May the source be with you, but remember the KISS principle ;-) Skepticism and critical thinking is not panacea, but can help to understand the world better
Neoconservatism
Neocons are attack dogs of neoliberalism and lobbyists for MIC: "national security parasites"
"There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare." ~Sun Tzu
Years ago, whilst this reactionary putsch was still in it's infancy,
my mom would
listen to the "news" on the local CBS affiliate,
and many times I heard her gasp and say,
referring to the "reporters"
jabbering, "My God, they're a bunch of dopes!"
The dopes areascendant; stupid, scared, violent-minded, and very well-paid.
Neoconservatives, which like Bolsheviks in the past are mostly Jewish intellectuals, are frequently described as ideologues with
pro-Israel and anti-Russian bent, but the truth is that they are far more interested in gaining access to money and power. Most of them
are useless smacks with degree in journalism or history and they would starve if not fed by military industrial complex. Being a lobbyist
of military industrial complex is the only job they can get. Add to that that most of them are personal cowards and chicken hawks and
you get the picture: they are just bottom-feeders. "National security parasites" is a very apt definition for this category of people.
The ideology of Neoconservatism was explicitly formulated in Wolfowitz Doctrine
which contains the key postulates of Neoconservatism in foreign policy. They can be summarized as "America has, and intends to keep,
military strengths beyond challenge". That partially explains unprecedented level of military expenses of the USA since 1991 (after
the dissolution of the USSR) when, effectively, the USA has not external enemies and those money can be used to improve well being
of common people in the USA. But neoliberal elite engage in building global neoliberal empire rules from Washington and that empire
needed the dominant military force to protect and expand it . From other point of view that was an attempt of the
US MIC to preserve its position acquired during the Cold War, if necessary by inventing or creating a new threats. Neocons
just happen perfectly suit the role of lobbyists of MIC interest in Washington and thus were financially and politically
supported by MIC.
Large part of neocons consist of so-called "elite-wannabes," often well-educated and highly capable, who has been denied access
to elite positions and who decided to use warmongering backdoor to get there.
Proselytizing their own brand of global regime change is just a mean to sustain the access to funds and political power. They
know perfectly well which side of the bread is buttered and by whom. We can suspect that for many of them (Max Boot is a
good example here) access to money from MIC and Israel lobby is the primary driving force. Often they are viewed as Likud lobby in the
USA: "The definition of a neocon is somebody who has great difficulty distinguishing between the strategic interests of Israel,
on the one hand, and the strategic interests of the United States on the other. Israel wants bedlam in Syria, and they’ve got it." (Israel lobby in the United States - Wikipedia
):
The formal component of the Israel lobby consists of organized lobby
groups, political action committees (PACs),
think tanks and
media watchdog groups. The
Center for Responsive Politics, which
tracks all lobbies and PACs, describes the ‘background’ of those ‘Pro-Israel’ as, “A nationwide network of local political action
committees, generally named after the region their donors come from, supplies much of the pro-Israel money in
US politics. Additional funds also come from individuals
who bundle contributions to candidates favored by the PACs.
The donors' unified goal is to build stronger US-Israel
relations and to support Israel in its negotiations and armed conflicts with its
Arab neighbors.”[24]
According to Mitchell Bard, there are, three key formal lobbying groups:
A summary of pro-Israel campaign donations for the period of 1990–2008 collected by
Center for Responsive Politics indicates
current totals and a general increase in proportional donations to the
US Republican party since 1996.[46]
The Center for Responsive Politics' 1990–2006 data shows that "pro-Israel interests have contributed $56.8 million in individual,
group and soft money donations to federal candidates and party committees since 1990."[47]
In contrast, Arab-Americans and
Muslim PACs contributed slightly less than $800,000 during the
same (1990–2006) period.[48]
In 2006, 60% of the Democratic Party’s
fundraising and 25% of that for the Republican Party's fundraising came from Jewish-funded PACs. According to a Washington Post estimate,
Democratic presidential candidates depend on Jewish sources for as much as 60% of money raised from private sources.[49]
... ... ...
AIPAC does not give donations directly to candidates, but those who donate to AIPAC are often important political contributors
in their own right. In addition, AIPAC helps connect donors with candidates, especially to the network of pro-Israel political action
committees. AIPAC president Howard Friedman says “AIPAC meets with every candidate running for Congress. These candidates receive
in-depth briefings to help them completely understand the complexities of Israel’s predicament and that of the Middle East as a whole.
We even ask each candidate to author a ‘position paper’ on their views of the US-Israel relationship – so it’s clear where they stand
on the subject.”[43]
.... ... ...
Mearsheimer and Walt state that “pro-Israel figures have established a commanding presence at the American Enterprise Institute,
the Center for Security Policy, the Foreign Policy Research Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute, the Institute
for Foreign Policy Analysis, and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA). These think tanks are all decidedly
pro-Israel and include few, if any, critics of US support for the Jewish state.”[50]
When strategic interests of Israeli (for example remaking of the Middle East so that Israel can exercise dominant power in this region;
which includes fragmentation of several existing states) deviate from the strategic interests of the USA (which mostly are interested
in uninterruptable supply of cheap oil) neocons do betray the USA national interests with ease. The US-Israel relationship significantly
damages the relationship between the United States and the Arab world. They also were serving as propagandists and influencers for all
recent Middle East military adventures and regime change efforts. Recently that was the case in Syria: in no way Assad government
represented a threat to the USA interests. Still the pressure of "likudniks" was such that the USA engaged in the "regime change" efforts.
But in reality they should be viewed more like lobbing group of MIC then lobbing group of Israel. As well as transnational corporations
interested in opening new markets. But recently facts that Israel spend large sums on money on trying to influence the USA politicians
came to light and to this extent one gets impression that the tail is wagging the dog.
They should probably be viewed as the lobbying and propaganda arm of military industrial complex. Is both Republican and
Democratic Party position themselves as a "War Party" they represent an important political force on the USA political landscape.
The fact that some of staunch neocons such as Max Boot recently defected to Democratic Party just confirm the fact that
in forign policy there is only one party in the usa -- the neocon party.
And there is not much conservative in neocon ideology -- it is basically a revamped Trotskyism, if not neo-fascism. Just look at
Nuland's fraternization with Ukrainian far right nationalists despite
her Jewish roots (and despite the fact that this movement was hell-bent on killing Jewish people during WWII and served as capos in
concentration camps). This was not accidental; this was a conscious political choice -- they are birds of the feather.
Ideologically they are a more militant flavor of neoliberals ("neoliberals with the gun", so to speak). They also are
more openly statist, then a typical neoliberal. But their neo-Trotskyites
roots are mostly demonstrated in foreign policy (they do not have a coherent domestic policy; but generally their views in this area are more aligned
with the Democratic Party than Republican Party views).
All-in-all, we will essentially view them as lobbyists of MIC, "neoliberals with a gun".
U.S. Navy photo by
Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class John Philip Wagner, Jr./Released◄►◄►▲▼ Remove from
Library B Show Comment Next
New Comment Next New Reply Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This
Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
AgreeDisagreeLOLTroll
These buttons register your public
Agreement, Disagreement, Troll, or LOL with the selected comment. They are ONLY available to
recent, frequent commenters who have saved their Name+Email using the 'Remember My Information'
checkbox, and may also ONLY be used once per hour. Email Comment Ignore Commenter Follow
Commenter Add to Library
Bookmark Toggle All ToC ▲▼ Search
Text Case Sensitive
Exact Words
Include Comments
Search Clear Cancel
Sooner or later the US "maximum pressure" on Iran would inevitably be met by "maximum
counter-pressure". Sparks are ominously bound to fly.
For the past few days, intelligence circles across Eurasia had been prodding Tehran to
consider a quite straightforward scenario. There would be no need to shut down the Strait of
Hormuz if Quds Force commander, General Qasem Soleimani, the ultimate Pentagon bête
noire, explained in detail, on global media, that Washington simply does not have the military
capacity to keep the Strait open.
would destroy the American economy by detonating the $1.2 quadrillion derivatives market;
and that would collapse the world banking system, crushing the world's $80 trillion GDP and
causing an unprecedented depression.
Soleimani should also state bluntly that Iran may in fact shut down the Strait of Hormuz if
the nation is prevented from exporting essential two million barrels of oil a day, mostly to
Asia. Exports, which before illegal US sanctions and de facto blockade would normally reach 2.5
million barrels a day, now may be down to only 400,000.
Soleimani's intervention would align with consistent signs already coming from the IRGC. The
Persian Gulf is being described as an imminent "shooting gallery." Brigadier General Hossein
Salami stressed that Iran's
ballistic missiles are capable of hitting "carriers in the sea" with pinpoint precision.
The whole northern border of the Persian Gulf, on Iranian territory, is lined up with anti-ship
missiles – as I confirmed
with IRGC-related sources.
We'll let you know when it's closed
Then, it happened.
Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, Major General Mohammad Baqeri,
went straight
to the point ; "If the Islamic Republic of Iran were determined to prevent export of oil
from the Persian Gulf, that determination would be realized in full and announced in public, in
view of the power of the country and its Armed Forces."
The facts are stark. Tehran simply won't accept all-out economic war lying down –
prevented to export the oil that protects its economic survival. The Strait of Hormuz question
has been officially addressed. Now it's time for the derivatives.
Presenting detailed derivatives analysis plus military analysis to global media would force
the media pack, mostly Western, to go to Warren Buffett to see if it is true. And it is true.
Soleimani, according to this scenario, should say as much and recommend that the media go talk
to Warren Buffett.
The extent of a possible derivatives crisis is an uber-taboo theme for the Washington
consensus institutions. According to one of my American banking sources, the most accurate
figure – $1.2 quadrillion – comes from a Swiss banker, off the record. He should
know; the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) – the central bank of central banks
– is in Basle.
The key point is it doesn't matter how the Strait of Hormuz is blocked.
It could be a false flag. Or it could be because the Iranian government feels it's going to
be attacked and then sinks a cargo ship or two. What matters is the final result; any blocking
of the energy flow will lead the price of oil to reach $200 a barrel, $500 or even, according
to some Goldman Sachs projections, $1,000.
Another US banking source explains; "The key in the analysis is what is called notional.
They are so far out of the money that they are said to mean nothing. But in a crisis the
notional can become real. For example, if I buy a call for a million barrels of oil at $300 a
barrel, my cost will not be very great as it is thought to be inconceivable that the price will
go that high. That is notional. But if the Strait is closed, that can become a stupendous
figure."
BIS will only commit, officially, to indicate the total notional amount outstanding for
contracts in derivatives markers is an estimated $542.4 trillion. But this is just an
estimate.
The banking source adds, "Even here it is the notional that has meaning. Huge amounts are
interest rate derivatives. Most are notional but if oil goes to a thousand dollars a barrel,
then this will affect interest rates if 45% of the world's GDP is oil. This is what is called
in business a contingent liability."
Goldman Sachs has projected a feasible, possible $1,000 a barrel a few weeks after the
Strait of Hormuz being shut down. This figure, times 100 million barrels of oil produced per
day, leads us to 45% of the $80 trillion global GDP. It's self-evident the world economy would
collapse based on just that alone.
War dogs barking mad
As much as 30% of the world's oil supply transits the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.
Wily Persian Gulf traders – who know better – are virtually unanimous; if Tehran
was really responsible for the Gulf of Oman tanker incident, oil prices would be going through
the roof by now. They aren't.
Iran's territorial waters in the Strait of Hormuz amount to 12 nautical miles (22 km). Since
1959, Iran recognizes only non-military naval transit.
Since 1972, Oman's territorial waters in the Strait of Hormuz also amount to 12 nautical
miles. At its narrowest, the width of the Strait is 21 nautical miles (39 km). That means,
crucially, that half of the Strait of Hormuz is in Iranian territorial waters, and the other
half in Oman's. There are no "international waters".
And that adds to Tehran now openly saying that Iran may decide to close the Strait of Hormuz
publicly – and not by stealth.
Iran's indirect, asymmetric warfare response to any US adventure will be very painful. Prof.
Mohammad Marandi of the University of Tehran once again reconfirmed, "even a limited strike
will be met by a major and disproportionate response." And that means gloves off, big time;
anything from really blowing up tankers to, in Marandi's words, "Saudi and UAE oil facilities
in flames".
Hezbollah will launch tens of thousands of missiles against Israel. As
Hezbollah's secretary-general Hasan Nasrallah has been stressing in his speeches, "war on
Iran will not remain within that country's borders, rather it will mean that the entire [Middle
East] region will be set ablaze. All of the American forces and interests in the region will be
wiped out, and with them the conspirators, first among them Israel and the Saudi ruling
family."
It's quite enlightening to pay close attention to what this Israel intel op is saying .
The dogs of war though are barking mad .
Earlier this week, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo jetted to CENTCOM in Tampa to discuss
"regional security concerns and ongoing operations" with – skeptical – generals, a
euphemism for "maxim pressure" eventually leading to war on Iran.
Iranian diplomacy, discreetly, has already informed the EU – and the Swiss –
about their ability to crash the entire world economy. But still that was not enough to remove
US sanctions.
War zone in effect
As it stands in Trumpland, former CIA Mike "We lied, We cheated, We stole" Pompeo
– America's "top diplomat" – is virtually running the Pentagon. "Acting" secretary
Shanahan performed self-immolation. Pompeo continues to actively sell the notion the
"intelligence community is convinced" Iran is responsible for the Gulf of Oman tanker incident.
Washington is ablaze with rumors of an ominous double bill in the near future; Pompeo as head
of the Pentagon and Psycho John Bolton as Secretary of State. That would spell out War.
Yet even before sparks start to fly, Iran could declare that the Persian Gulf is in a state
of war; declare that the Strait of Hormuz is a war zone; and then ban all "hostile" military
and civilian traffic in its half of the Strait. Without firing a single shot, no shipping
company on the planet would have oil tankers transiting the Persian Gulf.
American government arrogance under the control of sickos has not shied away from the belief
that destroying countries that do not cave in to Washington's demand of "surrender or perish"
-- an ultimatum made in Israel. Indeed it regards that despicable policy as an entitlement
– to protect the "international community". Iran may well be the nation that will do
away with the nations of turbaned lapdogs and absolute monarchs who have been kept in power
by the dozens of US military bases in the area. Maybe a serious jolt of the global economy is
long overdue, to bring the Washington dogs of perpetual war to come to their senses.
Was Iran succumbing to the JCPOA provisions and abiding by them not sufficient
capitulation for the insane leaders in Washington?
I hope we don't go into another stupid war. Bring all our troops home from all around
the world. Just protect this Republic. We're not the policemen of the world.
@joeshittheragman
It astonishes me that people are still using the phrase "policemen of the world" to define US
behavior.
The last time I recall The US even remotely acting as the "worlds's policeman" was in
1991, when we pushed Saddam out of Kuwait.
The Iraq 2003 "debacle", the Libya"shit show" and the Syria" fiasco" have all proven, over
time, to be acts of wanton carnage and illegal aggression, . not "police work".
The United States, under Neocon tutelage , is no "policeman" .not by any stretch
It is more like a humongous version of "Bernie Madoff meets Son of Sam."
We have become a grotesque, misshapen empire .of lies fraud .,illegal war, .mass murder
..and heinous f#cking debt.
You have to hand it to the Iranians for basically announcing their intentions to destroy the
US economy via the derivatives market that the US financial industry largely produced. Kill
them with their own weapon.
A show down between the US and some entity is inevitable. Be it Iran, China or Russia, the
US will be over extended and their very expensive weaponry will, I believe, come up wanting
on all counts. The MIC has been scamming the country for decades. The military brass is just
bluster. When it comes down to an actual confrontation, the US military will come up short as
BS won't cut it.
Yes, they will destroy lots of stuff and kill lots of people but then their toys will run
out and then what? Missiles will take out the aircraft carriers and the world will see that
the emperor is naked.
In June of 2014, as the forces of the Islamic State swept toward Baghdad, President
Barack Obama began to recommit American military forces to Iraq. He also observed that
"Iran can play a constructive role, if it sends the same message to the Iraqi government
that we're sending, which is that Iraq only holds together if it is inclusive." In an
instantly famous article by Atlantic magazine correspondent and White House amanuensis
Jeffrey Goldberg, Obama indicated that Saudi Arabia and other Arab states had to learn to
"share" the Middle East with Iran.
In imagining a kind of strategic partnership with Tehran, Obama is recycling a deeply
held belief of late-Cold War "realists" like former National Security Adviser Brent
Scowcroft. "For U.S. strategy, Iran should be viewed as a potential natural partner in
the region, as it was until 1979," when Shah Reza Pahlavi was toppled in the Khomeini
revolution." "Envisioning 2030: U.S. Strategy for a Post-Western World," foresaw that "a
post-Mullah dominated government shedding Shia political ideology could easily return to
being a net contributor to stability by 2030
https://en.mehrnews.com/news/143606/Mearsheimer-S-Arabia-a-threat-not-Iran
"The truth is that it is the United States that is a direct threat to Iran, not the other
way around. The Trump administration, with much prompting from Israel and Saudi Arabia, has
its gunsights on Iran. The aim is regime change.
America does not seem to think the Iranian regieme can do anything except bluster as they
are slowly smothered.
Famous last words -- review what Bernanke said just before subprime exploded: 2007 --
Bernanke: Subprime Mortgage Woes
Won't Seriously Hurt Economy -- that said, I have no idea what will happen if Iran
decides to interfere with shipping in the straits -- or how likely that is.
The biggest long-term threat to the US is the end of the petrodollar scheme -- due to its
unmatched worldwide political and military hegemony, and 'safe haven' status, the dollar has
largely been insulated from the consequences of what are in reality staggering, almost
structural (at this point) US deficits -- but that can't and won't go on forever.
In reality, the US is today far less dependent on imported oil than most people probably
imagine, and therefore far less vulnerable to any import supply issue.
Israel and the zio/US has interfered in Iran since the 1953 CIA/Mossad coup and at intervals
ever since then and have brought this problem on by the zio/US and Israeli meddling in the
affairs of Iran and an all out war via illegal sanctions which in fact are a form of war.
Iran has not started a war in over 300 years and is not the problem , the problem is the
warmongers in the zio/US and Israel and will not end as long as the warmongers remain in
power.
A good start to ending these problems would be to abolish the CIA!
@MLK
Yes, the sanctions on Iran are having an effect, and the recent Iranian actions acknowledge
this; but that does not mean Iran is weak. Iran is telling the U.S. that it is NOT Venezuela
or North Korea. Kim is all bark, but no bite; Trump was quite right to call him "little
rocket man." Even he, with his singular lack of style and grace, is not doing this to the
Iranian leadership.
The economic sanctions against Iran already constitute acts of war. The Iranians have just
demonstrated that they can disrupt oil flow from the Middle East in retaliation, and not just
in the Street of Hormuz. In addition, they have now shown that they can take down American
aircraft, stealth or not, with precision. This means Iran is able and willing to strike back
and escalate as it sees fit, both economically and militarily. If the U.S. don't relent, Iran
WILL send the oil prices through the roof, and it will humiliate the U.S. on the world stage
if they are stupid enough to go to war over it.
The Iranian messages are simple, clear, and consistent. Compare this to the confused
cacophony that emerges from the clown troupe in Washington, and you can easily tell which
side has been caught unawares by recent events.
This is a watershed moment for Trump – he will either assert himself, return to
reason, and keep the peace; or he will stay aboard the sinking ship. No good options for him
personally, of course; his choices are impeachment, assassination, or staying in office while
presiding over the final act of the U.S. empire.
The US is committed to conflict not only most obviously against Iran, but also with
Russia.
US, or rather a bunch of lunatics infesting Trump's Admin, might be committed, but it
absolutely doesn't mean that the US has resources for that. In fact, US doesn't have
resources to fight Iran, let alone Russia. By now most of it is nothing more than
chest-thumping and posturing. Today Bolton's statement is a further proof of that.
Instead, Bush saw that situation, within the unique moment of US no longer constrained
by a rival superpower, as an opportunity to exert US global dominance.
The much derided Chomsky
There were once two gangsters in town, the USA and USSR, there's relative peace cuz each
was constrained by the rival's threat.
NOW that the USSR is gone, the remaining gangster
is running amok with total impunity.
Now I dunno if the USSR was a 'gangster' ,
as for uncle scam, .. needs no introduction I presume ?
"Iran's ability to target and destroy the high-altitude American drone, which was
developed to evade the very surface-to-air missiles used to bring it down, surprised some
Defense Department officials, who interpreted it as a show of how difficult Tehran can make
things for the United States as it deploys more troops and steps up surveillance in the
region.– "
@Wally
It's all cashflow and OPM, on the hope of hitting the big-time when prices spike. A giant
house of cards waiting to implode, and that is before one takes into account all the hugely
negative externalities associated with fracking that give it any hope of profitability, which
would vapourise if the costs of the externalities were charged to the operators.
According to preliminary data for 2018, oil demand surpassed 20 mmb/d for the first time
since 2007 and will be just shy of the 2005 peak (20,524 mb/d versus 20,802 mb/d in
2005).
It's really tragic to see two brotherly ideologies Capitalism and Islam (both want to rule
the world) go at each other throats in this manner. After all, they have fought shoulder to
shoulder a holly jihad against socialism in such far flung places as Afghanistan, Iraq and
now Syria.
I think that based on this latest conflict, people can see what a principled country US
is. People used to think that US hates only socialist revolutions. Until Iran's Islamic
revolution came along – and US was against it too. So, it's safe to say that US are
against ANY revolutions – be they Socialist or Islamic. I guess we can call them
contra-revolutionaries.
At least 95% of the American people do not want war with Iran. For that matter the same
percentage did not want war with Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam or Korea. But the powers that be
do not ask the American people if they want to go to war, they just do it based on the
authority they assume is theirs. Meanwhile, our elected representatives who do have the
authority to start or prevent wars turn a deaf ear to their constituents because the voices
they hear in protest are weak or muted. Let's face it, the wars since WWII have affected only
a relatively minor segment of our population. A hell of a lot more people die in traffic
accidents than on the battlefield so what's to get excited about. Keeping a large standing
army, navy and air force is good for the economy, the troops have to be provided the latest
best of everything and as for the troops themselves for many it's not a bad way to make a
living with a retirement and health care system better than many jobs in the civilian sector.
So my message to the American people is if you really do not want war with Iran you had
better speak up louder than you are now.
CAN IRAN ENTER ITO NEGOTIATION WITH IRAN? IT CANT. BECAUSE ISRAEL WITH NO FOOT IN THE DOOR OF
THE HELL IS WAGING THE WAR AND GETTING US PUNISHED .
UC Berkeley journalism professor Sandy Tolan, Los Angeles Times, December 1, 2002–
[Richard] Perle, in the same 1998 article, told Forward that a coalition of pro-Israeli
groups was 'at the forefront with the legislation with regard to Iran. One can only speculate
what it might accomplish if it decided to focus its attention on Saddam Hussein.' Now,
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has joined the call against Tehran, arguing in a November
interview with the Times of London that the U.S. should shift its focus to Iran 'the day
after' the Iraq war ends
[Hide MORE]
-- -- -
They want to foment revolution in Iran and use that to isolate and possibly attack Syria in
[Lebanon's] Bekaa Valley, and force Syria out," says former Assistant Secretary of State for
Near East Affairs Edward S. Walker, now president of the Middle East Institute. http://prospect.org/article/just-beginning
03/14/03
--
in 2003 Morris Amitay and fellow neocon Michael Ledeen founded the Coalition for Democracy
in Iran, an advocacy group pushing for regime change in Iran . According to the website, it
will be un-American,immoral and unproductive to engage with any segment of the regime .
During a may 2003 conference at the AEI on the future of Iran,Amitay sharply criticized the
U.S State Department's efforts to engage the Islamic Republic ,claimed the criticism of Newt
Gingrich did not go far enough . Amiaty was introduced by M Ledeen as the "Godfather" of
AIPAC Amitay admitted that direct action against Iran would be difficult before 2004
election.
Nostalgia for the last shah's son, Reza Pahlavi ? has again risen," says Reuel Marc
Gerecht, a former CIA officer who, like Ledeen and Perle, is ensconced at the AEI. "We must
be prepared, however, to take the battle more directly to the mullahs," says Gerecht, adding
that the United States must consider strikes at both Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and
allies in Lebanon. "In fact, we have only two meaningful options: Confront clerical Iran and
its proxies militarily or ring it with an oil embargo." http://prospect.org/article/just-beginning
March 14,2003
"Neoconservatives in the Bush Administration have long targeted Iran. Richard Perle,
former Defense Policy Board member, and David Frum, of the neo-com Weekly Standard,
co-authored "An End to Evil," which calls for the overthrow of the "terrorist mullahs of
Iran." Michael Ladeen of the influential American Enterprise Institute argues that "Tehran is
a city just waiting for us." http://www.counterpunch.org/2004/05/26/the-oil-connection/
According to the 2016 documentary Zero Days by director Alex Gibney, Israel's incessant
public threats to attack Iran coupled with intense secret demands for cyber warfare targeting
Iran were the catalyst for massive new US black budget spending
NSA Director (1999-2005) and CIA Director (2006-2009) Michael Hayden claimed in Zero Days
that the goal of any Israeli air attack against Iran's nuclear facilities would be to drag
the United States into war.
