creationism of WWI

The origins of two “green” revolutions anchor on the historical harbors of the

early 1900s: Biodynamics and Wahhabism. The former is a response to the use of those

chemicals that were advanced as weaponry during WW1 and sustained on the farm

thereafter. Rudolf Steiner developed the practice and theory of Biodynamics in Germany
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during the early 1920s. Today, there are over 500 followers of Biodynamic viticulture.

The latter, that of Wahhabism, speaks to the taint that resides in interpreting the Koran

and applying that personal interpretation. Observance of this radical form of Sunni Islam

is most recently cited in the motives behind the September 11th attacks with Osama bin

Laden as its spokesperson. Saudi Arabia is the stomping grounds for the architect of

Wahhabism, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab. Together in history, Biodynamics and

Wahhabism penetrate our present in a very real way: Together, they show our role in the

environment; separately, biodynamics is a reproach to using chemicals as "an expansion

of the battleground in the environment," and Wahhabism was most recently used to show

the demise of democracy by the hands of democrats. Industrialized farming and radical

Islam dictate the value of and play a role in the assisted suicide of its members and

audience.

Viticulture and Osama bin Laden are cast as major characters in these revolutions,

at large and my endeavor, at small. They are the "Life Forces" of my research.

Biodynamic Viticulture: Return earth to the Earth

While viticulture describes the cultivation of grapevines, biodynamic viticulture

narrows in on cultivating grapevines for the production of wine under the authority of the

cosmos, to the life giving forces of the universe. It barters with the land to yield a high

quality wine, revealing not only the character of the soil in which it grew, but also a total

embodiment of the energies that filtered through from roots to must. Those energies are

archetypes for “anything under the sun”. Forces of gravity, of magnets, of light, and of

heat; follies of weather–droughts, humidity, floods; and faculty of objects or ideas of

higher sophistication such as the use of the cow horn as a catalyst for growing bacteria–
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the quintessential elementals that influence and motivate every living organism.

Biodynamic viticulture does not like weak or passive adherence, and those certified by

the Demeter Association rarely cite market incentives as reasons for adherence. Rather,

the strict practice and belief of Biodynamics files under one general motive: Return earth

to the Earth.

By its own right, Biodynamics claims that certain forces of the universe have been

numbed so that the demands for food in a growing population could be supplied quickly.

The detriment so described continues in the following passage from a Biodynamic

winegrower in the Loire Valley of France.

But when agriculture has killed the majority of living agents such as a soil’s

micro-organisms, or has modified the growth of a plant through artificial interventions

such as chemical fertilizers or dangerous systemic herbicides etc., the plant becomes less

receptive, or not receptive at all, to these celestial influences. It is like someone falling ill

and losing some of his capacity for communication. In consequence the plant becomes

somewhat deaf to these invisible, qualitative planes of life, and this is why the resonance

qualities of so much of our food are so poor for human nutrition… (Joly 131)

In addition, Biodynamics would potentially reconcile the pain of hunger and war

that would ravage such a future as desperate people struggle to maintain such a violent

relationship with the earth that sustains them. While wine could not sustain a hungry

civilization, it heeds to the same soil as wheat or corn and shares a common language

with the science of the intangible elements of the human experience. Aromas, tastes, and

harmonies are among several nouns—be they reminiscent of places or things—cited in a

glass of wine. Laws of light, gravity, and time lollygag in the relatively basic theories and
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conversations that people have with the universe. Chew on the concluding remarks of the

biodynamic winegrower, Nicholas Joly in his book, “Biodynamic Wine Demystified.”

When you drink a real wine, when you are transported by particular tastes

or aromas, it is really a far-off, ethereal world that you are admiring, one

distant from earthly laws. Each biodynamic agricultural act respects and

sustains this other reality, transforming it into a physical quality which

thereby becomes perceptible to our senses. By extending our knowledge,

by giving back to the earth all its faculties through a respectful and artistic

agriculture, the human being can come to play his full role. (Joly 145)

True, the fact that we can bottle wine to a certain level of stability and

preservation as well as maintain light by a bulb and switch indicates a fairly clear

example of an understanding worldly and intentional in temperament. To say a bottle of

wine is your finished product however, is as silly as saying that the infant is the finished

product of a man and woman: Both wine and an infant are living organisms, interacting

and engaging with their self and the environment, forever developing until death do them

part. Wine indeed sours into vinegar and children wrinkle into raisins. While the

processes between wine and vinegar and child and elder are no enigma, the capacities

that give rise to life at all are rather mystical.