"Our belief was that if they [Israel] went on their own, knowing the limitations No, they're
a very good air force, alright? But it's small and the distances are great, and the targets
dispersed and hardened, alright? If they would have attempted a raid on a military plane, we
would have been assuming that they were assuming we would finish that which they started. In
other words, there would be many of us in government thinking that the purpose of the raid
wasn't to destroy the Iranian nuclear system, but the purpose of the raid was to put us [the
United States] at war with Iran."
https://original.antiwar.com/smith-grant/2018/11/06/israel-and-the-trillion-dollar-2005-2018-us-intelligence-budget
Emergence of ISIS is linked to US efforts to weaken Iran
-In "The Redirection", written in 2008(!) – years before the 2011 uprising, Seymour
Hersh wrote of plans to use extremists in Syria.
Excerpts:
To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in
effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has
coöperated with Saudi Arabia's government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations
that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The
U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A
by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse
a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.
Nasr compared the current situation to the period in which Al Qaeda first emerged. In the
nineteen-eighties and the early nineties, the Saudi government offered to subsidize the
covert American C.I.A. proxy war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Hundreds of young
Saudis were sent into the border areas of Pakistan, where they set up religious schools,
training bases, and recruiting facilities. Then, as now, many of the operatives who were paid
with Saudi money were Salafis. Among them, of course, were Osama bin Laden and his
associates, who founded Al Qaeda, in 1988.
This time, "
@Simply
Simon In the old days, the orders for the US government were coming down from the
Tri-Lateral Commission and the 6-7 major companies. Rockefeller took the TLC underground
ground with himself. The oil companies continue asking the US government for protecting the
ME/NA resources. Then Neocons replaced the TLC which their focus was twofold.
1. Destabilize the regions for protecting Israel
2. Control the resources militarily
3. Keep the Chinese out and cut their access to the resources
Guess what, Chinese have penetrated the regions constructively and quietly. America with its
unjustified fucking wars is being hated even more than 1953.
@KA
Very true! Unfortunately the presidents were misinformed or uninformed about the proxies
created by the CIA. The first created to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan manned and financed
by the Saudis, recruited by Mossad and intelligence was provided by the CIA. Sound really
really good to the Americans since it was free of charge with no loss of life! Then during
the Iraq war its neighbor Syria was getting destabilized so the CIA replicated Al-Qaeda and
formed a new gang which called themselves ISIS. The function of ISIS was to overthrow
Al-Bashar of Syria. The secondary mission for both groups was to bug Iran from its western
and eastern front.
Manning both of these groups with Sunnis was the biggest mistake that KSA, Mossad and the CIA
made. See the Sunnis are not fighters without sophisticated weapons from the West. On the
other Shiites can fight with a sword and empty handed if they have to. They remind me of VC's
in Vietnam. The Shiites decimated the ISIS and most of AlQaeda now the US is trying to get
credit for that but they know better now. So my recommendation to the US is please don't
aggravate the Shiites otherwise they will embarrass us just the VC's
@Monty
Ahwazi{ All insurance companies will drop their coverage of the oil tankers
immediately.}
During the Iran-Iraq war, US re-flagged Kuwaiti tankers and ran them under US flag and
protection through the straight.
Same thing can be done again.
And if insurance companies drop coverage, US Treasury will provide the coverage: some US
insurance company will be "convinced" by US Gov to provide the coverage and US Treasury will
guarantee _any_ losses incurred by the insurance company or companies.
US can always add to the national debt ( .i.e. print more dollars).
So, no: declaration won't do.
Only destroying stuff works.
{You guys sitting here and making up these nonsensical policies}
Nobody is making policy here: we are not a government.
We are exchanging opinions.
btw: where are you sitting?
Are your personal opinions considered 'policy', because you are ..what?
@anon
That was buried deep in the article. (Thanks for posting link.) Next lines, the NYT is
skeptical of US claims. Too bad this isn't first pararaphs!)
Lt. Gen. Joseph Guastella, the Air Force commander for the Central Command region in the
Middle East, said the attack could have endangered "innocent civilians," even though
officials at Central Command continued to assert that the drone was over international
waters. He said that the closest that the drone got to the Iranian coast was 21 miles.
Late Thursday, the Defense Department released additional imagery in an email to support
its case that the drone never entered Iranian airspace. But the department incorrectly
called the flight path of the drone the location of the shooting down and offered little
context for an image that appeared to be the drone exploding in midair.
It was the latest attempt by the Pentagon to try to prove that Iran has been the
aggressor in a series of international incidents.
@Zumbuddi
Thank you. If the US were a real [HONEST] policeman, they would have stopped Kuwait from
stealing Iraqi oil. But no, Bush was a dirty cop, on the take.
@dearieme
Read "JFK and the Unspeakable" by James W. Douglass. JFK was getting us out of Vietnam. In
his time, there was not massive amounts of US troops in Vietnam, only advisors. JFK planned
to get all the troops out after he was re-elected.
It was during Johnson's presidency that the Vietnam war became a huge war for the US.
Johnson set up the Gulf of Tonkin false flag on August 2 1964. This started the huge draft of
young men for Vietnam war that dragged on till the early 1970s.
Johnson also allowed Israel to do a false flag on the US on June 8 1967. Israel attacked
the USS Liberty. 34 servicemen killed and 174 injured. Israel wanted to kill them all and
blame it on Egypt, so US would nuke Egypt. Lovely nation is little Israel. The song " Love is
all you need" by the Beatles was released on June 7 1967. Summer of Love, Hippies in San
Francisco, all planned to get Americans into drugs and forget about what Israel is doing in
the Middle East. It worked, nobody noticed what Israel did since we have a "free" 500 Zion BC
press in the US in 1967 and we still do these days.
Iran is pretty self sufficient with minimal foreign debt. Their Central Bank is under their
control and works for the people. They should just hunker down and hope Trumps crew is out of
a job after the elections next year
If the US strikes they can block the straits. However, the US would probably knock out the
refineries so that will hurt
They shot down the drone because it was collecting intelligence on targets the US plans to
strike. Thats defensive not provocative
If the US wants to go at Iran they will manufacture something. People are so dumbed down
they can made to believe anything, as events 18 years ago and since have proven
Hopefully this is just distraction to cover up some nefarious plan to loot the working
class some more. Or maybe getting the straits closed is part of the plan. Who knows?
THE TICK TOCKS WHY TRUMP DIDN'T BOMB IRAN NYT'S PETER BAKER, MAGGIE HABERMAN and THOMAS
GIBBONS-NEFF:
"Urged to Launch an Attack, Trump Listened to the Skeptics Who Said It Would Be a Costly
Mistake": "He heard from his generals and his diplomats. Lawmakers weighed in and so did his
advisers. But among the voices that rang powerfully for President Trump was that of one of
his favorite Fox News hosts: Tucker Carlson.
"While national security advisers were urging a military strike against Iran, Mr. Carlson
in recent days had told Mr. Trump that responding to Tehran's provocations with force was
crazy. The hawks did not have the president's best interests at heart, he said. And if Mr.
Trump got into a war with Iran, he could kiss his chances of re-election goodbye.
"The 150-dead casualty estimate came not from a general but from a lawyer, according to the
official. The estimate was developed by Pentagon lawyers drafting worst-case scenarios that,
the official said, did not account for whether the strike was carried out during daytime,
when more people might be present at the targets, or in the dark hours before sunrise, as the
military planned.
"That estimate was passed to the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, without being cleared
with [Patrick] Shanahan or General [Joseph] Dunford. It was then conveyed to the president by
the White House lawyers, at which point Mr. Trump changed his mind and called off the
strike." NYT NYT A1
"That estimate was passed to the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, without being cleared
with [Patrick] Shanahan or General [Joseph] Dunford. It was then conveyed to the president by
the White House lawyers, at which point Mr. Trump changed his mind and called off the
strike." NYT NYT A1
Saddam was given plenty of time, and plenty of resolutions to pack up his troops and go
home
.
Saddam was given the assurance by US ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie, that the USA
supported his retaliatory action against Kuwait. Same usual trap and deliberate provocation;
all the rest is obfuscation.
@AnonFromTN
The loss of two American aircraft carriers appears to be the assumption you are making to
guarantee an Iranian victory.
Such a loss is by no means assured.
The idea that American willpower will collapse in the event of the loss of two capital
ships is your second assumption, and it's both a fanciful and dangerous assumption.
I'm not myself terribly impressed by American military power, but comparing naval combat
to counterinsurgency operations is absurd.
Your economic assumptions appear to come from the permabear school. Actual economies and
governments don't work that way. A major reduction in global supplies will result in
compulsory conservation, rationing, price controls, etc. This was done in recent memory in
the 1970s in both North America and Western Europe, when you were still behind the Iron
Curtain and perhaps not aware.
@alexander
Saddam was given plenty of time, and plenty of resolutions to pack up his troops and go
home."
Efforts by Egypt to arrive an Arab initiated solution was ignored and dismissed by USA
Initial Saudi effort to find a face saving exit by Saddam was met with resistance and then
a manufactured satellite image of Saddam massing his soldiers for invasion of Saudi was
widely disseminated by US.
Saddam crimes was no less or more egregious than what Israel was enjoying with US dollars
and with US support and with impunity ( It was still occupying Pastien and Parts of Syria and
Lebanon )
It was Levy the Israeli FM who threatened that his country would attack Iraq if US did
not.
War against Saddam was orchestrated by Jewish members of Thatcher and by Democrats of USA
) Solarz – NY Senator was one of the guys and the AIPAC whose president Mr. Dine
confessed the crimes )
@alexander
UN has been abused by USA taking the advantage of the collapse of Soviet . (This is what
Wolf0owitz told Wesley Clarke in 1992 in Feb : This was the time we can and we should take
care of these countries Iran Iraq Syria Libya and Yemen while Russia is still weakened and
unable to help its erstwhile vassals states) .
USA had no right to ask Saddam to leave . Subsequent behaviors of USA has proved it.
Israel also in addition has no right to exist .
If correction had to come from Iran Hezbollah and Syria- then so be it. That news would be
best thing that would happen to humanity within last 200 yrs .
@Iris
but -- but -- but (sputters Alexander the otherwise sage commenter), The UN -- that's the
U-nited Nations!! fer pete's ache, Agreed!! ( Agreed is Diplomatese for: "Please stop
twisting my arm; Please stop bankrupting my country; Please stop threatening to tell my wife
-- ).
in other words, the UN is a toy and a ploy for someone like G H W Bush salivating at the
once in a lifetime opportunity to exert world dominance -- 'scuse me: "Create a New World
Order" -- in the context of a power vacuum / dissolution of the Soviet Empire, previously the
only counterbalance to US superpower status.
No doubt the UN was got on board. It acted like the paid-for- judge and show-trial in a
case the prosecutor had already rigged.
imho, what is more significant, and what it takes years to unearth, is the decision making
and back-room dealing that came BEFORE the UN was induced to stamp its imprimatur.
Tony Blair endorsed Bush the Lesser's war on Iraq. Does that grant it legitimacy, or in
any way explain why US waged that war?
I don't care about numbers.
50 (proper) sea mines backed up by 20 air/land-sea missiles do the job. Block the Hormuz.
I am sure the regime in Tehran has that number.
Does anyone?
Don't think so.
Mines in particular.
While missiles could be tricky to produce even smart sea mines are not.
A lot of explosive-check.
A couple of sensors (acoustic/magnetic)-check.
A couple of hardened micro controller boards-check.
That's it.
In this very game there are, really, only two elements that interest me:
Tactical nukes.
Selective draft.
What hehe really interests me is the escalation from "tactical" to "strategic".
@Thorfinnsson
Let me make this clear: there won't be Iranian victory. Iran will pay a hefty price. There
will be the defeat of the Empire, though, a major climb down. The worst (for the Empire) part
would be that the whole world would see that the king has no clothes. Then the backlash
against the Empire (hated by 6/7th of the Earth population) starts, and that would be
extremely painful for everyone in the US, guilty and innocent alike (myself included).
Compulsory rationing and price controls were possible when the governments actually
governed. When the whole governments and legislatures are full of corporations' marionettes,
as is the case now in the US and EU, these measures are impossible. Profiteers will have
their day. They will crush Western economies and therefore themselves, but never
underestimate the blinding force of greed. The same greedy bastards are supplying the US
military with airplanes that have trouble flying and with ships costing untold billions that
break down in the Panama canal, of all places. The same greedy scum destroyed the US industry
and moved all production to China, in effect spelling the doom of the only country that could
have protected their loot from other thieves. That's the problem with greed: it makes people
incredibly shortsighted.
So what? That nice lessons are being imparted slowly to the Israeli slave USA.
USA does what other countries are accused of before invading . USA throws out any qualms
any morality any legality . It uses UN . Right now it is illegally supplying arms to Saudi to
Israel and to the rebels in Syria. These are the reasons US have gone to wars against other
countries for. Now some countries are standing up and saying – those days are gone ,
you can't attack any country anymore just because someone has been raped or someone has been
distributing Viagra.
As a matter of fact, the whole world began to ask, you are willing to launch your military
to eject Saddam from Kuwait Bravo! ..Now what are willing to do about Israels illegal seizure
of Palestinian territory in the West bank .It is more or less the exact same crime, Isn't
it?
George Bush Senior was the last US President in American History to withhold all loans to
Israel, until it ceased and desisted from illegal settlement activity in the Palestinian
Territories.
Many believe it was his willingness to hold Israel to the same standard as everyone else,
which cost him his second term.
@Thorfinnsson
Iran shot down a US Navy RQ-4A intel drone that cost $250: A model that is marketed as being
hard to shoot down since it has an 11 mile high altitude ceiling and a long operational
range. That a coastal AA missile battery knocked it down with one shot answers several
questions.
So easy to say when you so blithely ignore the historical injustices, the inequality of
opportunity and the theft - the first person to claim a parcel of land as their own exclusive
property was committing an act of theft.
It's not entrepreneurial; it's base rent-seeking and
it was a violent act of forced approbriation by denying natural rights to others.
The
subsequent claims to title are enforced by the threat of violence through the emergence of a
pervasive state.
A modern example is the oligarchs who carved up the commons in a collapsing and
disintegrating Soviet Union. Their's was an act of theft committed against society and the
common good. Your definition of freedom is predicated on theft and is a denial of natural
freedoms,
The idiots in DC are literally talking about nuclear war with Russia right now in a defense
spending/policy hearing on CSPAN. Sickening. I'm not sure why I even turned on the TV.
The
"premise" is that Russia launches a "tactical" low yield weapon, and the consensus is that
we would not "measure" it and respond in kind, but start an all out nuclear war.
Everyone knows that actual discussions regarding policy are done in closed door
meetings (and several reps have referred to this happening at a later time).
So are we at that point in Idiocracy, where we believe our propaganda has some effect on
our enemy? Is it 1950? FFS
Tens of thousands of Venezuelans
have reportedly already died as a result of this administration's relentless assault on
their economy; those human beings are no less dead than they would have been if the US had
killed them by dropping cluster bombs on Caracas. Yet these deaths have received virtually no
mainstream media coverage, and Americans, while they
strongly oppose attacking Iran militarily , have had very little to say about Trump's
attacks on the nation's economy. The economy which people use to feed their children, to care
for their elderly and their sick.
I'm titling this essay "Starvation Sanctions Are Worse Than Overt Warfare", and I mean it. I
am not saying that starvation sanctions are more destructive or deadly than overt military
force in and of themselves; what I am saying is that the overall effect is worse, because
there's no public accountability for them and because they deliberately target civilians.
If the US were to launch a barrage of Tomahawk missiles into an Iranian suburb with the goal
of killing civilians, there'd be international outrage and the cohesion of the US-centralized
power alliance would take a major hit. Virtually everyone would recognize this as an
unforgivable war crime. Yet America will be able to kill the same number of civilians with the
same deliberate intention of inflicting deadly force, and it would suffer essentially no
consequences at all. There's no public or international pressure holding that form of violence
at bay, because it's invisible and poorly understood.
It reminds me of the way financial abuse gets overlooked and under-appreciated in our
society. Financial abuse can be more painful and imprisoning than physical or psychological
abuse (and I speak from experience), especially if you have children, yet you don't generally
see movies and TV shows getting made about it. In a society where people have been made to
depend on money for survival, limiting or cutting off their access to it is the same as any
other violent attack upon their personal sovereignty, and can easily be just as destructive.
But as a society we haven't yet learned to see and understand this violence, so it doesn't
attract interest and attention. That lack of interest and attention enables the empire to
launch deadly campaigns targeting civilian populations unnoticed, without any public
accountability. It's great that more people are starting to understand the cost of war, to the
extent that we're even seeing US presidential candidates make opposing it central to their
platforms, but this is happening at a time when overt warfare is becoming more obsolete and
replaced with something subtler and more sinister. We must as a society evolve our
understanding of what starvation sanctions are and what they do, and stop seeing them as in any
way superior or preferable to overt warfare.
The fact that people generally oppose senseless military violence but are unable to see and
comprehend a slow, boa constrictor-like act of slaughter via economic strangulation is why
these siege warfare tactics have become the weapon of choice for the US-centralized empire. It
is a more gradual way of murdering people than overt warfare, but when you control all the
resources and have an underlying power structure which maintains itself amid the comings and
goings of your officially elected government, you're in no hurry. The absence of any public
accountability makes the need for patience a very worthwhile trade-off.
So you see this siege warfare strategy employed everywhere by the US-centralized empire:
You see it with Iran and Venezuela.
You see it in Yemen, where in addition to deadly blockades the Saudis have been
deliberate targeting farms, fishing boats, marketplaces, food storage sites and
cholera treatment centers with US-assisted airstrikes.
You
saw it with Julian Assange , where Ecuador collaborated with the US to slowly make life
in the embassy more and more hellish in the hope that he'd step outside to be arrested by
British police.
You're
seeing it now with Chelsea Manning , who is currently racking up $500 a day fines for her
principled stand against a corrupt grand jury proceeding against Assange, fines which will
double next month to $1,000 a day.
The US-centralized power alliance is so powerful in its ability to hurt nations with
financial influence that in 1990 when Yemen voted against a UN Security Council Resolution
authorizing the attack against Iran, a senior US diplomat was caught on a hot mic telling the
Yemeni ambassador, "That will be the most expensive 'no' vote you ever cast." According to
German author Thomas Pogge , "The US stopped $70 million in aid to Yemen; other Western
countries, the IMF, and World Bank followed suit. Saudi Arabia expelled some 800,000 Yemeni
workers, many of whom had lived there for years and were sending urgently needed money to their
families."
That's real power. Not the ability to destroy a nation with bombs and missiles, but the
ability to destroy it without firing a shot.
It's no wonder, then, that the drivers of this empire work so hard to continue growing and
expanding it. The oligarchs and their allies in opaque government agencies no doubt envision a
world where all noncompliant nations like Iran, Russia and China have been absorbed into the
blob of empire and war becomes obsolete, not because anyone has become any less violent, but
because their economic control will be so complete that they can obliterate entire populations
just by cutting them off from the world economy whenever any of them become disobedient.
This is the only reason Iran is being targeted right now. That's why you'll never hear a
factually and logically sound argument defending Trump's withdrawal from the nuclear deal;
there is none. There was no problem with the JCPOA other than the fact that it barred America
from inflicting economic warfare upon Iran, which it needed for the purpose of toppling the
nation's government so that it can be absorbed into the blob of the US-centralized empire.
And all the innocent human beings who die of starvation and disease? They don't matter.
Imperial violence only matters if there are consequences for it. The price of shoring up the
total hegemony of the empire will have been worth it .
"... "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy" - Alexis de Toqueville ..."
The problem is that as De Toqueville realises (his quote below) most of the people
commenting here are simply living a parasitic existence benefiting from state largesse -
sucking the teat of a bloated and overburdened state caring not whether their sustenance is
remotely sustainable and just voting for ever more
"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the
voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that
moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the
public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy" -
Alexis de Toqueville
"... Keep a close watch on whether the organizers are shown to have studied in the US and if the most vociferous media are known to have had connections to the CIA/NED. ..."
The 'Extradition Protest', with its thousands of protesters seemingly instantly mobilized,
appears to have a startling resemblance to the 'Umbrella Protests' that were backed by the
CIA/NED.
Keep a close watch on whether the organizers are shown to have studied in the US and if
the most vociferous media are known to have had connections to the CIA/NED.
Imagine being stuck in a fall out shelter or an underground bunker during some apocalypse
with a devoted Ayn Rand follower or followers. Gurantee they would be killed and eaten with
in the first few hours.
Rand followers remind me of my little neices and nephews when they fight over candy and
toys. You tell them they have to share and they say no mine mine it's all mine. Now imagine a
grown man or woman doing the same exact thing except they run a major corporation or worse
are an elected official. They have tried to make money off of every crisis in the past thirty
years.
Rands followers are selfish greedy, most likely insane, jackles who have destroyed and
plundered the American and world economy for thier own ends. Usually so they can have the
most toys like cars, houses, hot tubs, private jets, viagra and wild sex parties Mind you
they most likely have to pay people to have sex with them. I have nothing against capitalism
but they need to reeled in at some point. Sadly goverment does not do it's job by looking
after the public but after their own wallets. The people who view her has a sage and goddess
are seriously out of touch with reality.
Honestly her idea's are failures, the west is in debt up to it's eyeballs, Asia is rising
and Latin America is telling America and Europe to collectively go and screw ourselves. I am
not happy about this but apart of me is a bit amused by it.
The intellectual antecedents of the new right go back to Leo Strauss and the University of
Chicago among others. Canadian academic Shadia Drury wrote two books critical of Straussian
philosophy: "Leo Strauss and the American Right" (1999) and "The Political Ideas of Leo
Strauss" (first published 1988, revised 2005). Counterpunch.org carries a number of articles
by Gary Leupp, Francis Boyle and others also castigating the influence of Leo Strauss and his
followers on US foreign policy. Seymour Hersch also took a blowtorch to Strauss in an article
for The New Yorker many years ago when George W Bush was US President (link:
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2003/05/12/030512fa_fact?currentPage=4#ixzz1437Z8MNs).
"... Mr. Macri has slashed subsidies for electricity, fuel and transportation, causing prices to skyrocket, and recently prompting Ms. Genovesi, 48, to cut off her gas service, rendering her stove lifeless. Like most of her neighbors, she illegally taps into the power lines that run along the rutted dirt streets. ..."
"... "It's a neoliberal government," she says. "It's a government that does not favor the people." ..."
"... The tribulations playing out under the disintegrating roofs of the poor are a predictable dimension of Mr. Macri's turn away from left-wing populism. He vowed to shrink Argentina's monumental deficits by diminishing the largess of the state. The trouble is that Argentines have yet to collect on the other element the president promised: the economic revival that was supposed to follow the pain. ..."
"... But as Mr. Macri seeks re-election this year, Argentines increasingly lament that they are absorbing all strife and no progress. Even businesses that have benefited from his reforms complain that he has botched the execution, leaving the nation to confront the same concoction of misery that has plagued it for decades. The economy is contracting. Inflation is running above 50 percent, and joblessness is stuck above 9 percent ..."
"... Poverty afflicts a third of the population, and the figure is climbing. ..."
"... Mr. Macri sold his administration as an evolved form of governance for these times, a crucial dose of market forces tempered by social programs. ..."
"... In the most generous reading, the medicine has yet to take effect. But in the view of beleaguered Argentines, the country has merely slipped back into the rut that has framed national life for as long as most people can remember. ..."
"... "We live patching things up," said Roberto Nicoli, 62, who runs a silverware company outside the capital, Buenos Aires. "We never fix things. I always say, 'Whenever we start doing better, I will start getting ready for the next crisis.'" ..."
"... "When our president Cristina was here, they sent people to help us," she says. "Now, if there's problems, nobody helps us. Poor people feel abandoned." ..."
On the ragged streets of the shantytown across the road, where stinking outhouses sit alongside shacks fashioned from rusted sheets
of tin, families have surrendered hopes that sewage lines will ever reach them.
They do not struggle to fashion an explanation for their declining fortunes: Since taking office more than three years ago, President
Mauricio Macri has broken with the budget-busting populism that has dominated Argentina for much of the past century, embracing the
grim arithmetic of economic orthodoxy.
Mr. Macri has slashed subsidies for electricity, fuel and transportation, causing prices to skyrocket, and recently prompting
Ms. Genovesi, 48, to cut off her gas service, rendering her stove lifeless. Like most of her neighbors, she illegally taps into the
power lines that run along the rutted dirt streets.
"It's a neoliberal government," she says. "It's a government that does not favor the people."
The tribulations playing out under the disintegrating roofs of the poor are a predictable dimension of Mr. Macri's turn away
from left-wing populism. He vowed to shrink Argentina's monumental deficits by diminishing the largess of the state. The trouble
is that Argentines have yet to collect on the other element the president promised: the economic revival that was supposed to follow
the pain.
Mr. Macri's supporters heralded his 2015 election as a miraculous outbreak of normalcy in a country with a well-earned reputation
for histrionics. He would cease the reckless spending that had brought Argentina infamy for defaulting on its debts eight times.
Sober-minded austerity would win the trust of international financiers, bringing investment that would yield jobs and fresh opportunities.
But as Mr. Macri seeks re-election this year, Argentines increasingly lament that they are absorbing all strife and no progress.
Even businesses that have benefited from his reforms complain that he has botched the execution, leaving the nation to confront the
same concoction of misery that has plagued it for decades. The economy is contracting. Inflation is running above 50 percent, and
joblessness is stuck above 9 percent.
Poverty afflicts a third of the population, and the figure is climbing.
Far beyond this country of 44 million people, Mr. Macri's tenure is testing ideas that will shape economic policy in an age of
recrimination over widening inequality. His presidency was supposed to offer an escape from the wreckage of profligate spending while
laying down an alternative path for countries grappling with the worldwide rise of populism. Now, his presidency threatens to become
a gateway back to populism. The Argentine economy is contracting. Inflation is running above 50 percent, and joblessness is stuck
above 9 percent. Poverty afflicts a third of the population. Credit Sarah Pabst for The New York Times
Image
The Argentine economy is contracting. Inflation is running above 50 percent, and joblessness is stuck above 9 percent. Poverty afflicts
a third of the population. Credit Sarah Pabst for The New York Times
As the October election approaches, Mr. Macri is contending with the growing prospect of a challenge from the president he succeeded,
Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who faces a
series of criminal indictments for corruption . Her unbridled spending helped deliver the crisis that Mr. Macri inherited. Her
return would resonate as a rebuke of his market-oriented reforms while potentially yanking Argentina back to its accustomed preserve:
left-wing populism, in uncomfortable proximity to insolvency.
The Argentine peso lost half of its value against the dollar last year, prompting the central bank to lift interest rates to a
commerce-suffocating level above 60 percent. Argentina was forced to secure a $57 billion
rescue from the International
Monetary Fund , a profound indignity given that the fund is widely despised here for the austerity it imposed in the late 1990s,
turning an economic downturn into a depression.
For Mr. Macri, time does not appear to be in abundant supply. The spending cuts he delivered hit the populace immediately. The
promised benefits of his reforms -- a stable currency, tamer inflation, fresh investment and jobs -- could take years to materialize,
leaving Argentines angry and yearning for the past.
In much of South America, left-wing governments have taken power in recent decades as an angry corrective to dogmatic prescriptions
from Washington, where the Treasury and the I.M.F. have focused on the confidence of global investors as the key to development.
Left-wing populism has aimed to redistribute the gains from the wealthy to everyone else. It has aided the poor, while generating
its own woes --
corruption and depression in
Brazil , runaway inflation and financial ruin in Argentina. In Venezuela, uninhibited spending has turned the country with the
world's largest proven oil reserves into a land where
children starve .
Mr. Macri sold his administration as an evolved form of governance for these times, a crucial dose of market forces tempered
by social programs.
In the most generous reading, the medicine has yet to take effect. But in the view of beleaguered Argentines, the country
has merely slipped back into the rut that has framed national life for as long as most people can remember.
"We live patching things up," said Roberto Nicoli, 62, who runs a silverware company outside the capital, Buenos Aires. "We
never fix things. I always say, 'Whenever we start doing better, I will start getting ready for the next crisis.'"
Cultivating wealth
... ... ...
In the beginning, there was Juan Domingo Perón, the charismatic Army general who was president from 1946 to 1955, and then again
from 1973 to 1974. He employed an authoritarian hand and muscular state power to champion the poor. He and his wife, Eva Duarte --
widely known by her nickname, Evita -- would dominate political life long after they died, inspiring politicians across the ideological
spectrum to claim their mantle.
Among the most ardent Peronists were Néstor Kirchner, the president from 2003 to 2007, and his wife, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner,
who took office in 2007, remaining until Mr. Macri was elected in 2015.
Their version of Peronism -- what became known as Kirchnerism -- was decidedly left-wing, disdaining global trade as a malevolent
force. They expanded cash grants to the poor and imposed taxes on farm exports in a bid to keep Argentine food prices low.
As the country's farmers tell it, Kirchnerism is just a fancy term for the confiscation of their wealth and the scattering of
the spoils to the unproductive masses. They point to Ms. Kirchner's 35 percent tax on soybean exports.
"We had a saying," Mr. Tropini says. "'For every three trucks that went to the port, one was for Cristina Kirchner.'"
reduction in export taxes.
"You could breathe finally," Mr. Tropini, the farmer, says.
He was free of the Kirchners, yet stuck with nature. Floods in 2016 wiped out more than half of his crops. A drought last year
wreaked even more havoc.
"This harvest, this year," he says, "is a gift from God."
But if the heavens are now cooperating, and if the people running Buenos Aires represent change, Mr. Tropini is critical of Mr.
Macri's failure to overcome the economic crisis.
A weaker currency makes Argentine soybeans more competitive, but it also increases the cost of the diesel fuel Mr. Tropini needs
to run his machinery. High interest rates make it impossible for him to buy another combine, which would allow him to expand his
farm.
In the first years of Mr. Macri's administration, the government lifted controls on the value of the peso while relaxing export
taxes. The masters of international finance delivered a surge of investment. The economy expanded by nearly 3 percent in 2017, and
then accelerated in the first months of last year.
But as investors grew wary of Argentina's deficits, they fled, sending the peso plunging and inflation soaring. As the rout continued
last year, the central bank mounted a futile effort to support the currency, selling its stash of dollars to try to halt the peso's
descent. As the reserves dwindled, investors absorbed the spectacle of a government failing to restore order. The exodus of money
intensified, and another potential default loomed, leading a chastened Mr. Macri to accept a rescue from the dreaded IMF.
Administration officials described the unraveling as akin to a natural disaster: unforeseeable and unavoidable. The drought hurt
agriculture.
Money was flowing out of developing countries as the Federal Reserve continued to lift interest rates in the United States, making
the American dollar a more attractive investment.
But the impact of the Fed's tightening had been widely anticipated. Economists fault the government for mishaps and complacency
that left the country especially vulnerable.
.... ... ...
Among the most consequential errors was the government's decision to include Argentina's central bank in a December 2017 announcement
that it was raising its inflation target. The markets took that as a signal that the government was surrendering its war on inflation
while opting for a traditional gambit: printing money rather than cutting spending.
... ... ...
The government insists that better days are ahead. The spending cuts have dropped the budget deficit to a manageable 3 percent
of annual economic output. Argentina is again integrated into the global economy.
"We haven't improved, but the foundations of the economy and society are much healthier," said Miguel Braun, secretary of economic
policy at the Treasury Ministry. "Argentina is in a better place to generate a couple of decades of growth."
... ... ...
Their television flashes dire warnings, like "Danger of Hyper Inflation." Throughout the neighborhood, people decry the sense
that they have been forsaken by the government.
Trucks used to come to castrate male dogs to control the packs of feral animals running loose. Not anymore. Health programs for
children are less accessible than they were before, they said.
Daisy Quiroz, 71, a retired maid, lives in a house that regularly floods in the rainy season.
"When our president Cristina was here, they sent people to help us," she says. "Now, if there's problems, nobody helps us.
Poor people feel abandoned."
... ... ...
Daniel Politi contributed reporting from Buenos Aires. Peter S. Goodman is a London-based European economics correspondent.
He was previously a national economic correspondent in New York. He has also worked at The Washington Post as a China correspondent,
and was global editor in chief of the International Business Times. @
petersgoodman
Holding up the EU as the root of all woes, while at the same time dominating political
discourse and deflecting the blame from the real culprits.
All at a time when public spending cuts in the name of austerity (itself a direct reaction
to the failings of the neoliberal economic system) are spreading untold misery. At a time
when we finally have an opposition ready to challenge the policies of austerity, the issue
has been conveniently brushed under the brexit rug.
Right-wing ideology is often presented as a natural state and not ideological at all. This
denial is a central feature, acting as a way of abdicating responsibility for harmful and
selfish actions and providing means of fostering intellectual suspicion to prevent challenges
or structured and coherent critiques like your own.
The right engenders coalitions of people disinterested in politics and distrustful of
politicians with those who feel intellectually superior but see politics as an amoral game in
the pursuit of "enlightened" self-interest.
As a result, everything about it is disingenous.
There is no alternative (that we want you to choose). It's not racist to (constantly,
always negatively and to the expense of everything else) talk about immigration. Cutting
taxes for the rich reduces inequality (because we change the criteria to exclude the richest
from the calculations). This is also because there are dualities at play. Neoliberalism
relies on immigration to increase worker competition and suppress wage demand but courts the
xenophobic vote (which is why even with reduced EU migration Brexit has so far increased
overall immigration and would continue to do so in the event of no deal or May's deal). Both
Remainers and Leavers have accused the other of being a neoliberal project, and in certain
aspects -because of these dualities - both sides are correct.
I also believe the disdain for "political correctness" is somewhat a result of
neoliberalism, since marketisation is so fundamental to the project and the wedge of the
market is advertising, the language of bullshit and manipulation. People railing against
political correctness feel judged for their automatic thoughts that they identify as natural
instead of culturally determined. Behavioural advertising encourages these thoughts and
suppresses consideration. It is a recipe for resentment.
"... If 'free markets' of enterprising individuals have been tested to destruction, then capitalism is unable to articulate an ideology with which to legitimise itself. ..."
"... Therefore, neoliberal hegemony can only be perpetuated with authoritarian, nationalist ideologies and an order of market feudalism. ..."
"... The market is no longer an enabler of private enterprise, but something more like a medieval religion, conferring ultimate authority on a demagogue. ..."
"... Only in theory is neoliberalism a form of laissez-faire. Neoliberalism is not a case of the state saying, as it were: 'OK everyone, we'll impose some very broad legal parameters, so we'll make sure the police will turn up if someone breaks into your house; but otherwise we'll hang back and let you do what you want'. ..."
"... Hayek is perfectly clear that a strong state is required to force people to act according to market logic. If left to their own devices, they might collectivise, think up dangerous utopian ideologies, and the next thing you know there would be socialism. ..."
"... This the paradox of neoliberalism as an intellectual critique of government: a socialist state can only be prohibited with an equally strong state. That is, neoliberals are not opposed to a state as such, but to a specifically centrally-planned state based on principles of social justice - a state which, to Hayek's mind, could only end in t totalitarianism. ..."
"... It should be understood (and I speak above all as a critic of neoliberalism) that neoliberal ideology is not merely a system of class power, but an entire metaphysic, a way of understanding the world that has an emotional hold over people. For any ideology to universalize itself, it must be based on some very powerful ideas. Hayek and Von Mises were Jewish fugitives of Nazism, living through the worst horrors of twentieth-century totalitarianism. There are passages of Hayek's that describe a world operating according to the rules of a benign abstract system that make it sound rather lovely. To understand neoliberalism, we must see that it has an appeal. ..."
"... However, there is no perfect order of price signals. People do not simply act according to economic self-interest. Therefore, neoliberalism is a utopian political project like any other, requiring the brute power of the state to enforce ideological tenets. With tragic irony, the neoliberal order eventually becomes not dissimilar to the totalitarian regimes that Hayek railed against. ..."
The other point to be made is that the return of fundamentalist nationalism is arguably a
radicalized form of neoliberalism. If 'free markets' of enterprising individuals have
been tested to destruction, then capitalism is unable to articulate an ideology with which to
legitimise itself.
Therefore, neoliberal hegemony can only be perpetuated with authoritarian, nationalist
ideologies and an order of market feudalism.
In other words, neoliberalism's authoritarian orientations, previously effaced beneath
discourses of egalitarian free-enterprise, become overt.
The market is no longer an enabler of private enterprise, but something more like a
medieval religion, conferring ultimate authority on a demagogue.
Individual entrepreneurs collectivise into a 'people' serving a market which has become
synonymous with nationhood. A corporate state emerges, free of the regulatory fetters of
democracy.
The final restriction on the market - democracy itself - is removed. There then is no
separate market and state, just a totalitarian market state.
Yes, the EU is an ordoliberal institution - the state imposing rules on the market from
without. Thus, it is not the chief danger. The takeover of 5G, and therefore our entire
economy and industry, by Huawei - now that would be a loss of state sovereignty. But because
Huawei is nominally a corporation, people do not think about is a form of governmental
bureaucracy, but if powerful enough that is exactly what it is.
Pinkie123: So good to read your understandings of neoliberalism. The political project is the
imposition of the all seeing all knowing 'market' on all aspects of human life. This version
of the market is an 'information processor'. Speaking of the different idea of the
laissez-faire version of market/non market areas and the function of the night watchman state
are you aware there are different neoliberalisms? The EU for example runs on the version
called 'ordoliberalism'. I understand that this still sees some areas of society as separate
from 'the market'?
ADamnSmith: Philip Mirowski has discussed this 'under the radar' aspect of neoliberalism. How
to impose 'the market' on human affairs - best not to be to explicit about what you are
doing. Only recently has some knowledge about the actual neoliberal project been appearing.
Most people think of neoliberalism as 'making the rich richer' - just a ramped up version of
capitalism. That's how the left has thought of it and they have been ineffective in stopping
its implementation.
Neoliberalism allows with impunity pesticide businesses to apply high risk toxic pesticides
everywhere seriously affecting the health of children, everyone as well as poisoning the
biosphere and all its biodiversity. This freedom has gone far too far and is totally
unacceptable and these chemicals should be banished immediately.
The left have been entirely wrong to believe that neoliberalism is a mobilisation of
anarchic, 'free' markets. It never was so. Only a few more acute thinkers on the left
(Jacques Ranciere, Foucault, Deleuze and, more recently, Mark Fisher, Wendy Brown, Will
Davies and David Graeber) have understood neoliberalism to be a techno-economic order of
control, requiring a state apparatus to enforce wholly artificial directives.
Also, the work
of recent critics of data markets such as Shoshana Zuboff has shown capitalism to be evolving
into a totalitarian system of control through cybernetic data aggregation.
Only in theory is neoliberalism a form of laissez-faire. Neoliberalism is not a case of the
state saying, as it were: 'OK everyone, we'll impose some very broad legal parameters, so
we'll make sure the police will turn up if someone breaks into your house; but otherwise
we'll hang back and let you do what you want'.
Hayek is perfectly clear that a strong state
is required to force people to act according to market logic. If left to their own devices,
they might collectivise, think up dangerous utopian ideologies, and the next thing you know
there would be socialism.
This the paradox of neoliberalism as an intellectual critique of
government: a socialist state can only be prohibited with an equally strong state. That is,
neoliberals are not opposed to a state as such, but to a specifically centrally-planned state
based on principles of social justice - a state which, to Hayek's mind, could only end in t
totalitarianism.
Because concepts of social justice are expressed in language, neoliberals
are suspicious of linguistic concepts, regarding them as politically dangerous. Their
preference has always been for numbers. Hence, market bureaucracy aims for the quantification
of all values - translating the entirety of social reality into metrics, data, objectively
measurable price signals. Numbers are safe. The laws of numbers never change. Numbers do not
lead to revolutions. Hence, all the audit, performance review and tick-boxing that has been
enforced into public institutions serves to render them forever subservient to numerical
(market) logic. However, because social institutions are not measurable, attempts to make
them so become increasingly mystical and absurd. Administrators manage data that has no
relation to reality. Quantitatively unmeasurable things - like happiness or success - are
measured, with absurd results.
It should be understood (and I speak above all as a critic of neoliberalism) that
neoliberal ideology is not merely a system of class power, but an entire metaphysic, a way of
understanding the world that has an emotional hold over people. For any ideology to
universalize itself, it must be based on some very powerful ideas. Hayek and Von Mises were
Jewish fugitives of Nazism, living through the worst horrors of twentieth-century
totalitarianism. There are passages of Hayek's that describe a world operating according to
the rules of a benign abstract system that make it sound rather lovely. To understand
neoliberalism, we must see that it has an appeal.
However, there is no perfect order of price signals. People do not simply act according to
economic self-interest. Therefore, neoliberalism is a utopian political project like any
other, requiring the brute power of the state to enforce ideological tenets. With tragic
irony, the neoliberal order eventually becomes not dissimilar to the totalitarian regimes
that Hayek railed against.
"... In his first speech to a joint session of Congress, President Trump promised to deliver on his populist campaign pledges to protect Americans from globalization. "For too long," he bemoaned, "we've watched our middle class shrink as we've exported our jobs and wealth to foreign countries." But now, he asserted, the time has come to "restart the engine of the American economy" and "bring back millions of jobs." ..."
"... To achieve his goals, Trump proposed mixing massive tax-cuts and sweeping regulatory rollbacks with increased spending on the military, infrastructure and border control. ..."
...with Trump the ideological patina of faith in free markets has gone and he's more or less
just engaged in an asset stripping exercise. Thing is, though, you can't get away with that
without some kind of distraction, and in Trump's case it's his country club racist's
understanding of geopolitics converted into campaign rhetoric and immigration policy.
I don't think this is some masterplan -- he just happened to stumble into the stage at a
point where there was an opening for his kind of rhetoric. I'm just amazed someone smarter
didn't see it earlier and capitalise.
Under Trumps tax plan, a single mother with 2 kids working fulltime at minumum wage gets 75
dollars a YEAR in childcare, about $-1.50 per week.
----------
While the rich, those making up to 400,000 per year get 2000.00 per year child credit off
their taxes.
---------------
Name a benefit for the poor,
that the recent tax bill passed by Trump and GREEDY GOP.
In his first speech to a joint session of Congress, President Trump promised to deliver on
his populist campaign pledges to protect Americans from globalization. "For too long," he
bemoaned, "we've watched our middle class shrink as we've exported our jobs and wealth to
foreign countries." But now, he asserted, the time has come to "restart the engine of the
American economy" and "bring back millions of jobs."
To achieve his goals, Trump proposed
mixing massive tax-cuts and sweeping regulatory rollbacks with increased spending on the
military, infrastructure and border control.
This same messy mix of free market
fundamentalism and hyper-nationalistic populism is presently taking shape in Trump's proposed
budget. But the apparent contradiction there isn't likely to slow down Trump's pro-market,
pro-Wall Street, pro-wealth agenda.
His supporters may soon discover that his professions of
care for those left behind by globalization are -- aside from some mostly symbolic moves on
trade -- empty.
Just look at what has already happened with the GOP's proposed replacement for Obamacare,
which if enacted would bring increased pain and suffering to the anxious voters who put their
trust in Trump's populism in the first place.
While these Americans might have thought their
votes would win them protection from the instabilities and austerities of market-led
globalization, what they are getting is a neoliberal president in populist clothing.
I adore the ill educated, unintentional, satirical nature of some of the Rand supporters
comments here - unsurprisingly predominantly American. Who appear to have a tenuous grasp on
the nature and meaning of philosophy. Who replace rational thought with cod philosophy and
hysterical rants, - that would embarrass your average cargo cult worshiper - as a
justification for their own sociopathy and intellectual inadequacy. Take a bow...
MoreThanExists and the even more comic BruceMajors
Ironic isn't it, America may end up becoming the Western world's first failed state? A
kind of Somalia with hamburgers,obesity and better drainage; ruled by Christian
fundamentalist neo liberal warlords and Ayn Rand inspired gangsters, funded by Wall Street
parasites, with the Tea Party as the Sturm Abteilung (SA), and "Atlas Shrugged" as their most
sacred holy text written by a third rate Sadeian dominatrix.
Remember the fascist war cry as they went into battle against Republican troops during the
Spanish Civil War, "Death to the intellect! Long live death!". How appropriate?!! Maybe
Rand's disciples could work that into a revised version of "The Star-Spangled Banner.?"
Iran's envoy to the United Nations has called on the international community to end "unlawful destabilizing measures" by the US,
declaring that while Iran does not seek war, it "reserves the right to counter any hostile act."
Iranian envoy to the UN Majid Takht Ravanchi has condemned continuing US provocations that culminated Thursday morning in the
downing of an American surveillance drone by the Iranian air force over Hormozgan province.
The drone "had turned off its identification equipment and [was] engaged in a clear spying operation," Ravanchi confirmed in a
letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, adding that the aircraft had ignored "repeated radio warnings" in order to enter
Iranian airspace near the Strait of Hormuz.
"... The build-up of riots against Hong Kong's proposed extradition treaty with the Mainland started months ago, supported and driven by commentary in the Land of the Free ..."
"... This happened before, in 2014. The Chinese leadership was certain the riots in Hong Kong reflected the work of American agencies. The following is an extract translated from a speech by Major-General Qiao Liang, a leading strategist for the Peoples' Liberation Army, addressing the Chinese Communist Party's Central Committee in 2015: ..."
"... weakening yuan-dollar exchange rate will dissuade international portfolios from investing in China's projects, for which the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank was established. China should respond to moves to undermine her currency, seeking to enhance the attractions of her investment opportunities to international investment funds by taking measures to support the yuan. If not, global investment funds will simply not come China's way. ..."
"... Besides attracting portfolio flows into the US, a rising dollar is also a threat to foreign governments and corporates who have borrowed dollars and then have to pay them back later. This was what mauled South-East Asian economies in the 1997 financial crisis. China as a state is not in this position, though some of her regional trading partners will have fallen into this trap again. ..."
"... It is clear from elsewhere in Qiao's speech that the Chinese understand America's motives and methods. Therefore, they will anticipate American actions to undermine the yuan. If the Americans succeed and with the yuan made unattractive, international portfolio money that is already invested in China will be sucked out, potentially crashing China's capital markets. ..."
"... Put another way, we face no less than a dangerous escalation of the financial war between America and China, with America trying to close off international finance to China. ..."
"... Through deploying similar monetary policies to the Americans, it might now occur to Beijing's central planners that they are at a severe disadvantage playing that game. The dollar and the yuan are both unbacked credit-based currencies bedevilled with debt. But if the dollar goes head-to-head against the yuan, the dollar will always destabilise the yuan. ..."
"... Meanwhile, Chinese inaction is likely to be encouraged by another factor: the escalation of US embargoes on Iranian oil, and the increasing possibility of a new Middle-East conflict with Iran. This is bound to have a bearing on Chinese-American relations. ..."
"... Meanwhile, China is securing her defences. Besides aligning with Russia and both being expected to vote at the UN against Israeli/American attempts to escalate tensions in the Gulf, Russia can be expected to covertly help Iran. Beijing is also securing a partnership to protect North Korea, with Xi visiting Pyongyang this week in order to head off American action in that direction. The whole Asian continent from Ukraine to the Bering Sea is now on a defensive footing. ..."
When you see a rash, you should look beyond the skin for a cause. It has been like this with
Hong Kong over the last few weeks. On the surface we see impressively organised demonstrations
to stop the executive from introducing extradition laws to China. We observe that university
students and others not much older are running the demonstrations with military precision. The
Mainland Chinese should be impressed.
They are unlikely to see it that way. The build-up of riots against Hong Kong's proposed
extradition treaty with the Mainland started months ago, supported and driven by commentary in
the Land of the Free . America is now coming out in the open as China's adversary, no longer
just a trading partner worried by the trade imbalances. And Hong Kong is the pressure
point.
This happened before, in 2014. The Chinese leadership was certain the riots in Hong Kong
reflected the work of American agencies. The following is an extract translated from a speech
by Major-General Qiao Liang, a leading strategist for the Peoples' Liberation Army, addressing
the Chinese Communist Party's Central Committee in 2015:
"Since the Diaoyu Islands conflict and the Huangyan Island conflict, incidents have kept
popping up around China, including the confrontation over China's 981 oil rigs with Vietnam
and Hong Kong's "Occupy Central" event. Can they still be viewed as simply accidental?
I accompanied General Liu Yazhou, the Political Commissar of the National Defence
University, to visit Hong Kong in May 2014. At that time, we heard that the "Occupy Central"
movement was being planned and could take place by end of the month. However, it didn't
happen in May, June, July, or August.
What happened? What were they waiting for?
Let's look at another time table: the U.S. Federal Reserve's exit from the Quantitative
Easing (QE) policy. The U.S. said it would stop QE at the beginning of 2014. But it stayed
with the QE policy in April, May, June, July, and August. As long as it was in QE, it kept
overprinting dollars and the dollar's price couldn't go up. Thus, Hong Kong's "Occupy
Central" should not happen either.
At the end of September, the Federal Reserve announced the U.S. would exit from QE. The
dollar started going up. Then Hong Kong's "Occupy Central" broke out in early October.
Actually, the Diaoyu Islands, Huangyan Island, the 981 rigs, and Hong Kong's "Occupy
Central" movement were all bombs. The successful explosion of any one of them would lead to a
regional crisis or a worsened investment environment around China. That would force the
withdrawal of a large amount of investment from this region, which would then return to the
U.S."
That America is stoking and organising discontent anew in Hong Kong is probably still
China's view today. Clearly, the Chinese believed America covertly managed "Occupy Central" and
therefore are at it again. Apart from what their spies tell them, the protests are too well
organised and planned to be spontaneous. This time, the attack appears to have a better chance
of success. The plan is coordinated with American pressure on Hong Kong's dollar peg in an
attempt to destabilise it, principally through the threat to extend tariffs against China to
Hong Kong. This second attempt to collapse Hong Kong is therefore more serious.
Hong Kong is critical, because through Shanghai Connect it is the only lawful channel for
foreign investment flows into China. This is important to the Americans, because the US
Treasury cannot afford to see global portfolio flows attracted into China at a time when they
will be needed to invest in increasing quantities of US Treasury stock. Understand that, and
you will have grasped a large part of the urgency behind America's attempt to destabilise Hong
Kong.