Assisted Suicide

In 1998, Osama bin Laden issued a fatwa against the United States and her allies

for her "declaration of war on God, his messenger, and Muslims", he issued the attacks of

September 11th, 2001, and he predicted that the U.S. could only avenge the attack by

dissolving her system of government. Essentially, in regard to the latter, the values and
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backbone of democracy would fracture and spoil on the fulcrum of the War on Terror. In

the name of National Security the retaliation required of the U.S. would expose the depth

of its evil. The wealth of democracy would in other words, remain unseen in the face of

death and destruction. The military might of which a superpower would use to restore

justice would render the power and reputation of its authority and democratic beliefs

impotent in the end. Strategically futile and inept, the potential of the U.S. to lose face is

not only among Muslims, but among her European allies as well. "Amid the rift that

opened over the Iraq War, Europeans began to question whether they could still look to

the United States to provide responsible international leadership." (Kupchan 4)

The United States did not invade Iraq with the blessings of the United Nations.

Further, the ways in which she handled her suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay

Detention Camp became the object of international disgust. The endgame of her conflicts

in the Middle East and Asia seems to alternate between the lesser of evils. The United

States had international support after the atrocities that befell the country. The ways in

which she responded however made that support run scarce and they played into the ideal

endgame of the very villain she sought.

When the air is poisoned with horror, fear, pain, suffering, and grief, only one

deep breath of it would be enough to kill. Osama bin Laden used 9/11 to expedite the

suicidal path of democracy. When bin Laden sold the noose on 9/11, the U.S. just had to

put her head in. And by his regard, America did not disappoint. This is what I mean by

the expansion of the battleground into the environment. My generation is witnessing a

case study of our country indulging in assisted suicide.

Syrian Olives: The Inoculation to Assisted Suicide

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In 2009, 2 days prior to Labor Day, I shared a day with my mentor family as

arranged by the International Rescue Committee over the summer. Although my

experience with this family extended through my employment at the IRC, the event I

wish to illustrate took place between 10AM and 3PM Saturday, September 5th in a room

outfitted within the metro Atlanta suburb.

The family includes the mother, Rajaa, the father, Abdel, a little girl, Marianne,

and two young boys, Yousef and Ameen. While the family sought refuge from the

quarrels of Iraq, the children were born in Jordan and most recently, in Syria.

Our morning progressed through puzzles, pretzels, and tea. The mother, Rajaa,

has a limited understanding of English, and invited a Sudanese woman living in the same

complex to come over. Our guest worked in several embassies as a translator for Arab-

English conversations after attending college some years ago. Her disposition was kind

and very intentional, and her presence was of great help for our conversations.

As the children plowed through the puzzle I brought in tow, Rajaa, her friend

(whose name I cannot recall), and I "met as women". The Sudanese woman shared with

me that it is commonplace for the women to talk over tea, and that our visit was to carry

on in no exception. Mostly, we talked about our families. While I thought my family of

six to be of impressive size, Rajaa's family took trump. To paint a picture, Rajaa is a very

strong Arab woman and she currently stands to match her husband barrel belly for barrel

belly--she's pregnant! The urgency of a woman to have children comes from Iraq she told

me. Rajaa's mother, the household matriarch, stands with 85 grandchildren to her name.

85! I thought such number to be serious misunderstanding—a number mixed in

translation, but our teatime translator confirmed the remark.

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Well, morning turned to noon and Abdel returned to a house laced with the smells

of slow-roasting lamb, fried rice and potatoes—lunch! By this time our morning's guest

had returned home to prepare lunch for her husband, the children had showered and

dressed for lunch, and Rajaa had bowed in prayer. Since I was well aware of the income

of an unemployed refugee I intended to leave before lunch. Also, I was a vegetarian and

quite unsure about how to explain such reality without being disrespectful and within the

margins of her limited vocabulary. Although I thought my pre-lunch departure was an act

of kindness and respect, Rajaa felt just the opposite and insisted that I stay for a meal.

She adorned the table with plates, platters, onions, and olives ("Veryyy old, from

Syria," she explained) while Ameen, age 3, serenaded us with a song and dance routine.

He was quite the charmer and ever so entertaining! When his song ended, we sat down

for lunch with Rajaa and I seated at the table's ends. Even though the smell of meat still

filled the air, Rajaa aborted the dish—much to Abdel's dismay.