Qiao Liang makes this point elsewhere in his aforementioned speech, claiming American
tactics are the consequence of the ending of Bretton Woods:
"Without the restriction of gold, the US can print dollars at will. If they keep a large
amount of dollars inside the US, it will certainly create inflation. If they export dollars
to the world, the whole world is helping the US deal with its inflation. That's why inflation
is not high in the US."
While one can take issue with his simplistic analysis, that is not the point. What matters
is what the Chinese believe. Qiao concludes:
"By issuing debt, the US brings a large amount of dollars from overseas back to the US's
three big markets: the commodity market, the Treasury Bills market, and the stock market. The
US repeats this cycle to make money: printing money, exporting money overseas, and bringing
money back. The US has become a financial empire."
Conceptually, Qiao was broadly correct. His error in these two statements was to not explain
that ownership of dollars means they are deployed exclusively in America, but perhaps he was
simplifying his argument for a non-technical audience. All dollars, despite foreign ownership,
remain in the American economy as a combination of US Treasuries and T-bills, investment in US
listed and unlisted securities, physical assets such as property and also deposits through
correspondent banks held in New York.
It is not the dollars that flow, but their ownership that changes. Dollars are bought and
sold for foreign currencies by central banks, sovereign wealth funds, commercial banks,
insurance companies and pension funds. The currencies in which these entities invest matters,
and investment decisions are obviously affected by currency prospects. It allows the US
Treasury to attract these flows into the dollar by simply making other currencies less
attractive. Foreign owners of foreign currencies can easily be spooked into the safe havens of
the dollar and US Treasuries. This is the way foreigners are corralled into funding the budget
deficit.
A weakening yuan-dollar exchange rate will dissuade international portfolios from investing
in China's projects, for which the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank was established. China
should respond to moves to undermine her currency, seeking to enhance the attractions of her
investment opportunities to international investment funds by taking measures to support the
yuan. If not, global investment funds will simply not come China's way.
Besides attracting portfolio flows into the US, a rising dollar is also a threat to foreign
governments and corporates who have borrowed dollars and then have to pay them back later. This
was what mauled South-East Asian economies in the 1997 financial crisis. China as a state is
not in this position, though some of her regional trading partners will have fallen into this
trap again.
It is clear from elsewhere in Qiao's speech that the Chinese understand America's motives
and methods. Therefore, they will anticipate American actions to undermine the yuan. If the
Americans succeed and with the yuan made unattractive, international portfolio money that is
already invested in China will be sucked out, potentially crashing China's capital markets.
With the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act going onto the US statute book, President
Trump will be able to use the link to the Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose sanctions
against trade, finance and technology. The concern in Hong Kong is personal wealth will now
decamp and that Hong Kong property prices will implode.
The British involvement
America's strategy has included putting pressure on her allies to fall into line with her
interests against China. All NATO members have been told not to buy Huawei equipment.
Protective of the special relationship, the British have gone along with it. But Cheltenham's
GCHQ (the UK's cyber monitoring agency) has at least given Huawei the opportunity to address
the security issues that have been raised.
A greater problem is bound to arise, and that is the role of the City of London. In 2014,
the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, agreed a plan with the Chinese leadership
for the City to work with Hong Kong to internationalise the yuan. The Chinese wanted to bypass
New York for obvious reasons.
The request to meet Osborne went through Boris Johnson, at the time Mayor of London and
leading a trade delegation to China on behalf of the City. Johnson is now odds-on favourite to
become the next Prime Minister and if appointed will undoubtedly find himself in a difficult
position. He will have to walk a very fine line between Britain's developing Chinese interests,
her special relationship with America, his new friendship with Trump, and also the trade
agreement with America which both Trump and Johnson are likely to prioritise following
Brexit.
Depending on how Johnson acts, China may have to put her plans to internationalise the yuan
on hold. The risk for China is that with her international financial plans threatened and the
Americans determined to strengthen the dollar in order to undermine the yuan, she will not have
access to the international portfolio flows she needs to help finance her infrastructure plans
and her Made in China 2025 project.
Put another way, we face no less than a dangerous escalation of the financial war between
America and China, with America trying to close off international finance to
China.
China's policy predicament
In a tactical retreat, Hong Kong has put plans to introduce the new extradition legislation
on hold. All it has achieved is to redirect demonstrators' demands towards Hong Kong's Chief
Executive to resign, and the demonstrations continued.
The question now arises as to how the Chinese will proceed. So far, they have played their
hand defensively in the financial war against America, but things are now coming to a head.
Obviously, they will protect Hong Kong, but more importantly they must address capital flight
through the Shanghai Connect. One option will be to suspend it, but that would undermine the
trust fundamental to future inward portfolio flows. It would also be a huge setback for the
international yuan. In any event, action must be taken to underwrite the yuan exchange
rate.
One option would be to increase interest rates, but this will risk being read as a panic
measure. In this context, an early and definite rise in interest rates would be better than a
delay or a lesser adjustment to monetary policy. For the domestic economy, this would favour
savers in an economy already savings-driven, but disadvantage exporters and many small and
medium-size businesses. It would amount to a reversal of recent economic and monetary policies,
which are intended to increase domestic consumption and reduce export surpluses.
The economic theories that the central planners in Beijing actually believe in will become
centre-stage. China has adopted the global neo-Keynesian standard of economic planning and
credit expansion. When the country moved rapidly from a peasant economy, credit was able to
expand without the regular pitfalls of a credit cycle observed in an advanced economy being
noticeable. This was because economic progress eclipsed the consequences of monetary
inflation.
But China is no longer an economic green-field site, having become predominantly a modern
economy. Consequently, she has moved from her pure mercantilist approach to running the economy
to a more financial and monetary style of central planning.
Through deploying similar monetary policies to the Americans, it might now occur to
Beijing's central planners that they are at a severe disadvantage playing that game. The dollar
and the yuan are both unbacked credit-based currencies bedevilled with debt. But if the dollar
goes head-to-head against the yuan, the dollar will always destabilise the yuan.
Supping from the Keynesian cup is China's principal weakness. She cannot afford to face down
the dollar, and the Americans know it. For the Chinese, the path of least risk appears to be
the one China has pursued successfully to date: do as little as possible to rock the boat, and
let America make the mistakes. However, as I shall argue later, the time is coming for China to
take the offensive.
Meanwhile, Chinese inaction is likely to be encouraged by another factor: the escalation of
US embargoes on Iranian oil, and the increasing possibility of a new Middle-East conflict with
Iran. This is bound to have a bearing on Chinese-American relations.
False flags and
Iran
Last week, two oil tankers suffered an attack by parties unknown after leaving the Strait of
Hormuz outward-bound. Predictably, the Americans and the Saudis blamed Iran, and Iran has
denied involvement. The Americans, supported by the British, have been quick to point out that
Iran had the motivation to attack and therefore was the guilty party. As a consequence of US
sanctions, her economy is in a state of collapse and Iran needs higher oil prices. The US has
been building up its Gulf fleet provocatively, increasing tensions. According to Al-Jazeera,
Iran's President Hassan Rouhani warned last December that "If one day they (the US) want to
prevent the export of Iran's oil, then no oil will be exported from the Persian Gulf."
Perhaps that day is close. Tehran must be desperate, and she blames the Americans and
Israelis for a false flag attack, an accusation that bases its credibility on previous
incidents in the region and a suspicion that Israel backed by America wants an excuse to attack
Iran. The Syrian bridge to Hezbollah threatens Israel to its North, so its involvement is
logical, and it looks like a Mossad operation. By driving Iran into a corner, it is hard to see
any other outcome than further escalation.
If America does get tied up in a new war in the Middle East, she will be fighting on two
Asian fronts: militarily against Iran and financially against China. It could descend rapidly
into a global crisis, which would not suit China's interests or anyone else's for that matter.
However, an American attack against Iran could trigger the widespread flight of investment
money to the safety of the dollar and US Treasuries.
If America achieves that objective before sending in the troops, she could then compromise
on both Iran and on tariffs against China. Assuming Qiao Liang's analysis still has traction in
Beijing, this is the way American strategy might be read by the Chinese war-gamers.
Meanwhile, China is securing her defences. Besides aligning with Russia and both being
expected to vote at the UN against Israeli/American attempts to escalate tensions in the Gulf,
Russia can be expected to covertly help Iran. Beijing is also securing a partnership to protect
North Korea, with Xi visiting Pyongyang this week in order to head off American action in that
direction. The whole Asian continent from Ukraine to the Bering Sea is now on a defensive
footing.
How will it be resolved?
If the funding of the US deficit is the underling problem, then a continuation of China's
longstanding policy of not reacting to America's financial aggression is no longer an option. A
weaker yuan will be the outcome and a second Asian financial crisis involving China would be in
the offing. It also means the progression of China's economy would become more dependent on
domestic inflationary financing through the expansion of bank credit at a time when food
prices, partially due to the outbreak of African swine fever, are rising as well.
There is bound to be an intense debate in the Chinese Politburo as to whether it is wise to
abandon neo-Keynesian financing and revert to the previous understanding that debasing the
currency and the inflation of food prices impoverishes the people and will inevitably lead to
political destabilisation. The logic behind the state accumulating a hoard of gold, encouraging
citizens to hoard it as well, and dominating international bullion markets was to protect the
citizens from a paper money crisis. That paper money crisis now threatens the yuan more than
the dollar.
It must be clear to the Chinese, who are no slouches when it comes to understanding
political strategy, why America is taking a far more aggressive stance in their financial war.
The absence of foreign buyers in the US Treasury market could turn out to be the most serious
crisis for America since the end of Bretton Woods. The Deep State, driven in this case by the
US Treasury, will not permit it to happen. For both China and America, these are desperate
times.
There was always going to be a point in time when mundane chess moves end up threatening to
check and then checkmate one or the other king. China now finds her king under serious threat
and she must make a countermove. She cannot afford portfolio flows to reverse. The financing of
her Made in China 2025 plan and the completion of the silk roads are vital to her long-term
political stability.
China must therefore counter dollar strength by means other than simply raising interest
rates. Inevitably, the solution points towards gold. Everyone knows, or at least suspects that
China has accumulated significant undeclared reserves of gold bullion. The time has probably
come for China to show her hand and declare her true gold reserves, or at least enough of them
to exceed the official gold reserves of the US.
It is likely a declaration of this sort would drive the gold price significantly higher,
amounting to a dollar devaluation. By denying gold is money, America has exposed itself to the
risk of the dollar's reserve status being questioned in global markets, and this is China's
trump card.
If Xi attends the Osaka G20 at the end of this month, the purpose would be less to talk to
Trump, but more to talk to the other leaders to make it clear what the Americans are up to and
to ensure they are aware of the consequences for the global monetary system when China takes
positive action to protect her own currency and domestic capital markets.
China gives the US too much credit for "people organizing" skills. Credit where credit is due: the Hong Kong population is dynamic and driven. They are
"incentivized" by Chinese policy itself.
"... Hire B-team actors whom he can fire at will, and for effect, as required to maintain the facade of 'dominance.' Let the dogs loose and then yank on their chains at the last minute. The master's voice etc. ..."
"... His problem is: it only works in TV Reality Show land -- and only for a limited time between business-as-usual advertising. ..."
"... He, and his cast of zio-policy diplomatic zombies have a much harder time when it comes to the real world and real national boundaries that resist and are likely to fight back. ..."
"... Seems the US is perpetually seeking war or at the very least threatening war. War on drugs, war on poverty war on disinfo war, trade wars , unending list of WAR, WAR, WAR. ..."
"... Sanctions were never justified in the first place. Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and has submitted to extra-ordinary inspections by the IAEA for decades. And gets ticks on the boxes. Anyone that thinks Iran is trying to 'build the bomb' probably believes unicorns live in the White House (the American one), and that Saddam blew up the Twin Towers. ..."
"... Compare the western attitudes towards Iran, and those towards India and Pakistan. Neither of which have signed up to the NPT. Not a single whimper from western governments or their MSM propaganda channels, when those countries developed an arsenal of nuclear WMD's. ..."
"... My guess on what happened with Trump was the same MO as in Syria, he has a temper tantrum ("kill them all, even the Russians" as was rumored) and he was informed of the possible fallout from such an attack. ..."
Whether Generalissimo Bone Spur and President Chief Kaiser of the USA, His Imperial Majesty Donald Trump, actually called for
a stand down of any attack on Iran for the shooting down of a surveillance UAV, or he suddenly realized that such an act would
touch off another unneeded war, is at this point in time a matter of some debate. What is clear however is that his Imperial Majesty
must clean out his current foreign policy and national defense staff (Bolton, Pompeo, Haspel etc.) before another crisis develops.
Otherwise the neocons that currently inhabit the Oval Office chicken hawk coop will be back at fomenting another crisis, which
might actually give them the war they so dearly want. His Imperial Majesty appointed them and he can fire them.
All this narrative fits Trump's modus operandi and his fake Alpha male persona.
Hire B-team actors whom he can fire at will, and for effect, as required to maintain the facade of 'dominance.' Let the dogs
loose and then yank on their chains at the last minute. The master's voice etc.
His problem is: it only works in TV Reality Show land -- and only for a limited time between business-as-usual advertising.
He, and his cast of zio-policy diplomatic zombies have a much harder time when it comes to the real world and real national
boundaries that resist and are likely to fight back.
Trump and US MIC is dangerous of course. But Trump has enough rat cunning to know when he's cornered. All he's done here with
this alleged last minute "call back" is test prove his chain of command is working. (...or is it?)
George V---
As far as I can tell it doesn't matter who the president has or who he is. Seems the US is perpetually seeking war or at the very
least threatening war. War on drugs, war on poverty war on disinfo war, trade wars , unending list of WAR, WAR, WAR.
I cannot see any way that the current irrational sanctions against Iran by the US can be rolled back. All US administrations are
full of hubris and in love with their own imagined gloriously supreme power. The only way they can be rolled back is if Iran offers
some face-saving excuse, which they can't do. They have nothing else to give (Pompeo's 'conditions for international re-alignment'
were essentially a demand for surrender and 'regime' change, probably authored by Maniac Walrus Bolton).
Sanctions were never justified in the first place. Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and has submitted
to extra-ordinary inspections by the IAEA for decades. And gets ticks on the boxes. Anyone that thinks Iran is trying to 'build
the bomb' probably believes unicorns live in the White House (the American one), and that Saddam blew up the Twin Towers.
Compare the western attitudes towards Iran, and those towards India and Pakistan. Neither of which have signed up to the NPT.
Not a single whimper from western governments or their MSM propaganda channels, when those countries developed an arsenal of nuclear
WMD's.
My guess on what happened with Trump was the same MO as in Syria, he has a temper tantrum ("kill them all, even the Russians"
as was rumored) and he was informed of the possible fallout from such an attack.
Trump will attack, just not yet. There is some new toy they want to try out. Shock and Awe style.
Obama did what Clinton wing of Dems wanted him to do. Dem party is the party of Wall Street oligarchy now.
Notable quotes:
"... "...Obama has been trying hard: On 20 July 2011, Tyler Durden at zerohedge.com headlined " Bipartisan Plan Summary Charts Confirm Key Deficit 'Cuts ' Come From Imminent Social Security Pillage," and this conservative website expressed shock at how amazingly Republican this plan was , which Obama was trying to ram through. The "bipartisan" Obama had reached farther into Republican territory than Republican politicians had even dared. .." ..."
"... Obama's 'Mandate' To Slash Medicare, Medicaid & Social Security," ..."
"... So he had a mandate to cut social security, but not one to pass single payer? Remember when we heard that he wouldn't allow single payer advocates in the room with the insurance and pharmaceutical companies that we later learned that he had already made a deal with before the democrats worked on the hideously flawed ACA? And remember how pissed off people were when they learned what we were getting? But when Bernie was saying that we deserved universal health care people asked him how he was going to pay for it. And people cheered when Herheinous said that " universal health care will never ever happen." ..."
"... Obama also killed the anti war movement when he lied about Gaddafi's troops raping women and invaded Libya and then Syria. During his tenure states lost close to 1,000 seats. Finally after Obomber waltzed out of the WH people were so pissed off at him that they voted for Trump or against Hillary. ..."
"... In the end, the Clintons ushered in anti-New Deal Neoliberalism -- economics based on the Right Wing principles of 'greed is good' and 'monopolies are good for America' because they are good for Empire's global hegemony. At the end of his term, President Clinton signed a bill that revoked the last of the New Deal regulations that once protected the People from predatory capitalism. No sooner did Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette leave the White House for good, than the capitalists swooped into the "free market" and began asset-stripping and wage-stripping the American people -- beginning with the working poor and Black homeowners. Personal debt took off on a parabolic climb and it continues today, clouding everyone's future. ..."
"... I knew Obama wanted to cut social security, but not as early as he did. ..."
"... "I made you guys rich" he said not too long ago to the bank CEOs. And now he's getting rewarded for doing that. ..."
@jbob@jbob@jbob@jbob
wishes when they formed no opposition at all on matters like making sure GWB's tax cuts
weren't allowed to sunset, in fact what Obama did was even worse, Bush's tax cuts had that
sunset clause, not so with Obama he made them permanent .
This includes "Obama's Long Battle to Cut Social Security Benefits"
"Back in 2009, he came into office wanting to address the long-term financial issue of
Social Security not by removing the annual earnings-cap of around $100,000 that pertained
(and above which income was/is untaxed for Social Security, so that this change alone could
solve the problem), but instead by reducing retirement benefits to seniors: cutting the
benefits they receive.
This man, Obama, who went along with George W. Bush's taxpayer-bailouts for Wall
Street rather than institute bailouts of Main Street (the public) and who thereby
produced continuation of the economic crash for everyone other than the nation's wealthiest
1% or 5%, was also aiming to serve the wealthiest Americans at the expense of everyone else
when it comes to long-term changes of Social Security."
".....On 16 January 2009, four days before Obama became President, Michael D. Shear headlined
in the Washington Post, "Obama Pledges Entitlement Reform, " and he reported about " a
wide-ranging 70 minute interview with Washington Post reporters and editors," in which Obama
endorsed efforts by congressional Republicans , and "the Blue Dog Coalition of fiscally
conservative Democrats," to cut Social Security and Medicare. Progressives were already
disturbed at what their friends in Congress were leaking to them about Obama's strong
commitment to doing this, and so a few blog posts were issued to ring alarm bells publicly
about it. Paul Rosenberg at openleft.com headlined on January 17th (three days before Obama's
Inauguration), regarding "Obama's 'Mandate' To Slash Medicare, Medicaid & Social
Security,"
Remember the "Cat food Commission"?
"...Obama has been trying hard: On 20 July 2011, Tyler Durden at zerohedge.com headlined "
Bipartisan Plan Summary Charts Confirm Key Deficit 'Cuts ' Come From Imminent Social Security
Pillage," and this conservative website expressed shock at how amazingly Republican this plan
was , which Obama was trying to ram through. The "bipartisan" Obama had reached farther
into Republican territory than Republican politicians had even dared. .."
The following day, July 21st, Paul Kane bannered in the Washington Post, "Debt Talks Bring
Tensions Between Democrats, Obama to Surface," and he reported that even top Democrats in the
Senate – Reid, Kerry, Cantwell, Mikulsky, Lautenberg, and Feinstein – were
shocked that the Democratic President was leaving them entirely out of the loop in his budget
negotiations, and was negotiating only with leading Republicans . "
Obama froze the federal wage for two years. Why did he think that was a good idea? For the
same reason he lowballed the money for us little folks and refused to help the 9 million
people who were losing their homes while the banks continued to commit fraud which he still
didn't stop or prosecute.
From the article..
Obama's 'Mandate' To Slash Medicare, Medicaid & Social Security,"
So he had a mandate to cut social security, but not one to pass single payer? Remember
when we heard that he wouldn't allow single payer advocates in the room with the insurance
and pharmaceutical companies that we later learned that he had already made a deal with
before the democrats worked on the hideously flawed ACA? And remember how pissed off people
were when they learned what we were getting? But when Bernie was saying that we deserved
universal health care people asked him how he was going to pay for it. And people cheered
when Herheinous said that " universal health care will never ever happen."
Obama also killed the anti war movement when he lied about Gaddafi's troops raping women
and invaded Libya and then Syria. During his tenure states lost close to 1,000 seats. Finally
after Obomber waltzed out of the WH people were so pissed off at him that they voted for
Trump or against Hillary.
...Bernie's dilemma is an easily-exploited structural distortion that occurs because the
Left is forced to share a Political Party with the Centrists and Center-Right in order for
their voice to be heard. That's not going to change until the Left changes it.
Democratic operatives and the Democratic party elite can easily push this attitude from
the inside, in subtle ways. When Bernie brings up marching with MLK (because the Democratic
Party is not about to tout his bio and lend credence to Bernie's story), the Dems simply roll
their eyes and mumble, "Here we go again." Or, "That story never gets old... to Bernie."
The Democrats have a long history of bamboozling Blacks. Contemplate the breathtaking
betrayal of Blacks by the Clinton administration. Black lives and families were destroyed by
heinous, unjust laws and by Democratic policies that weaponized the criminal justice against
them. This has shattered and traumatized Black families for generations.
In the end, the Clintons ushered in anti-New Deal Neoliberalism -- economics based on the
Right Wing principles of 'greed is good' and 'monopolies are good for America' because they
are good for Empire's global hegemony. At the end of his term, President Clinton signed a
bill that revoked the last of the New Deal regulations that once protected the People from
predatory capitalism. No sooner did Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette leave the White House for
good, than the capitalists swooped into the "free market" and began asset-stripping and
wage-stripping the American people -- beginning with the working poor and Black homeowners.
Personal debt took off on a parabolic climb and it continues today, clouding everyone's
future.
But returning to Democratic operatives for a moment, do you know why Black leaders
completely defaulted to the Clinton Administration, and why they went on to plant the seed of
Democratic Party bamboozlement in their followers? It was in this cauldron that the current
DC shitshow was made:
In the early years, following Martin Luther King's death, progressive social programs were
slowly put into place to convey onto Blacks some of the same Liberties that white population
enjoyed in the US. Public institutions were rendered color blind, by law. Blacks who wanted a
good education found it easier to gain admittance and to find government grants to help pay
for it. For Blacks who wanted to start their own businesses, there were advisors who offered
them support and small business loans. Buying a home suddenly became a real option in Black
communities. New mortgage banks opened that helped millions of Black residents take
ownership. Labor unions continued to lift many out of poverty, and lifted more into the
Middle Class for the first time.
Behind the scenes, however, there was obstruction. The Reagan and Bush I administrations
did not make it easy for Black leaders to access the funding that had been earmarked for
these programs. The bureaucracy put up walls and slow-walked the processes, deadlines were
frequently missed, documents were misplaced, and there was a general indifference to their
requests. But the arrival of the Clinton administration changed all that. A group of
Democrats opened a special 'window' where Black Leaders could finally get the money to run
the programs -- with none the hassle. This was enormously helpful and strong bonds developed
between the Democratic Party and Black community activists.
The Democratic Party assumed that they had corralled the Black Vote -- as if Blacks were
vending machines. Put in the right platitudes and out would come the expected votes. But I
wonder about that.... The rising generation Black journalists I've been reading since the
2016 election, paint a different picture of this political relationship. They are skeptical
of the words that politicians use. To them, 'MLK' is just another public holiday. Invoking
the name Martin Luther King does not put food on the table, or pay for college, or protect
them from daily government abuses. I think they know exactly who Joe Biden is and they are
aware that the Democratic Party feels entitled to their votes -- even when the Party isn't
fighting for economic justice and basic human rights, like universal healthcare. Perhaps it
is it's their turn to triangulate for awhile -- and see if the Neoliberal Party leadership is
going to respect their needs.
Thanks. Especially after reading aliasalias' comment. I knew Obama wanted to cut social
security, but not as early as he did.
"I made you guys rich" he said not too long ago to the bank CEOs. And now he's getting
rewarded for doing that.
Biden too has made speeches about cutting it and they are making the rounds on Twitter,
but too many people aren't hearing about it and think that he's just a lovable ole Joe who
sometimes talks funny and sticks his foot in his mouth. He is not. He was a ruthless during
his tenure in congress and not enough of those videos are getting out.
As too his not having a racist bone in his body just listen to his speech on busing. Sure
sounded racist to me. Of all the people he could have talked about back when congress was
sane why did he choose one of the biggest racists to bring up? Because even though he was
racist he could work with him? Nah..
to me that Lewis the civil rights leader was now sated and fat and had been replaced
by Lewis the toadying politician who would screw anyone including his own if it suited
him. Whoopi the same. When people get fat and comfortable for too long, they forget who
they are and don't care who they've become. As long as it involves more for them,
whatever it is, is fine with them.
When Lewis was called out for endorsing Clinton over Bernie, Whoopi for criticizing
AOC as not respectful of her betters, of course their critics were called racists. A
lament that never seems to get too old to the folks using it. While the old folks, white
racists, and black militants wallow in and continue to argue over the past, the kids are
moving way beyond them. Interracial relationships and biracial people are leaving it all
behind. Soon no one will know what race or ethnicity anyone is.
I really don't know how Bernie stands it. I couldn't do it, certainly not at age 77.
How many years now has he dragged his old and sorry ass around the country trying to
improve peoples lives? In return all he gets some dumb ass in the audience chastising him
for having fought for her equality. Fuck her. Fuck them. Fuck them all. From the Clintons
and the media to the whiny people with their shorts in a knot over this or that ONE thing
he failed to make better that they can't cope with or overcome - ever.
Divide and conquer is exactly what it is all about. Those that have theirs vs those
that don't and making sure it stays that way. I am so tired of them, their game, and the
victims. At what point does a victim wise up and quit being a victim or willingly become
a willing participant in the game?
U.S. -- A new policy issued by the United States Department of Defense, in conjunction
with online platforms like Twitter and Facebook, will automatically enlist you to fight in a
foreign war if you post your support for attacking another country.
People who bravely post about how the U.S. needs to invade some country in the Middle East
or Asia or outer space will get a pop-up notice indicating they've been enlisted in the
military. A recruiter will then show up at their house and whisk them away to fight in the
foreign war they wanted to happen so badly.
"Frankly, recruitment numbers are down, and we needed some way to find people who are
really enthusiastic about fighting wars," said a DOD official. "Then it hit us like a drone
strike: there are plenty of people who argue vehemently for foreign intervention. It doesn't
matter what war we're trying to create: Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, North Korea,
China---these people are always reliable supporters of any invasion abroad. So why not get
them there on the frontlines?"
"After all, we want people who are passionate about occupying foreign lands, not grunts
who are just there for the paycheck," he added.
Strangely, as soon as the policy was implemented, 99% of saber-rattling suddenly
ceased.
Note: The Babylon Bee is the world's best satire site, totally inerrant in all its
truth claims. We write satire about Christian stuff, political stuff, and everyday life.
The Babylon Bee was created ex nihilo on the eighth day of the creation week, exactly
6,000 years ago. We have been the premier news source through every major world event, from
the Tower of Babel and the Exodus to the Reformation and the War of 1812. We focus on just
the facts, leaving spin and bias to other news sites like CNN and Fox News.
If you would like to complain about something on our site, take it up with God.
Unlike other satire sites, everything we post is 100% verified by Snopes.com.
In a pointed critique of President Trump's foreign policy leadership, Senate Minority Leader
Chuck Schumer stated to members of the press Thursday that "the American people deserve a
president who can more credibly justify war with Iran."
"What the American people need is a president who can make a much more convincing case for
going to war with Iran," said Schumer (D-NY), adding that the Trump administration's corruption
and dishonesty have "proven time and time again" that it lacks the conviction necessary to act
as an effective cheerleader for the conflict.
"Donald Trump is completely unfit to assume the mantle of telling the American people what
they need to hear in order to convince them a war with Iran is a good idea.
One of the key duties of the president is to gain the trust of the people so that they feel
comfortable going along with whatever he says. President Trump's failure to serve as a credible
advocate for this war is yet another instance in which he has disappointed not only his
colleagues in Washington, but also the entire nation."
Schumer later concluded his statement with a vow that he and his fellow Democrats will
continue working toward a more palatable case in favor of bombing Iran.
"... "Iran cannot sit idly by as the American imperialist machine encroaches on their territory, threatens their sovereignty, and endangers their very way of life," said Bolton, warning that America's fanatical leadership, steadfast devotion to flexing their muscles in the region, and alleged access to nuclear weapons necessitated that Iran strike back with a vigorous show of force as soon -- and as hard -- as possible. ..."
"... "The only thing these Westerners understand is violence, so it's imperative that Iran sends a clear message that they won't be walked over. Let's not forget, the U.S. defied a diplomatically negotiated treaty for seemingly no reason at all -- these are dangerous radicals that cannot be reasoned with. ..."
Demanding that the Middle Eastern nation retaliate immediately in self-defense against the
existential threat posed by America's military operations, National Security Adviser John
Bolton called for a forceful Iranian response Friday to continuing United States aggression.
"Iran cannot sit idly by as the American imperialist machine encroaches on their territory,
threatens their sovereignty, and endangers their very way of life," said Bolton, warning that
America's fanatical leadership, steadfast devotion to flexing their muscles in the region, and
alleged access to nuclear weapons necessitated that Iran strike back with a vigorous show of
force as soon -- and as hard -- as possible.
"The only thing these Westerners understand is violence, so it's imperative that Iran sends
a clear message that they won't be walked over. Let's not forget, the U.S. defied a
diplomatically negotiated treaty for seemingly no reason at all -- these are dangerous radicals
that cannot be reasoned with.
They've been given every opportunity to back down, but their goal is total domination of the
region, and Iran won't stand for that."
At press time, Bolton said that the only option left on the table was for Iran to launch a
full-fledged military strike against the Great Satan.
WASHINGTON -- Maintaining that the unmanned aerial vehicle was simply going about its day
without posing a threat to anyone, U.S. Department of State officials claimed Thursday that
one of their drones was minding its own business on its way to church when Iran attacked it
out of nowhere. "This was an outrageous, unprovoked attack by the Islamic Republic of Iran on
an innocent drone who merely wanted to attend mass in peace," said acting Secretary of State
Mike Pompeo, emphasizing the drone's upstanding moral character by pointing out its history
of donating to charity, volunteering at soup kitchens, and making homemade cookies for school
bake sales. "We're talking about a drone that sings in the church choir and coaches little
league baseball games on the weekends -- an absolute pillar of the community. This is an
upstanding family drone who did nothing to deserve any sort of attack. What kind of world do
we live in where an innocent drone can't fly through Iranian air space on its way to church?"
At press time, Department of Defense officials confirmed that their request for Iran to
return the drone's body back to the U.S. for a proper burial had gone unanswered.
It is a very lightly written article but it touches on a very sensitive nerve rather hard. I liked the entire premise of this
story and have ome to agree with the writer that Americans hardly care who dies wherever as long as they can find themselves shoping
goods they dont need with the money they don't have and stuffing their mouth with food they don't deserve.
President Donald Trump likes to think of himself as a statesman, an author, an A-level negotiator, but at heart, he's one thing:
an insult comic.
Every day in D.C. is a roast, the insults and belittling nicknames wielded like tiny comedy bullets. And if you haven't seen enough
of the fusillade on Twitter, all you need to do is turn on late night TV. Television comedy has a strange, symbiotic relationship
with the real political world, something between a feedback loop and a funhouse mirror....
I was shocked-- but not surprised-- to see visibly-pained CBS Pentagon flack David Martin on
the boob tube this morning quoting an unnamed source that speculated that the reason Trump
cancelled the bombing of Iran was that he got "cold-feet."
Thank you, Vasili Arkhipov, for getting cold-feet, too! Madness, our nation is afflicted
with madness.
"... "Try as you might, you can't expel him. He seems to live forever in the bowels of the federal agencies, periodically reemerging to cause pain and suffering -- but somehow never suffering himself." ..."
Someone whose confidence Bolton does not enjoy is Carlson, a rival for Trump's ear. Carlson,
a true
believer, took to the airwaves to savage the ambassador Friday night. "John Bolton is a
kind of bureaucratic tapeworm," Carlson said.
"Try as you might, you can't expel him. He
seems to live forever in the bowels of the federal agencies, periodically reemerging to cause
pain and suffering -- but somehow never suffering himself."
"... "Let's go back to economic issues. Many people link these difficulties with the Western sanctions. By the way, the European Union again extended them today. Sometimes, there are appeals to make peace with everyone. If Russia complied with the West's demands and agreed to everything, would this benefit our economy in any way?" ..."
"... "Second, what would this give us and what would it not give us, and what would we lose? Look, according to expert analyses, Russia fell short by about $50 billion as a result of these restrictions during these years, starting in 2014. The European Union lost $240 billion, the US $17 billion (we have a small volume of trade with them) and Japan $27 billion. All this affects employment in these countries, including the EU: they are losing our market... ..."
"... "Now, the attack on Huawei: where does it come from and what is its objective? The objective is to hold back the development of China, the country that has become a global rival of another power, the United States. The same is happening with Russia, and will continue to happen , so if we want to occupy a worthy place under the sun, we must become stronger, including, and above all, in the economy." [My Emphasis] ..."
"... Dealing with Putin's bolded remark is a question not just for Russia, China and Iran; it's a question for the entire world and harkens back to the words of George Kennan I cited a few days ago about the USA needing a policy to continue its economic dominance of the planet he uttered in 1947, the policy that became The Anti-Communist Crusade covering for its actual Super Imperialism policy to retain that dominance. ..."
"... What's happening is a titanic struggle to make the Outlaw US Empire cease pursuing that policy. ..."
I'd like barflies to ponder the following thought/probability: Radar Saturated
Environment--radiation not from just individual, discreet, identifiable points, but from such
a vast multitude that no single point can be discerned.
To further my brainstorming de-escalation, I'd like to point out what Putin said in his
Direct Line
yesterday about the economic war being waged against Russia in accordance with the Ukraine
Coup in 2014. Pavel Zarubin asks:
"Let's go back to economic issues. Many people link these difficulties with the Western
sanctions. By the way, the European Union again extended them today. Sometimes, there are
appeals to make peace with everyone. If Russia complied with the West's demands and agreed to
everything, would this benefit our economy in any way?"
I thought this a capital question very similar to Iran's dilemma. Putin's response is
quite long, so I won't cite it all. Rather, I'll limit it to his initial reply and conclusion
as they both deal with the Big Picture:
"First, what does it mean 'to make peace'? We have not fought with anyone and have no
desire to fight with anyone.
"Second, what would this give us and what would it not give us, and what would we lose?
Look, according to expert analyses, Russia fell short by about $50 billion as a result of
these restrictions during these years, starting in 2014. The European Union lost $240
billion, the US $17 billion (we have a small volume of trade with them) and Japan $27
billion. All this affects employment in these countries, including the EU: they are losing
our market....
"Now to the question of whether some things would be different if we give in and abandon
our fundamental national interests. We are not talking about reconciliation here. Perhaps
there will be some external signals, but no drastic change. Look, the People's Republic of
China has nothing to do with Crimea and Donbass, does it? We are accused of occupying
Donbass, which is nonsense and a lie.
But China has nothing to do with it, and yet the tariffs for Chinese goods are rising,
which is almost the same as sanctions.
"Now, the attack on Huawei: where does it come from and what is its objective? The
objective is to hold back the development of China, the country that has become a global
rival of another power, the United States. The same is happening with Russia, and will
continue to happen , so if we want to occupy a worthy place under the sun, we must become
stronger, including, and above all, in the economy." [My Emphasis]
This year's Direct Line was as usual filled with domestic issues some that lead to foreign
policy issues. The overall scope and distinctness of the minutia are as vast as Russia. I've
followed these over the years and note they reveal Russia's strengths and fragilities. I'm
tempted to cite more but will leave it to the reader to pursue, but after 90 minutes you
still won't be finished because the transcript isn't yet complete, which while frustrating is
also amazing.
Dealing with Putin's bolded remark is a question not just for Russia, China and Iran; it's
a question for the entire world and harkens back to the words of George Kennan I cited a few
days ago about the USA needing a policy to continue its economic dominance of the planet he
uttered in 1947, the policy that became The Anti-Communist Crusade covering for its actual
Super Imperialism policy to retain that dominance.
What's happening is a titanic struggle to
make the Outlaw US Empire cease pursuing that policy.
"... The politicians running the United States often owe their careers to military contractors. ..."
"... Iran isn't Iraq, Serbia, Panama, or an airstrip in Grenada. This country has real military strike-back capabilities that the backwater states we're used to invading simply do not, meaning war would present a far heightened danger not only to our troops but to civilians in the region. All our recent wars have been stupid, but this one would be really stupid. Just once, could we not do this? Does the script always have to end the same way? ..."
When it comes to starting wars, we don't even bother to change the script anymore
<...>
[...]Trump himself doesn't appear thrilled with the idea of going to war with Iran. When
Iran shot down the drone, Trump said it was "hard to believe it was intentional" and might
have been done by someone who was "loose and stupid," despite the aforementioned General
Salami saying Iran was "ready for war" after it happened. This is an area where we actually
want to encourage the all-hat-no-cattle side of our president.
The seeming ambivalence of Trump while the likes of Bolton and Mike Pompeo burn through
the same old invasion-pretext script presents a powerful case that this is just how the
American state operates, irrespective of who sits in the White House.
What we end up calling "aggression" abroad is often more like resistance to our plans to
control a region. Sometimes the "aggressor" is genuinely behaving badly, and sometimes not,
but for decades we've been lightning-quick to opt for military solutions to almost any
crisis, for increasingly obvious reasons.
The politicians running the United States often owe their careers to military
contractors. Their children typically don't fight in wars. The mayhem, death, and
environmental catastrophe that result from modern war never occur in their home states. It
long ago became too easy to make this decision, and we're on the brink of making it again. At
least with Iraq we pretended to argue.
Iran isn't Iraq, Serbia, Panama, or an airstrip in Grenada. This country has real
military strike-back capabilities that the backwater states we're used to invading simply do
not, meaning war would present a far heightened danger not only to our troops but to
civilians in the region. All our recent wars have been stupid, but this one would be really
stupid. Just once, could we not do this? Does the script always have to end the same
way?
"... Putin followed by China decided to act, or rather accelerate the actions they'd already begun. Medvedev & Hu Jintao both erred by not vetoing the UNSCR regarding Libya. ..."
"... Note that there's more than Iran to deescalate from. Indeed, there's a very big mess needing cleaning. The group that's ultimately responsible for the mess is the Current Oligarchy as they did this for their usual goal of attaining A Few Dollars More to further enlarge their Fistful of Dollars at what appeared to be little risk. ..."
"... Trump and the Neocons will be sacrificed. But will the Current Oligarchy have learned its lesson, ceased its attempt at world domination, and become willing to settle for its slice of Win-Win are the big IFs. But for us to get to that point in 2021, we must get beyond the current inflection point here in 2019. ..."
"... Probably the majority of us bar flies have long accepted that there is a "deep state," "ruling plutocracy," call it what you will, effectively running the US...probably for most of its existence, truth be told. ..."
"... But the most interesting thing about the tail end of the Obama presidency, and amplified through the Trump term, was realizing that there is not a single monolith "Deep State." There are discrete groups. When things were going well for the sole superpower, in the '90s and 00's, all of the factions were able to loot to their hearts' content, so you didn't really notice their interests could diverge. ..."
"... But as the overreach became unsustainable, and the World began fighting back, you began to see infighting. I won't pretend to be smart enough to know who is who and how each faction's vision of the world fits or fights with each other, but I think we saw a bit of a glimpse here in Trump's actions. ..."
"... Trump may or may not have much original thought--it's hard to tell, with presidents becoming largely weather vanes. But vanes can show how the winds are blowing. There certainly appears to be an extremely powerful Zionist faction, often allied with the NeoCon "might-makes-right" faction, and there is strong reason to believe Trump was largely bankrolled by and is extremely beholden to that group. ..."
"... But at the very last moment, one of the few groups who are more powerful--the NeoLiberal/Globalist/Financier faction, threw their weight in behind "No War Today." ..."
"... They certainly don't mind when Israel goes stirring shit here and there, as long as they're profiting greatly from low-level warfare and arms sales. But THIS kind of war, that would almost certainly devastate world markets? No. ..."
The Outlaw US Empire finds itself embroiled in a Hybrid Third World War of its own making
that began while Obama was in office in an attempt to recoup and then expand its economic
dominance. On several occasions Russia's Putin warned the West about the consequences of its
intensions, but the West refused to listen.
Putin followed by China decided to act, or rather accelerate the actions they'd already
begun. Medvedev & Hu Jintao both erred by not vetoing the UNSCR regarding Libya.
The subsequent change in heads-of-state to Putin & Xi also marked a sea change in
treatment of West at UN and in Russia/China relations. Back at the helm, Putin returns to
warning the West about consequences. Then came the demonization in the run up to Sochi
Olympics and subsequent coup in Ukraine of 2014 followed by Crimea's rejoining Russia and
successful resistance by Donbass against aggression.
In 2015, Minsk 2 handcuffed NATO allied
with Ukrainian fascists; JCPOA was finalized in July; Russia intervened in Syria at end of
September--all turning points blunting Outlaw US Empire aggression.
These events seem to help
POTUS aspirations of Sanders and Trump, which Trump won in 2016 thanks to Sanders being
stabbed in the back by the Democratic Party establishment. The 2016 POTUS campaign, election
and aftermath indicate the breakout of a factional fight within the Current Oligarchy. Trump
gets the green light from the prevailing faction within the Current Oligarchy to violate JCPOA and commence economic war with Iran, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela while overseeing
the lawfare coup in Brazil to attack BRICS.
And that pretty much brings us to our current
moment, although I omitted a few details like Trade War with the world.
Note that there's more than Iran to deescalate from. Indeed, there's a very big mess
needing cleaning. The group that's ultimately responsible for the mess is the Current
Oligarchy as they did this for their usual goal of attaining A Few Dollars More to further
enlarge their Fistful of Dollars at what appeared to be little risk.
But , their risk
assessment was wrong thanks to decades of accumulated hubris. Trump finds himself the
figurehead of the treed Current Oligarchy that at present can't figure out a way down.
There's nothing symbolic to do. What needs to be done must be tangible. Removing its illegal
sanctions and surrendering to the many WTO challenges to its illegal trade practices would be
relatively quiet yet tangible ways to climb down without too much publicity.
Abstaining at UNSC to sanctions removal from DPRK and Iran would also be substantive and relatively quiet.
By then a new POTUS will be in charge and further changes can be made that can be attributed
to it as part of usual policy change thus saving whatever face remains to be saved.
Trump and the Neocons will be sacrificed. But will the Current Oligarchy have learned its
lesson, ceased its attempt at world domination, and become willing to settle for its slice of
Win-Win are the big IFs. But for us to get to that point in 2021, we must get beyond the
current inflection point here in 2019.
"...the Current Oligarchy running the Outlaw US Empire."
I agree with the gist of this, but would refine it a bit. Probably the majority of us bar
flies have long accepted that there is a "deep state," "ruling plutocracy," call it what you
will, effectively running the US...probably for most of its existence, truth be told.
But the
most interesting thing about the tail end of the Obama presidency, and amplified through the
Trump term, was realizing that there is not a single monolith "Deep State." There are
discrete groups. When things were going well for the sole superpower, in the '90s and 00's,
all of the factions were able to loot to their hearts' content, so you didn't really notice
their interests could diverge.
But as the overreach became unsustainable, and the World began
fighting back, you began to see infighting. I won't pretend to be smart enough to know who is
who and how each faction's vision of the world fits or fights with each other, but I think we
saw a bit of a glimpse here in Trump's actions.
Trump may or may not have much original thought--it's hard to tell, with presidents
becoming largely weather vanes. But vanes can show how the winds are blowing. There certainly
appears to be an extremely powerful Zionist faction, often allied with the NeoCon
"might-makes-right" faction, and there is strong reason to believe Trump was largely
bankrolled by and is extremely beholden to that group. Hence his strong pro-Israel/anti-Iran
stance.
But at the very last moment, one of the few groups who are more powerful--the NeoLiberal/Globalist/Financier faction, threw their weight in behind "No War Today."
They
certainly don't mind when Israel goes stirring shit here and there, as long as they're
profiting greatly from low-level warfare and arms sales. But THIS kind of war, that would
almost certainly devastate world markets? No.
So the Pentagon drew the line, and Trump toed
the line. The nut jobs may have painted everyone so far into a corner that a major conflict
might still happen, but there are now truly powerful forces trying to throw cold water on
it.
The current conflict is about the US hegemony in the region, not anything else.
The analysis is really good. I especially like "The Trump administration is essentially a one-trick pony when it comes to
foreign policy toward hostile states. The standard quo is to apply massive economic pressure and demand surrender"
That means that Doug Bandow
proposals while good are completely unrealistic.
Notable quotes:
"... Sixteen years ago, the George W. Bush administration manipulated intelligence to scare the public into backing an aggressive war against Iraq. The smoking gun mushroom clouds that National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice warned against didn’t exist, but the invasion long desired by neoconservatives and other hawks proceeded. Liberated Iraqis rejected U.S. plans to create an American puppet state on the Euphrates and the aftermath turned into a humanitarian and geopolitical catastrophe which continues to roil the Middle East. ..."
"... Now the Trump administration appears to be following the same well-worn path. The president has fixated on Iran, tearing up the nuclear accord with Tehran and declaring economic war on it—as well as anyone dealing with Iran. He is pushing America toward war even as he insists that he wants peace. How stupid does he believe we are? ..."
"... Washington did much to encourage a violent, extremist revolution in Tehran. The average Iranian could be forgiven for viewing America as a virulently hostile power determined to do his or her nation ill at almost every turn. ..."
"... The Shah was ousted in 1979. Following his departure the Reagan administration backed Iraq’s Saddam Hussein when he invaded Iran, triggering an eight-year war which killed at least half a million people. Washington reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers to protect revenue subsequently lent to Baghdad, provided Iraq with intelligence for military operations, and supplied components for chemical weapons employed against Iranian forces. In 1988 the U.S. Navy shot down an Iranian civilian airliner in international airspace. ..."
"... Economic sanctions were first imposed on Iran in 1979 and regularly expanded thereafter. Washington forged a close military partnership with Iran’s even more repressive rival, Saudi Arabia. In the immediate aftermath of its 2003 victory over Saddam Hussein, the Bush administration rejected Iran’s offer to negotiate; neoconservatives casually suggested that “real men” would conquer Tehran as well. Even the Obama administration threatened to take military action against Iran. ..."
"... Contrary to the common assumption in Washington that average Iranians would love the United States for attempting to destroy their nation’s economy, the latest round of sanctions apparently triggered a notable rise in anti-American sentiment. Nationalism trumped anti-clericalism. ..."
"... Iran also has no desire for war, which it would lose. However, Washington’s aggressive economic and military policies create pressure on Tehran to respond. Especially since administration policy—sanctions designed to crash the economy, military moves preparing for war — almost certainly have left hardliners, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, who opposed negotiations with Washington, ascendant in Tehran. ..."
"... Europeans also point to Bush administration lies about Iraq and the fabricated 1964 Tonkin Gulf incident used to justify America’s entry into the Vietnam War. Even more important, the administration ostentatiously fomented the current crisis by trashing the JCPOA, launching economic war against Iran, threatening Tehran’s economic partners, and insisting on Iran’s submission. A cynic might reasonably conclude that the president and his aides hoped to trigger a violent Iranian response. ..."
"... Indeed, a newspaper owned by the Saudi royal family recently called for U.S. strikes on Iran. One or the reasons Al Qaeda launched the 9/11 attacks was to trigger an American military response against a Muslim nation. A U.S.-Iran war would be the mother of all Mideast conflagrations. ..."
"... In parallel, Washington should propose negotiations to lower tensions in other issues. But there truly should be no preconditions, requiring the president to consign the Pompeo list to a White House fireplace. In return for Iranian willingness to drop confrontational behavior in the region, the U.S. should offer to reciprocate—for instance, indicate a willingness to cut arms sales to the Saudis and Emiratis, end support for the Yemen war, and withdraw American forces from Syria and Iraq. ..."
"... Most important, American policymakers should play the long-game. Rather than try to crash the Islamic Republic and hope for the best, Washington should encourage Iran to open up, creating more opportunity and influence for a younger generation that desires a freer society. ..."
Sixteen years ago, the George W. Bush administration manipulated intelligence to scare the public into backing an aggressive war
against Iraq. The smoking gun mushroom clouds that National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice warned against didn’t exist, but the
invasion long desired by neoconservatives and other hawks proceeded. Liberated Iraqis rejected U.S. plans to create an American puppet
state on the Euphrates and the aftermath turned into a humanitarian and geopolitical catastrophe which continues to roil the Middle
East.
Thousands of dead Americans, tens of thousands of wounded and maimed U.S. personnel, hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, and
millions of Iraqis displaced. There was the sectarian conflict, destruction of the historic Christian community, the creation of
Al Qaeda in Iraq—which morphed into the far deadlier Islamic State—and the enhanced influence of Iran. The prime question was how
could so many supposedly smart people be so stupid?
Now the Trump administration appears to be following the same well-worn path. The president has fixated on Iran, tearing up the
nuclear accord with Tehran and declaring economic war on it—as well as anyone dealing with Iran. He is pushing America toward war
even as he insists that he wants peace. How stupid does he believe we are?
The Iranian regime is malign. Nevertheless, despite being under almost constant siege it has survived longer than the U.S.-crafted
dictatorship which preceded the Islamic Republic. And the latter did not arise in a vacuum. Washington did much to encourage a violent,
extremist revolution in Tehran. The average Iranian could be forgiven for viewing America as a virulently hostile power determined
to do his or her nation ill at almost every turn.
In 1953 the United States backed a coup against democratically selected prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh. Washington then aided
the Shah in consolidating power, including the creation of the secret police, known as SAVAK. He forcibly modernized Iran’s still
conservative Islamic society, while his corrupt and repressive rule united secular and religious Iranians against him.