As we finished our plates the children ran upstairs for an afternoon nap, and Rajaa

begin to clean the table. Abdel waved me into the living room and Rajaa later joined us

equipped with three cups of orange soda. We talked about Iraq, about starting a new

home in the United States, and about the soon-to-be new addition to the family. After

some time, Abdel rose in excitement and retrieved a film depicting the crucifixion of

Christ. He placed it in the old VHS player at the end of the room and pressed play. The

video was confusing for several reasons:

1.) I am not Christian, and neither are Abdel and Rajaa

2.) The language was Farsi--one in which was foreign to all 3 of us

3.) Why now?

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At the close of the film, I had the impression that I was imposing upon Abdel's

naptime. I packed away the puzzles, books, and colored pencils, and Rajaa and Abdel

saw me to the door. Sharing smiles of pearly whites, we said our goodbyes and good

evenings.

The global scope hones in on and concludes with one thought. In the few visits I

have shared with this family I have come to articulate a question: How do I act among a

family displaced in a country that invaded, now occupies, and promises reconstruction for

their own country of origin? While I never felt like the question was at the forefront of

our relationship, it was indeed the parameters for our introduction. Thus far, I have not an

answer.

Terror in Terms of Terroir

“Whoever wants to understand the originality of this age will have to take into account:

the praxis of terrorism, the conception of product design, and concepts of the

environment.” Peter Sloterdijk

Where is the terrorist's vineyard? By now, the reign of terror extends through

various networks across national borders and international waters. Because the fruit of a

terrorist's labor is as simple as seeds (propaganda), meat (warriors), and skin (idea) it is

vulnerable by and large to the elements it encounters. From the frosts of winter to the

droughts of summer “braving the elements” refers to preparations very specific in sort. In

the New Order of day (post 9/11), such encounter answers to the name

"Counterterrorism". In the days of our elders, the ways and names by which the terms

"Counterintelligence" or "Counterstrategy" reeled through public policy were a display of

an entirely different season. Indeed, the ways in which we define our enemy change, and
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the ways in which we fight our enemy refashion to better fit the sharpness of that new

enemy.

Working within the progression of climate--be it political, economical or societal

—a terrorist must understand the preparations demanded by the sow of his labor and

essential to the structure and resonance of his or her final product. What fruit is good to

preserve the terrorist should next consider which bottle best carries out the job. More,

what does that bottle look like? Reflect on, for example, the tactical use of a maroon-

colored iodine bottle to preserve the contents within. Considering the tangible “realness”

of simple materials mingling and tingling, leavening from such basic constituents as the

heat of light and willingness, composed to vacate the bottle at the first sign of exposure.

The mild experiments that take place throughout the season just after curing the juice of

the fruits of terror reveal to those who planted the seeds and tended the fruit a kind of

satisfaction as well as engage with those who unknowingly import the fruits of terror into

their harbors and ports. As the cured fruit of terror ages it is also likely to establish itself

as a vintage or as a reserve blend. In regard to the former, that of terror as vintage, the

events of 9/11 made an example of terror locked in time. In regard to the latter, that of

terror as a reserve, it is not unlike the actions made by the United States or the Soviet

Union during the cold war to create stockpile after stockpile of nuclear weapons. While

such an action plays on the palate like a simple table wine, it does not pertain to an

immediate engagement, but rather to a foreseeable threat. While the effects of cured fruit

are no different in a vintage blend than a reserve blend, the effects are lucid, palpable and

do not leave the body quickly.

To even stand a chance of absorbing the fruit of terror, the body requires an
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enzyme. In the event that a terrorist pours you a glass of his or her finest yield, he or she

demonstrates the first submission of control over the fruit: the ways in which terror is

circulated, internalized, and digested within another human body now propagates and

regulates the future of terror. Without the enzyme necessary for proper digestion of

terror, the side effects appear in the face as the consumer becomes flush with

embarrassment and anger. (The enzyme required to properly break down the alcohol in

wine is called aldehyde dehydrogenase 2 and indeed any indulgent consumer who has a

deficiency of this enzyme will appear flush in the face.) Not only is the future determined

by those who directly consume cured fruit, the community also wields a controlling hand,

with those whose children attend school with children from the vineyard, with those who

shop with or cut the hair of the wily and willing producers of terror. A similar sentiment

resonates from a passage in the book Endgame: "...Ultimately, it is up the world's

Muslims to make a commitment to peace, freedom, and tolerance; to determine how they

will reconcile their religion with modernity..."

Sure terrorism is a trade as characteristically Old World as wine, and it is easy to

see A in terms of B. It is also easy to understand the urgency that extrapolates the need to

develop a defense against terrorist attacks; to counter terrorist attacks. While my position

in Boone as a student allows me enough distance so as not to feel that urgency to counter

terrorism or nourish the world, allowing me, on the other hand, room to play, it also

excludes me from resources and networks. For example, I have not been able to converse

with anyone who grows and makes a biodynamic wine, nor do I know anyone to talk

with about terrorism at the scale of 9/11, which apparently threw the United States into a

watershed.
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Bugaboo

With bugs seemingly as minute as those listening to your bed time stories, and

equally as devastating, the grape vines of Southeast France hosted an aphid known as

Phylloxera. The pandemic took root in the 1860’s and depicts a relationship between

American vines and French vines that unraveled similar to the relationship shared

between Small Pox and Native Americans. A peculiar hodgepodge of diagnoses and

treatments resulted and circled the drain of past experience looking for a cure. The vine

growers knew soil erosion, they knew winter frosts, they knew wet springs, and they

knew any which one of them was a passing drudge that could be bargained with via cover

crops or diluted sulfur treatments. However, when the vines did not respond in favor of

such treatments and the similar symptoms surfaced even so far as Australia, a witch-

hunt/Sherlock Holmes investigation evolved. Men were out at all hours of the day (and

night) with magnifying glasses and notebooks—out to restore peace to the people! To

some, it was seen as an act of God—a punishment, a lesson to be learned. The aphid was

personified as a “dévatrice” or as “good bourgeois”. And yet, the vine grower seemingly

tried everything to remedy his livelihood. From chain mail glove scrapings to the young

men of Beaujolais urinating on the vines between classes!

There was an exhausted list of failed remedies—all “solutions” no more helpful

than a placebo is to a diabetic. As time and devastation progressed on the vineyard, so did

incentives for a cure. Well into the late 1880’s, the potential idea of vine grafting passes

into a kinetic plan of action. It was an idea reached upon the collective knowledge of

numerous scientists (both French and American). It was an idea that suggested corruption

among the winemaking tradition in France. However, the observations of the pandemic
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seemed to dictate two options: find a new trade and allow French wine to die out, or

adopt the ugly “step-vine” into the family and learn to love it. In the end, after much

exasperation the latter presided.

Indulgent of the tangled vines of history I wonder about international relations,

and to what extent international hands reach into history. Grafting New World vines onto

the Old World created a whirlwind effect in the national and international realms of both

worlds. To what extent are the conflicts, which thus define my generation, a furthered

debate on whether or not to graft the tolerance of one specimen to the exposed root of

another? To be clear, I am talking about globalization. International influence is an

interesting point to take up with bin Laden who dressed in a turban, Timex, Russian

fatigues, decorating himself further with the Russian AK-47. Using mass media to

convey his distaste for the hegemonic powers of the world and globalization was also a

very interesting way to convey his message. Are the strife, strain, and struggles of the

world as easily traced back to one source? If bin Laden awards the hegemonic powers of

the United States and her allies credit for the problems plaguing the Middle East, to what

extent is this New World available to solve the problems to which it has seemingly since

grown immune? For instance, to the extent that an Arab woman is corrupt from exposure

to Western culture, Western culture may also have the antidote. I wonder about the use of

homeopathy in such a hypothetical context (and I cannot help but smile for the weight of

homeopathy in Biodynamics).

There might be another dimension of religion in the tension between Christian-

identified West and Islamic-identified Middle East: both Christian and Islamic calendars

have notations of time before and after the life of “the creator”. Since Jesus preceded
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Muhammad the Christian calendar is set nearly 500 years in the future by comparison. So

as the cultures clash so too does our engagement in time. The interaction between Christ

and people is over 500 years more ripe than that felt between Muhammad and his people.

Without suggesting that the West is wiser and better versed with “God” than Muslims, I

mean only to say that the retraction to fundamental ideas has us all in higher thought.

How far back in history does one seek answers, and in which soil does one seek

immunity? Be it from a domestic conflict or an international presence, there is a great

tension between national, international, and supranational relations. For Biodynamic

viticulture that tension sits somewhere between a practice that promises the full

expression of the soil, landscape, and climate and the country of origin glued to the bottle

of wine. For terrorism, in the season of today, that tension may reside in the

reconciliation of religion with modernity.