The Shah was ousted in 1979. Following his departure the Reagan administration backed Iraq’s Saddam Hussein when he invaded Iran,
triggering an eight-year war which killed at least half a million people. Washington reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers to protect revenue
subsequently lent to Baghdad, provided Iraq with intelligence for military operations, and supplied components for chemical weapons
employed against Iranian forces. In 1988 the U.S. Navy shot down an Iranian civilian airliner in international airspace.
Economic sanctions were first imposed on Iran in 1979 and regularly expanded thereafter. Washington forged a close military partnership
with Iran’s even more repressive rival, Saudi Arabia. In the immediate aftermath of its 2003 victory over Saddam Hussein, the Bush
administration rejected Iran’s offer to negotiate; neoconservatives casually suggested that “real men” would conquer Tehran as well.
Even the Obama administration threatened to take military action against Iran.
As Henry Kissinger reportedly once said, even a paranoid can have enemies. Contrary to the common assumption in Washington that
average Iranians would love the United States for attempting to destroy their nation’s economy, the latest round of sanctions apparently
triggered a notable rise in anti-American sentiment. Nationalism trumped anti-clericalism.
The hostile relationship with Iran also has allowed Saudi Arabia, which routinely undercuts American interests and values, to
gain a dangerous stranglehold over U.S. policy. To his credit President Barack Obama attempted to rebalance Washington’s Mideast
policy. The result was the multilateral Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. It provided for an intrusive inspection regime designed
to discourage any future Iranian nuclear weapons program—which U.S. intelligence indicated had been inactive since 2003.
However, candidate Donald Trump had an intense and perverse desire to overturn every Obama policy. His tight embrace of Israeli
prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who ignored the advice of his security chiefs in denouncing the accord, and the Saudi royals,
who Robert Gates once warned would fight Iran to the last American, also likely played an important role.
Last year the president withdrew from the accord and followed with a declaration of economic war. He then declared the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard Corps, a military organization, to be a terrorist group. (Washington routinely uses the “terrorist” designation
for purely political purposes.) Finally, there are reports, officially denied by Washington, that U.S. forces, allied with Islamist
radicals—the kind of extremists responsible for most terrorist attacks on Americans—have been waging a covert war against Iranian
smuggling operations.
The president claimed that he wanted to negotiate: “We aren’t looking for regime change,” he said. “We are looking for no nuclear
weapons.” But that is what the JCPOA addressed. His policy is actually pushing Tehran to expand its nuclear program. Moreover, last
year Secretary of State Mike Pompeo gave a speech that the Washington Post’s Jason Rezaian, who spent more than a year in
Iranian prison, called “silly” and “completely divorced from reality.”
In a talk to an obsequious Heritage Foundation audience, Pompeo set forth the terms of Tehran’s surrender: Iran would be expected
to abandon any pretense of maintaining an independent foreign policy and yield its deterrent missile capabilities, leaving it subservient
to Saudi Arabia, with the latter’s U.S.-supplied and -trained military. Tehran could not even cooperate with other governments, such
as Syria, at their request. The only thing missing from Pompeo’s remarks was insistence that Iran accept an American governor-general
in residence.
The proposal was a nonstarter and looked like the infamous 1914 Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia, which was intended to be
rejected and thereby justify war. After all, National Security Advisor John Bolton expressed his policy preference in a 2015 New
York Times op-ed titled: “To Stop Iran’s Bomb, Bomb Iran.” Whatever the president’s true intentions, Tehran can be forgiven for
seeing Washington’s position as one of regime change, by war if necessary.
The administration apparently assumed that new, back-breaking sanctions would either force the regime to surrender at the conference
table or collapse amid political and social conflict. Indeed, when asked if he really believed sanctions would change Tehran’s behavior,
Pompeo answered that “what can change is, the people can change the government.” Both Reuel Marc Gerecht of the Foundation for the
Defense of Democracies and Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations have recently argued that the Islamic Republic is an exhausted
regime, one that is perhaps on its way to extinction.
However, Rezaian says “there is nothing new” about Tehran’s difficult Iranian economic problems. “Assuming that this time around
the Iranian people can compel their government to bend to America’s will seems—at least to anyone who has spent significant time
in Iran in recent decades—fantastical,” he said. Gerecht enthusiasm for U.S. warmaking has led to mistakes in the past. He got Iraq
wrong seventeen years ago when he wrote that “a war with Iraq might not shake up the Middle East much at all.
Today the administration is using a similar strategy against Russia, North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela. The citizens of these countries
have not risen against their oppressors to establish a new, democratic, pro-American regime. Numerous observers wrongly predicted
that the Castro regime would die after the end of Soviet subsidies and North Korea’s inevitable fall in the midst of a devastating
famine. Moreover, regime collapse isn’t likely to yield a liberal, democratic republic when the most radical, authoritarian elites
remain best-armed.
... ... ...
More important, Washington does not want to go to war with Iran, which is larger than Iraq, has three times the population, and
is a real country. The regime, while unpopular with many Iranians, is much better rooted than Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship. Tehran
possesses unconventional weapons, missiles, and allies which could spread chaos throughout the region. American forces in Syria and
Iraq would be vulnerable, while Baghdad’s stability could be put at risk. If Americans liked the Iraq debacle, then they would love
the chaos likely to result from attempting to violently destroy the Iranian state. David Frum, one of the most avid neoconservative
advocates of the Iraq invasion, warned that war with Iran would repeat Iraqi blunders on “a much bigger sale, without allies, without
justification, and without any plan at all for what comes next.”
Iran also has no desire for war, which it would lose. However, Washington’s aggressive economic and military policies create pressure
on Tehran to respond. Especially since administration policy—sanctions designed to crash the economy, military moves preparing for
war — almost certainly have left hardliners, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, who opposed negotiations with Washington,
ascendant in Tehran.
Carefully calibrated military action, such as tanker attacks, might be intended to show “resolve” to gain credibility. Washington
policymakers constantly justify military action as necessary to demonstrate that they are willing to take military action. Doing
so is even more important for a weaker power. Moreover, observed the Eurasia Group, Iranian security agencies “have a decades-long
history of conducting attacks and other operations aimed precisely at undermining the diplomatic objectives of a country’s elected
representatives.” If Iran is responsible, observed Ali Vaez of the International Crisis Group, then administration policy perversely
“is rendering Iran more aggressive, not less,” thereby making the Mideast more, not less dangerous
Of course, Tehran has denied any role in the attacks and there is good reason to question unsupported Trump administration claims
of Iranian guilt. The president’s indifferent relationship to the truth alone raises serious questions. Europeans also point to Bush
administration lies about Iraq and the fabricated 1964 Tonkin Gulf incident used to justify America’s entry into the Vietnam War.
Even more important, the administration ostentatiously fomented the current crisis by trashing the JCPOA, launching economic war
against Iran, threatening Tehran’s economic partners, and insisting on Iran’s submission. A cynic might reasonably conclude that
the president and his aides hoped to trigger a violent Iranian response.
Other malicious actors also could be responsible for tanker attacks. Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Israel, ISIS, and Al
Qaeda all likely believe they would benefit from an American war on Tehran and might decide to speed the process along by fomenting
an incident. Indeed, a newspaper owned by the Saudi royal family recently called for U.S. strikes on Iran. One or the reasons Al
Qaeda launched the 9/11 attacks was to trigger an American military response against a Muslim nation. A U.S.-Iran war would be the
mother of all Mideast conflagrations.
Rather than continue a military spiral upward, Washington should defuse Gulf tensions. The administration brought the Middle East
to a boil. It can calm the waters. Washington should stand down its military, offering to host multilateral discussions with oil
consuming nations, energy companies, and tanker operators over establishing shared naval security in sensitive waterways, including
in the Middle East. Given America’s growing domestic energy production, the issue no longer should be considered Washington’s responsibility.
Other wealthy industrialized states should do what is necessary for their economic security.
The administration also should make a serious proposal for talks. It won’t be easy. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
declared “negotiation has no benefit and carries harm.” He further argued that “negotiations are a tactic of this pressure,” which
is the ultimate “strategic aim.” Even President Hassan Rouhani rejected contact without a change in U.S. policy. “Whenever they lift
the unjust sanctions and fulfill their commitments and return to the negotiations table, which they left themselves, the door is
not closed,” he said. In back channel discussions Iranians supposedly suggested that the U.S. reverse the latest sanctions, at least
on oil sales, ending attempts to wreck Iran’s economy.
If the president seriously desires talks with Tehran, then he should demonstrate that he does not expect preemptive surrender.
The administration should suspend its “maximum pressure” campaign and propose multilateral talks on tightening the nuclear agreement
in return for additional American and allied concessions, such as further sanctions relief.
In parallel, Washington should propose negotiations to lower tensions in other issues. But there truly should be no preconditions,
requiring the president to consign the Pompeo list to a White House fireplace. In return for Iranian willingness to drop confrontational
behavior in the region, the U.S. should offer to reciprocate—for instance, indicate a willingness to cut arms sales to the Saudis
and Emiratis, end support for the Yemen war, and withdraw American forces from Syria and Iraq. Tehran has far greater interest in
neighborhood security than the United States, which Washington must respect if the latter seeks to effectively disarm Iran. The administration
should invite the Europeans to join such an initiative, since they have an even greater reason to worry about Iranian missiles and
more.
Most important, American policymakers should play the long-game. Rather than try to crash the Islamic Republic and hope for the
best, Washington should encourage Iran to open up, creating more opportunity and influence for a younger generation that desires
a freer society. That requires greater engagement, not isolation. Washington’s ultimate objective should be the liberal transformation
of Iran, freeing an ancient civilization to regain its leading role in today’s world, which would have a huge impact on the region.
The Trump administration is essentially a one-trick pony when it comes to foreign policy toward hostile states. The standard quo
is to apply massive economic pressure and demand surrender. This approach has failed in every case. Washington has caused enormous
economic hardship, but no target regime has capitulated. In Iran, like North Korea, U.S. policy sharply raised tensions and the chances
of conflict.
War would be a disaster. Instead, the administration must, explained James Fallows, “through bluff and patience, change the actions
of a government whose motives he does not understand well, and over which his influence is limited.” Which requires the administration
to adopt a new, more serious strategy toward Tehran, and quickly.
While everybody is entertained with the drone and events in the Persian Gulf, as it susally
goes lately, a coup d´etat is in the works in Georgia, against the moderate, not so
russophobic as the US/UK need, recently elected government who wants to restore mutual
beneficcial relations with its neighbors..
As the available videos
illustrate , this is the same crowd on rollpay we are used to witness in the Maidan, on
jeans bermudas and t-shirts or bare chest, wearing police helmets and shields, with both, the
US and Ukrainian flags waving in the sides and amongst the crowd of "protestors".
It is also reported that the handlers were all English speakers....
Most of injured resulting, according to Georgian Health Ministry, belong to police
members.
When you see a rash, you should look beyond the skin for a cause. It has been like this with
Hong Kong over the last few weeks. On the surface we see impressively organised demonstrations
to stop the executive from introducing extradition laws to China. We observe that university
students and others not much older are running the demonstrations with military precision. The
Mainland Chinese should be impressed.
They are unlikely to see it that way. The build-up of riots against Hong Kong's proposed
extradition treaty with the Mainland started months ago, supported and driven by commentary in
the Land of the Free . America is now coming out in the open as China's adversary, no longer
just a trading partner worried by the trade imbalances. And Hong Kong is the pressure
point.
This happened before, in 2014. The Chinese leadership was certain the riots in Hong Kong
reflected the work of American agencies. The following is an extract translated from a speech
by Major-General Qiao Liang, a leading strategist for the Peoples' Liberation Army, addressing
the Chinese Communist Party's Central Committee in 2015:
"Since the Diaoyu Islands conflict and the Huangyan Island conflict, incidents have kept
popping up around China, including the confrontation over China's 981 oil rigs with Vietnam
and Hong Kong's "Occupy Central" event. Can they still be viewed as simply accidental?
I accompanied General Liu Yazhou, the Political Commissar of the National Defence
University, to visit Hong Kong in May 2014. At that time, we heard that the "Occupy Central"
movement was being planned and could take place by end of the month. However, it didn't
happen in May, June, July, or August.
What happened? What were they waiting for?
Let's look at another time table: the U.S. Federal Reserve's exit from the Quantitative
Easing (QE) policy. The U.S. said it would stop QE at the beginning of 2014. But it stayed
with the QE policy in April, May, June, July, and August. As long as it was in QE, it kept
overprinting dollars and the dollar's price couldn't go up. Thus, Hong Kong's "Occupy
Central" should not happen either.
At the end of September, the Federal Reserve announced the U.S. would exit from QE. The
dollar started going up. Then Hong Kong's "Occupy Central" broke out in early October.
Actually, the Diaoyu Islands, Huangyan Island, the 981 rigs, and Hong Kong's "Occupy
Central" movement were all bombs. The successful explosion of any one of them would lead to a
regional crisis or a worsened investment environment around China. That would force the
withdrawal of a large amount of investment from this region, which would then return to the
U.S."
That America is stoking and organising discontent anew in Hong Kong is probably still
China's view today. Clearly, the Chinese believed America covertly managed "Occupy Central" and
therefore are at it again. Apart from what their spies tell them, the protests are too well
organised and planned to be spontaneous. This time, the attack appears to have a better chance
of success. The plan is coordinated with American pressure on Hong Kong's dollar peg in an
attempt to destabilise it, principally through the threat to extend tariffs against China to
Hong Kong. This second attempt to collapse Hong Kong is therefore more serious.
Hong Kong is critical, because through Shanghai Connect it is the only lawful channel for
foreign investment flows into China. This is important to the Americans, because the US
Treasury cannot afford to see global portfolio flows attracted into China at a time when they
will be needed to invest in increasing quantities of US Treasury stock. Understand that, and
you will have grasped a large part of the urgency behind America's attempt to destabilise Hong
Kong.
Qiao Liang makes this point elsewhere in his aforementioned speech, claiming American
tactics are the consequence of the ending of Bretton Woods:
"Without the restriction of gold, the US can print dollars at will. If they keep a large
amount of dollars inside the US, it will certainly create inflation. If they export dollars
to the world, the whole world is helping the US deal with its inflation. That's why inflation
is not high in the US."
While one can take issue with his simplistic analysis, that is not the point. What matters
is what the Chinese believe. Qiao concludes:
"By issuing debt, the US brings a large amount of dollars from overseas back to the US's
three big markets: the commodity market, the Treasury Bills market, and the stock market. The
US repeats this cycle to make money: printing money, exporting money overseas, and bringing
money back. The US has become a financial empire."
Conceptually, Qiao was broadly correct. His error in these two statements was to not explain
that ownership of dollars means they are deployed exclusively in America, but perhaps he was
simplifying his argument for a non-technical audience. All dollars, despite foreign ownership,
remain in the American economy as a combination of US Treasuries and T-bills, investment in US
listed and unlisted securities, physical assets such as property and also deposits through
correspondent banks held in New York.
It is not the dollars that flow, but their ownership that changes. Dollars are bought and
sold for foreign currencies by central banks, sovereign wealth funds, commercial banks,
insurance companies and pension funds. The currencies in which these entities invest matters,
and investment decisions are obviously affected by currency prospects. It allows the US
Treasury to attract these flows into the dollar by simply making other currencies less
attractive. Foreign owners of foreign currencies can easily be spooked into the safe havens of
the dollar and US Treasuries. This is the way foreigners are corralled into funding the budget
deficit.
A weakening yuan-dollar exchange rate will dissuade international portfolios from investing
in China's projects, for which the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank was established. China
should respond to moves to undermine her currency, seeking to enhance the attractions of her
investment opportunities to international investment funds by taking measures to support the
yuan. If not, global investment funds will simply not come China's way.
Besides attracting portfolio flows into the US, a rising dollar is also a threat to foreign
governments and corporates who have borrowed dollars and then have to pay them back later. This
was what mauled South-East Asian economies in the 1997 financial crisis. China as a state is
not in this position, though some of her regional trading partners will have fallen into this
trap again.
It is clear from elsewhere in Qiao's speech that the Chinese understand America's motives
and methods. Therefore, they will anticipate American actions to undermine the yuan. If the
Americans succeed and with the yuan made unattractive, international portfolio money that is
already invested in China will be sucked out, potentially crashing China's capital markets.
With the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act going onto the US statute book, President
Trump will be able to use the link to the Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose sanctions
against trade, finance and technology. The concern in Hong Kong is personal wealth will now
decamp and that Hong Kong property prices will implode.
The British involvement
America's strategy has included putting pressure on her allies to fall into line with her
interests against China. All NATO members have been told not to buy Huawei equipment.
Protective of the special relationship, the British have gone along with it. But Cheltenham's
GCHQ (the UK's cyber monitoring agency) has at least given Huawei the opportunity to address
the security issues that have been raised.
A greater problem is bound to arise, and that is the role of the City of London. In 2014,
the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, agreed a plan with the Chinese leadership
for the City to work with Hong Kong to internationalise the yuan. The Chinese wanted to bypass
New York for obvious reasons.
The request to meet Osborne went through Boris Johnson, at the time Mayor of London and
leading a trade delegation to China on behalf of the City. Johnson is now odds-on favourite to
become the next Prime Minister and if appointed will undoubtedly find himself in a difficult
position. He will have to walk a very fine line between Britain's developing Chinese interests,
her special relationship with America, his new friendship with Trump, and also the trade
agreement with America which both Trump and Johnson are likely to prioritise following
Brexit.
Depending on how Johnson acts, China may have to put her plans to internationalise the yuan
on hold. The risk for China is that with her international financial plans threatened and the
Americans determined to strengthen the dollar in order to undermine the yuan, she will not have
access to the international portfolio flows she needs to help finance her infrastructure plans
and her Made in China 2025 project.
Put another way, we face no less than a dangerous escalation of the financial war between
America and China, with America trying to close off international finance to
China.
China's policy predicament
In a tactical retreat, Hong Kong has put plans to introduce the new extradition legislation
on hold. All it has achieved is to redirect demonstrators' demands towards Hong Kong's Chief
Executive to resign, and the demonstrations continued.
The question now arises as to how the Chinese will proceed. So far, they have played their
hand defensively in the financial war against America, but things are now coming to a head.
Obviously, they will protect Hong Kong, but more importantly they must address capital flight
through the Shanghai Connect. One option will be to suspend it, but that would undermine the
trust fundamental to future inward portfolio flows. It would also be a huge setback for the
international yuan. In any event, action must be taken to underwrite the yuan exchange
rate.
One option would be to increase interest rates, but this will risk being read as a panic
measure. In this context, an early and definite rise in interest rates would be better than a
delay or a lesser adjustment to monetary policy. For the domestic economy, this would favour
savers in an economy already savings-driven, but disadvantage exporters and many small and
medium-size businesses. It would amount to a reversal of recent economic and monetary policies,
which are intended to increase domestic consumption and reduce export surpluses.
The economic theories that the central planners in Beijing actually believe in will become
centre-stage. China has adopted the global neo-Keynesian standard of economic planning and
credit expansion. When the country moved rapidly from a peasant economy, credit was able to
expand without the regular pitfalls of a credit cycle observed in an advanced economy being
noticeable. This was because economic progress eclipsed the consequences of monetary
inflation.
But China is no longer an economic green-field site, having become predominantly a modern
economy. Consequently, she has moved from her pure mercantilist approach to running the economy
to a more financial and monetary style of central planning.
Through deploying similar monetary policies to the Americans, it might now occur to
Beijing's central planners that they are at a severe disadvantage playing that game. The dollar
and the yuan are both unbacked credit-based currencies bedevilled with debt. But if the dollar
goes head-to-head against the yuan, the dollar will always destabilise the yuan.
Supping from the Keynesian cup is China's principal weakness. She cannot afford to face down
the dollar, and the Americans know it. For the Chinese, the path of least risk appears to be
the one China has pursued successfully to date: do as little as possible to rock the boat, and
let America make the mistakes. However, as I shall argue later, the time is coming for China to
take the offensive.
Meanwhile, Chinese inaction is likely to be encouraged by another factor: the escalation of
US embargoes on Iranian oil, and the increasing possibility of a new Middle-East conflict with
Iran. This is bound to have a bearing on Chinese-American relations.
False flags and
Iran
Last week, two oil tankers suffered an attack by parties unknown after leaving the Strait of
Hormuz outward-bound. Predictably, the Americans and the Saudis blamed Iran, and Iran has
denied involvement. The Americans, supported by the British, have been quick to point out that
Iran had the motivation to attack and therefore was the guilty party. As a consequence of US
sanctions, her economy is in a state of collapse and Iran needs higher oil prices. The US has
been building up its Gulf fleet provocatively, increasing tensions. According to Al-Jazeera,
Iran's President Hassan Rouhani warned last December that "If one day they (the US) want to
prevent the export of Iran's oil, then no oil will be exported from the Persian Gulf."
Perhaps that day is close. Tehran must be desperate, and she blames the Americans and
Israelis for a false flag attack, an accusation that bases its credibility on previous
incidents in the region and a suspicion that Israel backed by America wants an excuse to attack
Iran. The Syrian bridge to Hezbollah threatens Israel to its North, so its involvement is
logical, and it looks like a Mossad operation. By driving Iran into a corner, it is hard to see
any other outcome than further escalation.
If America does get tied up in a new war in the Middle East, she will be fighting on two
Asian fronts: militarily against Iran and financially against China. It could descend rapidly
into a global crisis, which would not suit China's interests or anyone else's for that matter.
However, an American attack against Iran could trigger the widespread flight of investment
money to the safety of the dollar and US Treasuries.
If America achieves that objective before sending in the troops, she could then compromise
on both Iran and on tariffs against China. Assuming Qiao Liang's analysis still has traction in
Beijing, this is the way American strategy might be read by the Chinese war-gamers.
Meanwhile, China is securing her defences. Besides aligning with Russia and both being
expected to vote at the UN against Israeli/American attempts to escalate tensions in the Gulf,
Russia can be expected to covertly help Iran. Beijing is also securing a partnership to protect
North Korea, with Xi visiting Pyongyang this week in order to head off American action in that
direction. The whole Asian continent from Ukraine to the Bering Sea is now on a defensive
footing.
How will it be resolved?
If the funding of the US deficit is the underling problem, then a continuation of China's
longstanding policy of not reacting to America's financial aggression is no longer an option. A
weaker yuan will be the outcome and a second Asian financial crisis involving China would be in
the offing. It also means the progression of China's economy would become more dependent on
domestic inflationary financing through the expansion of bank credit at a time when food
prices, partially due to the outbreak of African swine fever, are rising as well.
There is bound to be an intense debate in the Chinese Politburo as to whether it is wise to
abandon neo-Keynesian financing and revert to the previous understanding that debasing the
currency and the inflation of food prices impoverishes the people and will inevitably lead to
political destabilisation. The logic behind the state accumulating a hoard of gold, encouraging
citizens to hoard it as well, and dominating international bullion markets was to protect the
citizens from a paper money crisis. That paper money crisis now threatens the yuan more than
the dollar.
It must be clear to the Chinese, who are no slouches when it comes to understanding
political strategy, why America is taking a far more aggressive stance in their financial war.
The absence of foreign buyers in the US Treasury market could turn out to be the most serious
crisis for America since the end of Bretton Woods. The Deep State, driven in this case by the
US Treasury, will not permit it to happen. For both China and America, these are desperate
times.
There was always going to be a point in time when mundane chess moves end up threatening to
check and then checkmate one or the other king. China now finds her king under serious threat
and she must make a countermove. She cannot afford portfolio flows to reverse. The financing of
her Made in China 2025 plan and the completion of the silk roads are vital to her long-term
political stability.
China must therefore counter dollar strength by means other than simply raising interest
rates. Inevitably, the solution points towards gold. Everyone knows, or at least suspects that
China has accumulated significant undeclared reserves of gold bullion. The time has probably
come for China to show her hand and declare her true gold reserves, or at least enough of them
to exceed the official gold reserves of the US.
It is likely a declaration of this sort would drive the gold price significantly higher,
amounting to a dollar devaluation. By denying gold is money, America has exposed itself to the
risk of the dollar's reserve status being questioned in global markets, and this is China's
trump card.
If Xi attends the Osaka G20 at the end of this month, the purpose would be less to talk to
Trump, but more to talk to the other leaders to make it clear what the Americans are up to and
to ensure they are aware of the consequences for the global monetary system when China takes
positive action to protect her own currency and domestic capital markets.
Bolton is just Albright of different sex. The same aggressive stupidity.
Notable quotes:
"... Albright typifies the arrogance and hawkishness of Washington blob... ..."
"... How to describe US foreign policy over the last couple of decades? Disastrous comes to mind. Arrogant and murderous also seem appropriate. ..."
"... Washington and Beijing appear to be a collision course on far more than trade. Yet the current administration appears convinced that doing more of the same will achieve different results, the best definition of insanity. ..."
"... Despite his sometimes abusive and incendiary rhetoric, the president has departed little from his predecessors' policies. For instance, American forces remain deployed in Afghanistan and Syria. Moreover, the Trump administration has increased its military and materiel deployments to Europe. Also, Washington has intensified economic sanctions on Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, and even penalized additional countries, namely Venezuela. ..."
"... "If we have to use force, it is because we are America: we are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us." ..."