Concluding Collisions

The pendulum of my research swung by the weight of those authors willing to

engage sympathy for their subjects and those willing to detail an intolerance for the acts

of terrorism. The overall sentiment resulted in two vehicles of thought. One regaled a title

of “Justice Earned,” another of “Justice Deserved”. In attempt to reconcile my frustration

with the body of work available and the jumps and curves I yearned for on the straight,

dusty road of research, I stopped reading and considered the information I knew thus far.

Initially, I forgot that embedded within the morsel of my education lay also the source of

my itchy frustration for counterterrorism. After a while however, the pieces I engaged on

wine and terrorism began a coexistence not unlike dueling banjos–a duel that heeds

caution in the High Country, albeit one that can also entertain long measures and knee-
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slapping foot taps.

Most admirably, the strings I held above the puppets of my project seemed to

connect in one very unexpected, although illuminating way. Throughout my research I

stumbled upon some interesting vocabulary, none of which was so interesting as the

consistent reference to the psychology, receptivity, perceptions, tendencies, etc. of my

subjects. Whenever a report flooded in from the stormy situations in Iraq or Afghanistan

its dictation was usually already watered down and weak. For instance, consider the

following statement from a report assembled by the RAND corporation under the name,

“The Iraq Effect: The Middle East After The Iraq War”.

The ousting of the Iraqi leader created the perception of increased

vulnerability on the Arab side, resulting in a tendency to exaggerate the

specter of Iran and its associated nonstate allies. (xii)

While I can appreciate the general good that comes from writing down the observations

of one’s work, the expense of energy, resources, lives, and trust has more than calculated

a greater need for intentional language by now.

While vital information remained in the stronghold of passive conclusions on the

perceptions and recognitions of the terrorism of today, Biodynamic viticulture elaborated

on how the process of winemaking can demonstrate and make obvious to the winemaker

just how receptive our plants are to their surroundings. There is a clear movement in the

latter to better cultivate an understanding of receptivity, perceptivity, etc. Whereas one

hid behind the mysterious nature of the words, the other was a clear act to indulge that

mysterious nature. The power of cosmic forces was called down on the sides of both my

subjects—a matter I intentionally did not indulge mainly out of respect. Admittedly, in no
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other project has a more lucid attempt to observe the gestation and fermentation of

immortality been thus apparent than in my conversation with viticulture and terrorism. As

of yet, I do not claim to have scheduled my wine tasting to the phase of the moon nor

have I read the Koran. I do not know the effects of either, and because of that I do not

know how either single out the cosmic forces for their benefit.

Indeed, the followers of Biodynamic viticulture and Osama bin Laden are radical.

More, they are an extreme extension of the circumstances of his or her environment.

Essentially revolutionary and fundamentally looped in a circuit, Biodynamic viticulture

and Osama bin Laden are the connections from these modern movements to the cardinal

beliefs and theories from an earlier time. In essence, revolutionaries rid the system they

inhabit of all its symbols either intentionally or indirectly, and reorganize current affairs

by dismantling the figures and structures that represent and employ the system. Friedrich

Engels points out, however, that these figures gain head, light the fuse by their feet, and

stands witness to the uncontainable explosion of his packed canon and, consequently, to

his immediate secession of control. He will assume responsibility for his actions or flee

"to think about what he's done" allowing his anonymous following to absorb the

electricity that circulates overhead. In the case of the latter, he is a coward and a tyrant to

the youth that fill his boots. Regarding the former, he will hardly engage a new

arrangement of symbols by which to live before donning the red light of a disgruntled

scope above his nose. It takes a tyrant to eradicate a tyrant as it takes only a revolutionary

to deny his future the revolution of his father. This is illustrative of my frustration with an

eye for an eye, with tyrants requiring tyrants to rid a society of tyranny, of a revolution to

undermine the revolution, of, most vibrantly, a counter-terrorist for a terrorist. With little
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repose from the cause of the revolution, the very nature of such geopolitics supersedes

any claim I could pose about the politics involved with labeling a bottle of wine. There is

a political power inherent to the root system of a grape vine for example, in its ventures

to travel several miles underground in search of the nutrients and water proper to its vital

interests. A vineyard’s finished product is the elected official of the landscape of its

upbringing. More, as bin Laden raises a voice from his minute location he speaks to the

Western presence in the world. Where Biodynamic viticulture was equipped to measure

those loosely defined draws of nature—those perceptions and tendencies—that acted

upon the specific nature of the situation on the ground, so too I received mild relieve for

the frustrated follies of political jargon.

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