"... Even then her claim was implausible. America blundered into the Korean War and barely achieved a passable outcome. The Johnson administration infused Vietnam with dramatically outsize importance. For decades, Washington foolishly refused to engage the People's Republic of China. Washington-backed dictators in Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran, and elsewhere fell ingloriously. An economic embargo against Cuba that continues today helped turn Fidel Castro into a global folk hero. Washington veered dangerously close to nuclear war with Moscow during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 and again two decades later during military exercises in Europe. ..."
"... Perhaps the worst failing of U.S. foreign policy was ignoring the inevitable impact of foreign intervention. Americans would never passively accept another nation bombing, invading, and occupying their nation, or interfering in their political system. Even if outgunned, they would resist. Yet Washington has undertaken all of these practices, with little consideration of the impact on those most affected -- hence the rise of terrorism against the United States. Terrorism, horrid and awful though it is, became the weapon of choice of weaker peoples against intervention by the world's industrialized national states. ..."
"... Albright's assumption that members of The Blob were far-seeing was matched by her belief that the same people were entitled to make life-and-death decisions for the entire planet. ..."
"... The willingness to so callously sacrifice so many helps explain why "they" often hate us, usually meaning the U.S. government. This is also because "they" believe average Americans hate them. Understandably, it too often turns out, given the impact of the full range of American interventions -- imposing economic sanctions, bombing, invading, and occupying other nations, unleashing drone campaigns, underwriting tyrannical regimes, supporting governments which occupy and oppress other peoples, displaying ostentatious hypocrisy and bias, and more. ..."
"... At the 1999 Rambouillet conference Albright made demands of Yugoslavia that no independent, sovereign state could accept: that, for instance, it act like defeated and occupied territory by allowing the free transit of NATO forces. Washington expected the inevitable refusal, which was calculated to provide justification for launching an unprovoked, aggressive war against the Serb-dominated remnant of Yugoslavia. ..."
"... Alas, members of the Blob view Americans with little more respect. The ignorant masses should do what they are told. (Former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster recently complained of public war-weariness from fighting in Afghanistan for no good reason for more than seventeen years.) Even more so, believed Albright, members of the military should cheerfully patrol the quasi-empire being established by Washington's far-sighted leaders. ..."
"... When asked in 2003 about the incident, she said "what I thought was that we had -- we were in a kind of a mode of thinking that we were never going to be able to use our military effectively again." ..."
"... For Albright, war is just another foreign policy tool. One could send a diplomatic note, impose economic sanctions, or unleash murder and mayhem. No reason to treat the latter as anything special. Joining the U.S. military means putting your life at the disposal of Albright and her peers in The Blob. ..."
Albright typifies the arrogance and hawkishness of Washington blob...
How to describe US foreign policy over the last couple of decades? Disastrous comes to mind. Arrogant and murderous also seem
appropriate.
Since 9/11, Washington has been extraordinarily active militarily -- invading two nations, bombing and droning several others,
deploying special operations forces in yet more countries, and applying sanctions against many. Tragically, the threat of Islamist
violence and terrorism only have metastasized. Although Al Qaeda lost its effectiveness in directly plotting attacks, it continues
to inspire national offshoots. Moreover, while losing its physical "caliphate" the Islamic State added further terrorism to its portfolio.
Three successive administrations have ever more deeply ensnared the United States in the Middle East. War with Iran appears to
be frighteningly possible. Ever-wealthier allies are ever-more dependent on America. Russia is actively hostile to the United States
and Europe. Washington and Beijing appear to be a collision course on far more than trade. Yet the current administration appears
convinced that doing more of the same will achieve different results, the best definition of insanity.
Despite his sometimes abusive and incendiary rhetoric, the president has departed little from his predecessors' policies. For
instance, American forces remain deployed in Afghanistan and Syria. Moreover, the Trump administration has increased its military
and materiel deployments to Europe. Also, Washington has intensified economic sanctions on Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, and
even penalized additional countries, namely Venezuela.
U.S. foreign policy suffers from systematic flaws in the thinking of the informal policy collective which former Obama aide Ben
Rhodes dismissed as "The Blob." Perhaps no official better articulated The Blob's defective precepts than Madeleine Albright, United
Nations ambassador and Secretary of State.
First is overweening hubris. In 1998 Secretary of State Albright declared that
"If we have to use force, it is because we are America: we are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further than
other countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us."
Even then her claim was implausible. America blundered into the Korean War and barely achieved a passable outcome. The Johnson
administration infused Vietnam with dramatically outsize importance. For decades, Washington foolishly refused to engage the People's
Republic of China. Washington-backed dictators in Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran, and elsewhere fell ingloriously. An economic embargo against
Cuba that continues today helped turn Fidel Castro into a global folk hero. Washington veered dangerously close to nuclear war with
Moscow during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 and again two decades later during military exercises in Europe.
U.S. officials rarely were prepared for events that occurred in the next week or month, let alone years later. Americans did no
better than the French in Vietnam. Americans managed events in Africa no better than the British, French, and Portuguese colonial
overlords. Washington made more than its share of bad, even awful decisions in dealing with other nations around the globe.
Perhaps the worst failing of U.S. foreign policy was ignoring the inevitable impact of foreign intervention. Americans would never
passively accept another nation bombing, invading, and occupying their nation, or interfering in their political system. Even if
outgunned, they would resist. Yet Washington has undertaken all of these practices, with little consideration of the impact on those
most affected -- hence the rise of terrorism against the United States. Terrorism, horrid and awful though it is, became the weapon
of choice of weaker peoples against intervention by the world's industrialized national states.
The U.S. record since September 11 has been uniquely counterproductive. Rather than minimize hostility toward America, Washington
adopted a policy -- highlighted by launching new wars, killing more civilians, and ravaging additional societies -- guaranteed to
create enemies, exacerbate radicalism, and spread terrorism. Blowback is everywhere. Among the worst examples: Iraqi insurgents mutated
into ISIS, which wreaked military havoc throughout the Middle East and turned to terrorism.
Albright's assumption that members of The Blob were far-seeing was matched by her belief that the same people were entitled to
make life-and-death decisions for the entire planet. When queried 1996 about her justification for sanctions against Iraq which had
killed a half million babies -- notably, she did not dispute the accuracy of that estimate -- she responded that "I think this is
a very hard choice, but the price -- we think the price is worth it." Exactly who "we" were she did not say. Most likely she meant
those Americans admitted to the foreign policy priesthood, empowered to make foreign policy and take the practical steps necessary
to enforce it. (She later stated of her reply: "I never should have made it. It was stupid." It was, but it reflected her mindset.)
In any normal country, such a claim would be shocking -- a few people sitting in another capital deciding who lived and died.
Foreign elites, a world away from the hardship that they imposed, deciding the value of those dying versus the purported interests
being promoted. Those paying the price had no voice in the decision, no way to hold their persecutors accountable.
The willingness to so callously sacrifice so many helps explain why "they" often hate us, usually meaning the U.S. government.
This is also because "they" believe average Americans hate them. Understandably, it too often turns out, given the impact of the
full range of American interventions -- imposing economic sanctions, bombing, invading, and occupying other nations, unleashing drone
campaigns, underwriting tyrannical regimes, supporting governments which occupy and oppress other peoples, displaying ostentatious
hypocrisy and bias, and more.
This mindset is reinforced by contempt toward even those being aided by Washington. Although American diplomats had termed the
Kosovo Liberation Army as "terrorist," the Clinton Administration decided to use the growing insurgency as an opportunity to expand
Washington's influence. At the 1999 Rambouillet conference Albright made demands of Yugoslavia that no independent, sovereign state
could accept: that, for instance, it act like defeated and occupied territory by allowing the free transit of NATO forces. Washington
expected the inevitable refusal, which was calculated to provide justification for launching an unprovoked, aggressive war against
the Serb-dominated remnant of Yugoslavia.
However, initially the KLA, determined on independence, refused to sign Albright's agreement. She exploded. One of her officials
anonymously complained: "Here is the greatest nation on earth pleading with some nothingballs to do something entirely in their own
interest -- which is to say yes to an interim agreement -- and they stiff us." Someone described as "a close associate" observed:
"She is so stung by what happened. She's angry at everyone -- the Serbs, the Albanians and NATO." For Albright, the determination
of others to achieve their own goals, even at risk to their lives, was an insult to America and her.
Alas, members of the Blob view Americans with little more respect. The ignorant masses should do what they are told. (Former National
Security Adviser H.R. McMaster recently complained of public war-weariness from fighting in Afghanistan for no good reason for more
than seventeen years.) Even more so, believed Albright, members of the military should cheerfully patrol the quasi-empire being established
by Washington's far-sighted leaders.
As Albright famously asked Colin Powell in 1992:
"What's the use of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?" To her, American military personnel
apparently were but gambit pawns in a global chess game, to be sacrificed for the interest and convenience of those playing. No
wonder then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell's reaction stated in his autobiography was: "I thought I would
have an aneurysm."
When asked in 2003 about the incident, she said "what I thought was that we had -- we were in a kind of a mode of thinking
that we were never going to be able to use our military effectively again." Although sixty-five years had passed, she
admitted that "my mindset is Munich," a unique circumstance and threat without even plausible parallel today.
Such a philosophy explains a 1997 comment by a cabinet member, likely Albright, to General Hugh Shelton, then Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff: "Hugh, I know I shouldn't even be asking you this, but what we really need in order to go in and take out
Saddam is a precipitous event -- something that would make us look good in the eyes of the world. Could you have one of our U-2s
fly low enough -- and slow enough -- so as to guarantee that Saddam could shoot it down?" He responded sure, as soon as she qualified
to fly the plane.
For Albright, war is just another foreign policy tool. One could send a diplomatic note, impose economic sanctions, or unleash
murder and mayhem. No reason to treat the latter as anything special. Joining the U.S. military means putting your life at the disposal
of Albright and her peers in The Blob.
Anyone of these comments could be dismissed as a careless aside. Taken together, however, they reflect an attitude dangerous for
Americans and foreigners alike. Unfortunately, the vagaries of U.S. foreign policy suggest that this mindset is not limited to any
one person. Any president serious about taking a new foreign-policy direction must do more than drain the swamp. He or she must sideline
The Blob.
"... Twenty years have passed since the U.S.-orchestrated NATO attack on Yugoslavia. As the United States readied its forces for war in 1999, it organized a peace conference that was ostensibly intended to resolve differences between the Yugoslav government and secessionist ethnic Albanians in Kosovo on the future status of the province. A different scenario was being played out behind the scenes, however. U.S. officials wanted war and deliberately set up the process to fail, which they planned to use as a pretext for war. ..."
"... U.S. mediators habitually referred to the Yugoslav delegation as "the Serbs," even though they constituted a minority of the members. The Americans persisted in trying to cast events in Kosovo as a simplistic binary relationship of Serb versus Albanian, disregarding the presence of other ethnic groups in the province, and ignoring the fact that while some ethnic Albanians favored separation, others wished to remain in multiethnic Yugoslavia. ..."
"... It is probable that the U.S. was also operating electronic listening equipment and that U.S. mediators knew everything the delegations were saying in private. ..."
"... "Madeleine Albright told us all the time: 'If the Yugoslav delegation does not accept what we offer, you will be bombed.'" Šainović added, "We agreed in Rambouillet to any form of autonomy for Kosovo," but sovereignty remained the red line. [viii] ..."
"... As the conference progressed, U.S. negotiators were faced with an alarming problem, in that the Yugoslav delegation had accepted all of the Contact Group's fundamental political principles for an agreement, balking only at a NATO presence in Kosovo. On the other hand, the secessionist delegation rejected the Contact Group's political principles. Something had to be done to reverse this pattern. ..."
"... Quite intentionally, U.S. mediators included provisions in the final version of the text that no sovereign nation could be expected to accept. Neoliberal economic interests are always front and center when U.S. officials are involved, and they surely were not unaware of Kosovo's abundant reserves of mineral resources, ripe for exploitation. The first point in Article 1 of the Economic Issues section of the text states: ..."
"... Western investors were favored with a provision stating that authorities shall "ensure the free movement of persons, goods, services, and capital to Kosovo, including from international sources." [xiii] One may wonder what these stipulations had to do with peace negotiations, but then the talks had far more to do with U.S. interests than anything to do with the needs of the people in the region. ..."
"... Yugoslavia was required "to provide, at no cost, the use of all facilities and services required" by NATO. [xvii]Within six months, Yugoslavia would have to withdraw all of its military forces from Kosovo, other than a small number of border guards. [xviii] ..."
"... The plan granted NATO "unrestricted use of the entire electromagnetic spectrum" to "communicate." Although the document indicated NATO would make "reasonable efforts to coordinate," there were no constraints on its power. [xix] Yugoslav officials, "upon simple request," would be required to grant NATO "all telecommunication services, including broadcast services free of cost." [xx]NATO could take over any radio and television facilities and transmission wavelengths it chose, knocking local stations off the air. ..."
"... The plan did not restrict NATO's presence to Kosovo. It granted NATO, with its "vehicles, vessels, aircraft, and equipment, free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY [Federal Republic of Yugoslavia]." [xxi] NATO would be "granted the use of airports, roads, rails, and ports without payment of fees, duties, dues, tools, or charges." [xxii] ..."
"... Bombing Yugoslavia was meant to solidify the new role for NATO as an offensive military force, acting on behalf of U.S. imperial interests. Since that time, NATO has attacked Libya, and engaged in military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and a variety of nations in Africa. Despite NATO's claim that it is "committed to the peaceful resolution of disputes," the record shows otherwise. ..."
"... Gregory Elich is a Korea Policy Institute associate and on the Board of Directors of the Jasenovac Research Institute. He is a member of the Solidarity Committee for Democracy and Peace in Korea, a columnist for Voice of the People , and one of the co-authors of Killing Democracy: CIA and Pentagon Operations in the Post-Soviet Period , published in the Russian language. He is also a member of the Task Force to Stop THAAD in Korea and Militarism in Asia and the Pacific. His website is https://gregoryelich.org . Follow him on Twitter at @GregoryElich ..."
Twenty years have passed since the U.S.-orchestrated NATO attack on Yugoslavia. As the United States readied its forces for
war in 1999, it organized a peace conference that was ostensibly intended to resolve differences between the Yugoslav government
and secessionist ethnic Albanians in Kosovo on the future status of the province. A different scenario was being played out behind
the scenes, however. U.S. officials wanted war and deliberately set up the process to fail, which they planned to use as a pretext
for war.
The talks opened on February 6, 1999, in Rambouillet, France. Officially, the negotiations were led by a Contact Group comprised
of U.S. Ambassador to Macedonia Christopher Hill , European Union envoy Wolfgang Petritsch , and Russian diplomat Boris Mayorsky
. All decisions were supposed to be jointly agreed upon by all three members of the Contact Group. In actual practice, the U.S. ran
the show all the way and routinely bypassed Petritsch and Mayorsky on essential matters.
Ibrahim Rugova , an ethnic Albanian activist who advocated nonviolence, was expected to play a major role in the Albanian secessionist
delegation. Joining him at Rambouillet was Fehmi Agani , a fellow member of Rugova's Democratic League of Kosovo.
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright regularly sidelined Rugova, however, preferring to rely on delegation members from
the hardline Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which had routinely murdered Serbs, Roma, and Albanians in Kosovo who worked for the government
or opposed separatism. Only a few months before the conference, KLA spokesman Bardhyl Mahmuti spelled out his organization's vision
of a future Kosovo as separate and ethnically pure:
"The independence of Kosovo is the only solution We cannot live together. That is excluded." [i]
Rugova had at one time engaged in fairly productive talks with Yugoslav officials, and his willingness to negotiate was no doubt
precisely the reason Albright relegated him to a background role. Yugoslav Minister of Information Milan Komnenić accompanied the
Yugoslav delegation to Rambouillet. He recalls,
"With Rugova and Fehmi Agani it was possible to talk; they were flexible. In Rambouillet, [KLA leader Hashim] Thaçi appears
instead of Rugova. A beast." [ii]
There was no love between Thaçi and Rugova, whose party members were the targets of threats and assassination attempts at the
hands of the KLA. Rugova himself would survive an assassination attempt six years later.
The composition of the Yugoslav delegation reflected its position that many ethnic groups resided in Kosovo, and any agreement
arrived at should take into account the interests of all parties. All of Kosovo's major ethnic groups were represented in the delegation.
Faik Jashari , one of the Albanian members in the Yugoslav delegation, was president of the Kosovo Democratic Initiative and an official
in the Provisional Executive Council, which was Yugoslavia's government in Kosovo. Jashari observed that Albright was startled when
she saw the composition of the Yugoslav delegation, apparently because it went against the U.S. propaganda narrative. [iii] Throughout
the talks, Albright displayed a dismissive attitude towards the delegation's Albanian, Roma, Egyptian, Goran, Turkish, and Slavic
Muslim members.
U.S. mediators habitually referred to the Yugoslav delegation as "the Serbs," even though they constituted a minority of the members.
The Americans persisted in trying to cast events in Kosovo as a simplistic binary relationship of Serb versus Albanian, disregarding
the presence of other ethnic groups in the province, and ignoring the fact that while some ethnic Albanians favored separation, others
wished to remain in multiethnic Yugoslavia.
After arriving at Rambouillet, the secessionist Albanian delegation informed U.S. diplomats that it did not want to meet with
the Yugoslav side. Aside from a brief ceremonial meeting, there was no direct contact between the two groups. The Yugoslav and Albanian
delegations were placed on two different floors to eliminate nearly all contact. U.S. mediators Richard Holbrooke and Christopher
Hill ran from one delegation to the other, conveying notes and verbal messages between the two sides but mostly trying to coerce
the Yugoslav delegation. [iv]
Luan Koka, a Roma member of the Yugoslav delegation, noted that the U.S. was operating an electronic jamming device.
"We knew exactly when Madeleine Albright was coming. Connections on our mobile phones were breaking up and going crazy." [v]
It is probable that the U.S. was also operating electronic listening equipment and that U.S. mediators knew everything the delegations
were saying in private.
Albright, Jashari said, would not listen to anyone.
"She had her task, and she saw only that task. You couldn't say anything to her. She didn't want to talk with us and didn't
want to listen to our arguments." [vi]
One day it was Koka's birthday, and the Yugoslav delegation wanted to encourage a more relaxed atmosphere with U.S. mediators,
inviting them to a cocktail party to mark the occasion.
"It was a slightly more pleasant atmosphere, and I was singing," Koka recalled. "I remember Madeleine Albright saying: 'I really
like partisan songs. But if you don't accept this, the bombs will fall.'" [vii]
According to delegation member Nikola Šainović ,
"Madeleine Albright told us all the time: 'If the Yugoslav delegation does not accept what we offer, you will be bombed.'"
Šainović added, "We agreed in Rambouillet to any form of autonomy for Kosovo," but sovereignty remained the red line. [viii]
From the beginning of the conference, U.S. mediator Christopher Hill "decided that what we really needed was an Albanian approval
of a document, and a Serb refusal. If both refused, there could be no further action by NATO or any other organization for that matter."
[ix] It was not peace that the U.S. team was seeking, but war.
As the conference progressed, U.S. negotiators were faced with an alarming problem, in that the Yugoslav delegation had accepted
all of the Contact Group's fundamental political principles for an agreement, balking only at a NATO presence in Kosovo. On the other
hand, the secessionist delegation rejected the Contact Group's political principles. Something had to be done to reverse this pattern.
On the second day of the conference, U.S. officials presented the Yugoslav delegation with the framework text of a provisional
agreement for peace and self-rule in Kosovo, but it was missing some of the annexes. The Yugoslavs requested a copy of the complete
document. As delegation head Ratko Marković pointed out,
"Any objections to the text of the agreement could be made only after an insight into the text as a whole had been obtained."
Nearly one week passed before the group received one of the missing annexes. That came on the day the conference had originally
been set to end. The deadline was extended, and two days later a second missing annex was provided to the Yugoslav delegation.[x]
When the Yugoslavs next met with the Contact Group, they were assured that all elements of the text had now been given to them.
Several more days passed and at 7:00 PM on February 22, the penultimate day of the conference, the Contact Group presented three
new annexes, which the Yugoslavs had never seen before. According to Marković, "Russian Ambassador Boris Mayorsky informed our delegation
that Annexes 2 and 7 had not been discussed or approved by the Contact Group and that they were not the texts drafted by the Contact
Group but by certain Contact Group members, while Annex 5 was discussed, but no decision was made on it at the Contact Group meeting."
The Yugoslav delegation refused to accept the new annexes, as their introduction had violated the process whereby all proposals had
to be agreed upon by the three Contact Group members. [xi]
At 9:30 AM on February 23, the final day of the conference, U.S. officials presented the full text of the proposal, containing
yet more provisions that were being communicated for the first time. The accompanying note identified the package as the definitive
text while adding that Russia did not support two of the articles. The letter demanded the Yugoslav delegation's decision by 1:00
PM that same day.[xii] There was barely time enough to carefully read the text, let alone negotiate. In essence, it was an ultimatum.
Quite intentionally, U.S. mediators included provisions in the final version of the text that no sovereign nation could be expected
to accept. Neoliberal economic interests are always front and center when U.S. officials are involved, and they surely were not unaware
of Kosovo's abundant reserves of mineral resources, ripe for exploitation. The first point in Article 1 of the Economic Issues section
of the text states:
"The economy of Kosovo shall function in accordance with free market principles."
Western investors were favored with a provision stating that authorities shall "ensure the free movement of persons, goods, services,
and capital to Kosovo, including from international sources." [xiii] One may wonder what these stipulations had to do with peace
negotiations, but then the talks had far more to do with U.S. interests than anything to do with the needs of the people in the region.
The document called for a Western-led Joint Commission including local representatives to monitor and coordinate the implementation
of the plan. However, if commission members failed to reach consensus on a matter, the Western-appointed Chair would have the power
to impose his decision unilaterally. [xiv] Local representatives would serve as little more than window-dressing for Western dictate,
as they could adopt no measure that went against the Chair's wishes.
The Chair of the Implementation Mission was authorized to "recommend" the "removal and appointment of officials and the curtailment
of operations of existing institutions in Kosovo." If the Chair's command was not obeyed "in the time requested, the Joint Commission
may decide to take the recommended action," and since the Chair had the authority to impose his will on the Joint Commission, there
was no check on his power. He could remove elected and appointed officials at will and replace them with handpicked lackeys. The
Chair was also authorized to order the "curtailment of operations of existing institutions." [xv]Any organization that failed to
bend to U.S. demands could be shut down.
Chapter 7 of the plan called for the parties to "invite NATO to constitute and lead a military force" in Kosovo. [xvi]The choice
of words was interesting. In language reminiscent of gangsters, Yugoslavia was told to "invite" NATO to take over the province of
Kosovo or suffer the consequences.
Yugoslavia was required "to provide, at no cost, the use of all facilities and services required" by NATO. [xvii]Within six months,
Yugoslavia would have to withdraw all of its military forces from Kosovo, other than a small number of border guards. [xviii]
The plan granted NATO "unrestricted use of the entire electromagnetic spectrum" to "communicate." Although the document indicated
NATO would make "reasonable efforts to coordinate," there were no constraints on its power. [xix] Yugoslav officials, "upon simple
request," would be required to grant NATO "all telecommunication services, including broadcast services free of cost." [xx]NATO could
take over any radio and television facilities and transmission wavelengths it chose, knocking local stations off the air.
The plan did not restrict NATO's presence to Kosovo. It granted NATO, with its "vehicles, vessels, aircraft, and equipment, free
and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY [Federal Republic of Yugoslavia]." [xxi] NATO would be "granted
the use of airports, roads, rails, and ports without payment of fees, duties, dues, tools, or charges." [xxii]
The agreement guaranteed that NATO would have "complete and unimpeded freedom of movement by ground, air, and water into and throughout
Kosovo." Furthermore, NATO personnel could not be held "liable for any damages to public or private property." [xxiii] NATO as a
whole would also be "immune from all legal process, whether civil, administrative, or criminal," regardless of its actions anywhere
on the territory of Yugoslavia. [xxiv]Nor could NATO personnel be arrested, detained, or investigated. [xxv]
Acceptance of the plan would have brought NATO troops swarming throughout Yugoslavia and interfering in every institution.
There were several other objectionable elements in the plan, but one that stood out was the call for an "international" (meaning,
Western-led) meeting to be held after three years "to determine a mechanism for a final settlement for Kosovo."[xxvi] It was no mystery
to the Yugoslav delegation what conclusion Western officials would arrive at in that meeting. The intent was clearly to redraw Yugoslavia's
borders to further break apart the nation.
U.S. officials knew the Yugoslav delegation could not possibly accept such a plan.
"We deliberately set the bar higher than the Serbs could accept," Madeleine Albright confided to a group of journalists, "because
they needed a little bombing." [xxvii]
At a meeting in Belgrade on March 5, the Yugoslav delegation issued a statement which declared:
"A great deceit was looming, orchestrated by the United States. They demanded that the agreement be signed, even though much
of this agreement, that is, over 56 pages, had never been discussed, either within the Contact Group or during the negotiations."
[xxviii]
Serbian President Milan Milutinović announced at a press conference that in Rambouillet the Yugoslav delegation had "proposed
solutions meeting the demands of the Contact Group for broad autonomy within Serbia, advocating full equality of all national communities."
But "agreement was not what they were after." Instead, Western officials engaged in "open aggression," and this was a game "about
troops and troops alone." [xxix]
While U.S. officials were working assiduously to avoid a peaceful resolution, they needed the Albanians to agree to the plan so
that they could accuse the Yugoslav delegation of being the stumbling block to peace. U.S. mainstream media could be counted on to
unquestioningly repeat the government's line and overlook who the real architects of failure were. U.S. officials knew the media
would act in their customary role as cheerleaders for war, which indeed, they did.
British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook revealed the nature of the message Western officials were conveying to the Albanian delegation
when he said,
"We are certainly saying to the Kosovo Albanians that if you don't sign up to these texts, it's extremely difficult to see
how NATO could then take action against Belgrade." [xxx]
Western officials were practically begging the secessionists to sign the plan. According to inside sources, the Americans assured
the Albanian delegation that disarmament of the KLA would be merely symbolic and that it could keep the bulk of its weaponry so long
as it was concealed. [xxxi]
Albright spent hours trying to convince Thaçi to change his mind, telling him:
"If you say yes and the Serbs say no, NATO will strike and go on striking until the Serb forces are out and NATO can go in.
You will have security. And you will be able to govern yourselves." [xxxii]
That was a clear enough signal that the intent was to rip the province away from Yugoslavia and create an artificial state. Despite
such assurances, Thaçi feared the wrath of fellow KLA members if he were to sign a document that did not explicitly call for separation.
When U.S. negotiators asked Thaçi why he would not sign, he responded:
"If I agree to this, I will go home and they will kill me." [xxxiii]
This was not hyperbole. The KLA had threatened and murdered a great many Albanians who in its eyes fell short of full-throated
support for its policy of violent secession and ethnic exclusion.
Even NATO Commander Wesley Clark , who flew in from Belgium, was unable to change Thaçi's mind. [xxxiv] U.S. officials were exasperated
with the Albanian delegation, and its recalcitrance threatened to capsize plans for war.
"Rambouillet was supposed to be about putting the screws to Belgrade," a senior U.S. official said. "But it went off the rails
because of the miscalculation we made about the Albanians." [xxxv]
On the last day at Rambouillet, it was agreed that the Albanian delegation would return to Kosovo for discussions with fellow
KLA leaders on the need to sign the document. In the days that followed, Western officials paid repeated visits to Kosovo to encourage
the Albanians to sign.
So-called "negotiations" reconvened in Paris on March 15. Upon its arrival, the Yugoslav delegation objected that it was "incomprehensible"
that "no direct talks between the two delegations had been facilitated." In response to the Yugoslavs' proposal for modifications
to the plan, the Contact Group informed them that no changes would be accepted. The document must be accepted as a whole. [xxxvi]
The Yugoslav position, delegation head Ratko Marković maintained, was that "first one needs to determine what is to be implemented,
and only then to determine the methods of implementation." [xxxvii]The delegation asked the Americans what there was to talk about
regarding implementation "when there was no agreement because the Albanians did not accept anything." U.S. officials responded that
the Yugoslav delegation "cannot negotiate," adding that it would only be allowed to make grammatical changes to the text. [xxxviii]
From the U.S. perspective, the presence of the Yugoslav delegation in Paris was irrelevant other than to maintain the pretense
that negotiations were taking place. Not permitted to negotiate, there was little the Yugoslavs could do but await the inevitable
result, which soon came. The moment U.S. officials obtained the Albanian delegation's signatures to the plan on March 18, they aborted
the Paris Conference. There was no reason to continue engaging with the Yugoslav delegation, as the U.S. had what it needed: a pretext
for war.
On the day after the U.S. pulled the plug on the Paris talks, Milan Milutinović held a press conference in the Yugoslav embassy,
condemning the Paris meeting as "a kind of show," which was meant "to deceive public opinion in the whole world." [xxxix]
While the United States and its NATO allies prepared for war, Yugoslavia was making last-ditch efforts to stave off attack, including
reaching out to intermediaries. Greek Foreign Minister Theodoros Pangalos contacted Madeleine Albright and told her that Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milošević had offered to engage in further negotiations. But Albright told him that the decision to bomb had already
been made. "In fact," Pangalos reported, "she told me to 'desist, you're just being a nuisance.'" [xl] In a final act of desperation
to save the people from bombing, Milutinović contacted Christopher Hill and made an extraordinary offer: Yugoslavia would join NATO
if the United States would allow Yugoslavia to remain whole, including the province of Kosovo. Hill responded that this was not a
topic for discussion and he would not talk about it. [xli]
Madeleine Albright got her war, which brought death, destruction, and misery to Yugoslavia. But NATO had a new role, and the United
States further extended its hegemony over the Balkans.
In the years following the demise of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union, NATO was intent on redefining its mission. The absence
of the socialist bloc presented NATO not only with the need to construct a new rationale for existence but also with the opportunity
to expand Western domination over other nations.
Bosnia offered the first opportunity for NATO to begin its transformation, as it took part in a war that presented no threat to
member nations.
Bombing Yugoslavia was meant to solidify the new role for NATO as an offensive military force, acting on behalf of U.S. imperial
interests. Since that time, NATO has attacked Libya, and engaged in military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and a variety of nations
in Africa. Despite NATO's claim that it is "committed to the peaceful resolution of disputes," the record shows otherwise.
*
Note to readers: please click the share buttons below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site,
internet forums. etc.
Gregory Elich is a Korea Policy Institute associate and on the Board of Directors of the Jasenovac Research Institute. He is
a member of the Solidarity Committee for Democracy and Peace in Korea, a columnist for
Voice of the People , and one of the co-authors of
Killing Democracy: CIA
and Pentagon Operations in the Post-Soviet Period , published in the Russian language. He is also a member of the Task Force
to Stop THAAD in Korea and Militarism in Asia and the Pacific. His website is
https://gregoryelich.org . Follow him on Twitter at @GregoryElich
Andrew Bacevich
recalls Madeleine
Albright's infamous statement about American indispensability, and notes how poorly it has held up over the last twenty-one years:
Back then, it was Albright's claim to American indispensability that stuck in my craw. Yet as a testimony to ruling class
hubris, the assertion of indispensability pales in comparison to Albright's insistence that "we see further into the future."
In fact, from February 1998 down to the present, events have time and again caught Albright's "we" napping.
Albright's statement is even more damning for her and her fellow interventionists when we consider that the context of her remarks
was a discussion of the supposed threat from Iraq. The full sentence went like this: "We stand tall and we see further than other
countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us." Albright was making a general claim about our supposed superiority
to other nations when it came to looking into the future, but she was also specifically warning against a "danger" from Iraq that
she claimed threatened "all of us." She answered
one of Matt Lauer's questions with this assertion:
I think that we know what we have to do, and that is help enforce the UN Security Council resolutions, which demand that Saddam
Hussein abide by those resolutions, and get rid of his weapons of mass destruction, and allow the inspectors to have unfettered
and unconditional access.
Albright's rhetoric from 1998 is a grim reminder that policymakers from both parties accepted the existence of Iraq's "weapons
of mass destruction" as a given and never seriously questioned a policy aimed at eliminating something that did not exist. American
hawks couldn't see further in the future. They weren't even perceiving the present correctly, and tens of thousands of Americans
and millions of Iraqis would suffer because they insisted that they saw something that wasn't there.
A little more than five years after she uttered these words, the same wild threat inflation that Albright was engaged in led
to the invasion of Iraq, the greatest blunder and one of the worst crimes in the history of modern U.S. foreign policy . Not
only did Albright and other later war supporters not see what was coming, but their deluded belief in being able to anticipate future
threats caused them to buy into and promote a bogus case for a war that was completely unnecessary and should never have been fought.
Douglas Macgregor is right -- Trump have surrounded himself with neocons and now put himself against the wall. Wars destroy
presidency -- George Bush II is not viewed favorable by the US people now, not is Obama with his Libya adventure.
With the amount of derivatives in the US financial system the rise of the price of oil above $100 can produce some interesting
and unanticipated effects.
Notable quotes:
"... PRESIDENT TRUMP don't let them sucker you. ..."
"... The true American people, do never believe what this congress, house, and senate want they are cramming down your throats... ..."
The first thing to say here is that we have no means to know what really happened. At the
very least, there are two possible hypotheses which could explain what took place:
1) a US provocation: it is quite possible that somebody in the US chain of command decided
that Iran should be put under pressure and that having US UAV fly right next to, or even just
inside, the international border of Iran would be a great way to show Iran that the US is ready
to attack. If that is the case, this was a semi-success (the Iranians had to switch on their
radars and attack the UAV which is very good for US intelligence gathering) and a semi-failure
(since the Iranians were clearly unimpressed by the US show of resolve).
2) an Iranian provocation: yup, that is a theoretical possibility which cannot reject
prima facie : in this scenario it was indeed the Iranians who blew up the two tankers
last week and they also deliberately shot down the US UAV over international waters. The goal?
Simple: to show that the Iranians are willing and ready to escalate and that they are confident
that they will prevail.
Now, in the real world, there are many more options, including even mixes of various
options. What matters is now not this, as much as Trump's reaction:
Now, whether this was a US provocation or an Iranian one – Trump's reaction was the
only correct one. Why? Because the risks involved in any US "more than symbolic strike" would
be so great as to void any rationale for such a strike in the first place. Think of it: we can
be very confident that the Iranian military installations along the Persian Gulf and the
southern border of Iran are highly redundant and that no matter how successful any limited US
missile strike would have been, the actual military capabilities of Iran would not have been
affected. The only way for the US to effectively degrade Iranian capabilities would be to have
a sustained, multi-day, attack on the entire southern periphery of Iran. In other words, a real
war. Anything short of that would simply be meaningless. The consequences of such an attack,
however, would be, in Putin's words "catastrophic" for the entire region.
If this was an Iranian provocation, then it was one designed to impress upon the Empire that
Iran is also very much "locked, cocked and ready to rock". But if that is the case, there is
zero change that any limited strike would achieve anything. In fact, any symbolic US attack
would only signal to the Iranians that the US has cold feet and that all the US sabre-rattling
is totally useless.
I have not said such a thing in many months, but in this case I can only admit that Trump
did the right thing. No limited attack also makes sense even if we assume that the Empire has
made the decision to attack Iran and is just waiting for the perfect time. Why? Because the
longer the Iranian feel that an attack is possible, the more time, energy and money they need
to spend remaining on very high alert.
The basic theory of attack and defense clearly states that the attacking side can gain as a
major advantage if it can leave the other side in the dark about its plans and if the costs of
being ready for a surprise attack are lower than the costs of being on high alert (those
interested in the role and importance of surprise attack in the theory of deterrence can read
Richard Betts' excellent book "
the longer the Iranian feel that an attack is possible, the more time, energy and money
they need to spend remaining on very high alert.
Yep. Men and material getting tired. Tired men and material make mistakes.
Smart.
As I've said plenty of times before, the "beauty" of the setup is that TPTBs simply create a
climate for a mistake resulting in loss of life of American personnel. BANG.
Or, you put two combat forces next to each other and ramp up the tension. Just a matter of time.
I am currently very slightly optimistic (48-52%) that the US will not attack Iran in the
short term. In the long term, however, I consider that an AngloZionist attack is a quasi certainty.
Yep. Short term being 3 months (related to the first paragraph).
Sean Hannity lives in the largest Mansion in Lloyd Neck I have driven past his Mansion to get
a look as to just how big it is IT'S HUGE ..Lloyd Neck has the most expensive zip code in the
US ..Hannity the Chicken-Hawk thinks he is even tougher Chicken-Hawk War Hawk now that he
studies MMA Serra Brazilian Ji-jitsu on Jericho Turnpike ..Yesterday Sean Hannity"My
philosophy is you hit me .I hit you back ten times harder" .of course, Sean will be hiding in
his mega-Mansion in Lloyd Neck .as the US Cargo Planes land in Virginia with a 100 stainless
steel coffins containing the bodies headless bodies of Native Born White American Working
Class Young Men Donald and Melania step inside the cargo bay to view the stainless steel
coffins ..
Military action needs to support the underlying political goals. And, the political goal is
to stop the Iranian regime from threatening and destabilizing the region.
Would killing 150+ Iranians help dislodge the violent regime? No. Thus, the proposed
strike did not align with the political goal. Trump was right to cancel it.
Think of it as the Putin Playbook. Did Putin go for mass casualties when Turkey shot down
one of its fighters in 2015? No. Both Putin and Trump show similar strength. Restraint
against precipitous, ill conceived, and overly bloody actions.
_____
Trump realizes that the Iranian people are the victims of sociopath Kahmeni. There will be
a response with minimal bloodshed. Instead it will focus on the regime. Deepening the divide
between the Iranian people and their despotic leaders prepares the path for internal
forces to replace those leaders.
Oil storage is a likely choice. The tanks are large and spilled oil is highly visible. It
would demonstrate the inability of the regime to stop the U.S. Storage facilities are visible
to the public, so the government would have trouble denying or misrepresenting the event.
Port facilities would also be a good choice, although that would be harder to time for few to
no casualties.
That's going overboard on precision though. And what's with the oil refinery in Pennsylvania going up into balls of flame. I hope this
won't get dragooned into an "Iranian sleeper cell attack".
The provocations have to be such that domestic acquiescence in elite war profit taking will
not be disturbed. That requires a series of propaganda events ramping up for domestic
consumption.
10 minutes from striking is worryingly close, and Trump's disclosures on the matter are
troubling. Apparently it was only at this late hour that Trump came around to asking for
specifics on how many Iranians his order would kill. The generals told him approximately
150.
This was the game-changer, and Trump was nominally ordering this attack over the shoot
down of a single US surveillance drone, and he rightly noticed that killing 150 people was
not very proportionate to that, fortunately, he called the attack off before the first
missiles were fired.
Trump went on to issue a flurry of Tweets saying Iran would never be allowed to have
nuclear weapons, which of course this entire almost-attack had not a thing to do with. He
also bragged about how much damage the US sanctions have done to Iran and how weakened Iran
already is.
Troublingly though, administration hawks were still able to get Trump to sign off on the
attack earlier on Thursday, and his assurances on Twitter suggest that the loss of the
single drone really didn't enter into it as a big issue for him. This raises ongoing
concerns that having called off the Thursday attack, Trump might be sold on a lesser attack
at any time, or at least something nominally different that gets carried out before he gets
around to asking about the casualties.
Why would you end your mis-analysis where you justify war with the word PEACE? Spelling it out in all CAPS? You are seriously proposing that the US has the right to judge the government of another
country and to deliberately destabilize that country in order to oerturn its governemtn?
Do you realize that economic sanctions are considered to be acts of war? In other words, you support acts of war and think that is PEACE? Are you insane?
Military action needs to support the underlying political goals. And, the political goal
is to stop the Iranian regime from threatening and destabilizing the region.
Yeah. Makes total sense from an Israeli/Saudi perspective. When bullshit is all there is,
Hollywood logic can be used to explain the world!
Trump realizes that the Iranian people are the victims of sociopath Kahmeni.
I hope you have been given a sheet with talking points, otherwise I pity you.
The Deep State never rests.
Dual treason sandwich via Reuters for Mr. Trump. It's really like living in a Nazi regime, with Heydrich walking the corridors,
blackmailing and manipulating and "disposing of" problem factors.
Iran's top national security official has denied a Reuters report claiming that Tehran
had received a low-key message via Oman from the US warning of an imminent attack on the
Islamic Republic.
"The US didn't send any message," Keyvan Khosravi, spokesman for the National Security
Council, told Iranian television.
The comment dismissed a previous report by Reuters, which cited unnamed Iranian
officials as saying that Donald Trump had warned Tehran of a military strike and also gave
a time to respond. The message was reportedly delivered via Oman and followed the downing
of a US spy UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) earlier in the week.
Hmm, so they shot down a drone; would they be able to shoot down every American plane that
entered their airspace? A good reason to call off the strike; if the Iranians had a missile
lock on every American plane. Having all their planes shot down would be an even worse defeat
for the United States than just calling off an attack.
Putin checks Trump.
The Iranians might be deciding to stand firm against US sanctions and other provocations as
de facto acts of war before the sanctions do materially impact the Iranian
economy and its military capability.
Recall the chicanery through which the United States surreptitiously provoked Japan into
attacking the United States at Pearl Harbor so that FDR, a committed Anglophile, could enter
the European war through the back door to save his British friends.
1. Via economic sanctions, the United States and its European colonial allies
systematically denied Japan the resources it needed to sustain its population and its
industrial economy.
2. Japan decided that it would have to act to obtain those resources or, accept its
eventual demise as a nation state.
3. FDR hinted to the Dutch that the newly-positioned naval resources at Pearl Harbor would
attack and cut the Japanese lines-of-communication per chance Japan struck south to obtain
oil, rubber, and other resources in Southeast Asia. This was intentionally leaked to the
Japanese.
4. The United States monitored the locations and progress of the Japanese fleet en route
to Pearl Harbor to protect its exposed flank per the above. Japanese naval resources were
under a communications blackout. However, the Japanese merchant marine supporting those
forces were not. The US monitored their locations as a proxy for the location of the Japanese
fleet. The rest is history
The Iranians are in a similar position: either fight now at the peak of their military
power or, fight for survival later at a significant economic and military disadvantage. Like
the Japanese, the Iranians would be wise to do the former. This strategy optimizes their
chances for national survival.
The first thing in is missiles that target air defense batteries. I doubt
the US is worried about Iran shooting down every plane. The drone probably was flying a
steady even course and took no evasive maneuvers unlike an attacking aircraft. The success
rate of surface to air missiles is not very high.
@TheJester1. Via economic sanctions, the United States and its European colonial
allies systematically denied Japan the resources it needed to sustain its population and its
industrial economy.
BS. The embargo was because Japan continued to occupy part of China. All they had to do
was go back home. Did FDR do it to get us into the war? Maybe, but Hitler was under no
obligation to declare war on the US since Japan did not declare war on the USSR when Hitler
attacked the USSR.
No limited attack also makes sense even if we assume that the Empire has made the
decision to attack Iran and is just waiting for the perfect time. Why? Because the longer
the Iranian feel that an attack is possible, the more time, energy and money they need to
spend remaining on very high alert.
Then
this might also be a strategic PSYOP destined to lull the Iranians into a false sense of
security. If that is the plan, it will fail: the Iranians have lived with a AngloZionist
bullseye painted on their heads ever since 1979 and they are used to live under constant
threat of war.
Trump Claims He Canceled an Airstrike Against Iran at the Very Last Minute
I one hundred percent support letting The Orange One continue on with his awesome cowboy
delusions as long as it keeps a war from starting.
My reaction:
"Wow, sir! You have such self-control! Those Iranians don't know how close they were to you
just kicking them back to the Stone Age! It's great that the better (wiser and more patient)
side of you won out in the end – you are awesome!"
WASHINGTON -- Maintaining that the unmanned aerial vehicle was simply going about its day
without posing a threat to anyone, U.S. Department of State officials claimed Thursday that
one of their drones was minding its own business on its way to church when Iran attacked it
out of nowhere. "This was an outrageous, unprovoked attack by the Islamic Republic of Iran on
an innocent drone who merely wanted to attend mass in peace," said acting Secretary of State
Mike Pompeo, emphasizing the drone's upstanding moral character by pointing out its history
of donating to charity, volunteering at soup kitchens, and making homemade cookies for school
bake sales. "We're talking about a drone that sings in the church choir and coaches little
league baseball games on the weekends -- an absolute pillar of the community. This is an
upstanding family drone who did nothing to deserve any sort of attack. What kind of world do
we live in where an innocent drone can't fly through Iranian air space on its way to church?"
At press time, Department of Defense officials confirmed that their request for Iran to
return the drone's body back to the U.S. for a proper burial had gone unanswered.
@MarkinLA Read Frazier Hunt, The Untold Story of Douglas MacArthur.
TheJester is right.
Yes, China was under Japanese occupation. The Chinese Communists were fighting the Japs.
The USA was supporting the side that was not fighting the Japs but the Communists, being, the
USA, fanatically anti-communist.
My guess is that the USA forced Japan into war because of the economic potential of China,
i.e. they wanted to take Japan's place.
And the USA didn't side with Hitler but with the other side because they didn't know
Indian independence would come immediately after the War. So they sided with the Brits
because of the apparent economic potential of the British Empire. If India had gained
independence just before the war the USA would have sided with Hitler, because then, without
India, German Europe would have had a greater economic potential than the British Empire.
The Iranians claim that a manned spy plane was next to the drone (i.e. that it also was in
their territory) but that they chose not to shoot it down since 35 soldiers were on board.
"Along with the American drone was an American P8 aircraft with 35 on board, and it was
also violating our airspace and we could have downed it too," he said, adding, "But we did
not do [shoot down] it, because our aim was to warn the terrorist forces of the US."
To me, a total cynic, it looks like the Americans attempted a repeat of the incident when
they deliberately misled their sailors so that they sailed into Iranian territorial waters. I
guess they messed up the GPS for them.
"Iran releases video of captured American sailor crying "
I too would cry if I realised that my superiors had set me up as a sacrificial lamb.
Let's not forget the attempt to sink the USS Liberty. That was a joint operation between
the US Deep State and Israel to try and get the US to attack Egypt.
"'But Sir, It's an American Ship.' 'Never Mind, Hit Her!' When Israel Attacked USS
Liberty"
@TheJester But why were sanctions imposed on Japan? Because Japan was acting in violation
of international law? Well yes due to Japanese imperial aggression against China. In 1935-40
Japan was no angelic virgin. It committed unprovoked aggression against China, committed
massive war crimes and crimes against humanity. Yes FDR likely wanted to have USA enter the
Pacific war to enable war against Hitler but the crippling sanctions against Japan had a
legitimate basis. To punish Japan for aggression in China
It looks like the Americans are having a false flag feast.
The positions in Iraq – whether directly or indirectly connected to the US
interests in Iraq – for example Baghdad, Basra and al-Taji base to Northwest of Baghdad
and Nineveh operations command headquarters in Northern Iraq have come under Katyusha missile
attacks in recent day, the Al-Akhbar newspaper reported.
The paper reiterated that the missile attacks have taken place as a result of recent
regional tensions, and said that the US officials are trying to portray the attacks as
messages by Iran after al-Fujaira and the Sea of Oman mishaps.
It noted that no group has claimed responsibility for the recent missile attacks on Iraqi
cities.
Sources close to Hashd al-Sha'abi Commander Abu Mohandes al-Mahdi, meantime, categorically
dismissed any accusations against the Iraqi popular and resistance forces, and said that the
Americans themselves are most probably behind some of these attacks because some of the
missiles are made in the US.
@HEREDOT Mr. Saker left out the inconvenient fact that while that drone was indeed flying
over Iranian air space, a much larger target, the Poseidon P8 was flying nearby. The P8 is a
converted Boeing 737, making for a much larger radar profile for that missile. The P8 has
many ASW capabilities, and also can control drones.
It's usual crew numbers nine, but this one had 35 sacrificial lambs packed onboard, to be
murdered by the (((Deep State))) to push Trump into the corner, with the (((MSM))) screaming
that it was Iran's fault, no proof needed or lies fabricated–just like the illegal
invasion of Iraq–to give Israel what it's demanding that its American colony do: Bomb,
bomb, bomb Iran.
My guess is that the American thugs behind this latest FF attempt were hoping the
Iranian surface-to-air missile would of shifted its initial target–the drone– and
went for the much larger P8.
That Butcher Boy Bolton and his fellow homicidal maniacs failed means that more Americans
are being lined up in their cross-hairs, ready to be sacrificed for the glory of Apartheid
Israel.
If that is the plan, it will fail: the Iranians have lived with a AngloZionist bullseye
painted on their heads ever since 1979 and they are used to live under constant threat of
war.
Wrong, Saker, the Iranians have been getting attacked by America and the Brits since we
overthrew their democratically elected prez in 1953, because he had the audacity to think and
say that the majority of Iran's oil revenues should be going to Iranians, not Wall Street
.
@BengaliCanadianDude Agreed. If Israel want to attack Iran, go ahead, but they won't,
because they know they'd get their asses kicked unless Uncle Sucker was leading the way.
Or maybe Israel could send in its fearsome DIAPER BRIGADES to wreak havoc in
Tehran?
The diaper reference is not a joke, it's fact that the IDF has issued combat nappies to
their troops, who let loose their bladder anytime they engage REAL men with guns who shoot
back. But let's give credit where its due, when it comes to shooting Palestinian kids with
slingshots or medics, Israel is #1.
@peterAUS Iran has been living with the same threat since 1979. The result is a hugely
popular military and IRGC which is one of the best career choices in the country. It's a way
of life for the nation to be under siege by now and for Shia Muslims the idea of being ready
to fight to the death always hovers due to the history of Islam with respect to the
Sunni/Shia divide. This disagreement is extreme, to be a Muslim and understand it is to feel
horror! ; and despair at the idea any reconciliation is even possible between the two sects
and a shared history does not make for a shared point of view. Shias have always been
outnumbered and it was us who were targeted for extreme violence in the end (or the
begginning) when a dispute over leadership turned bitter. Successive Islamic powers have
attempted to exterminate Shias and the latest incarnation of the Salafis begginning with
Wahhabism (nurtured by the Rothschild controlled British SS at the end of the Ottoman Empire)
and lately morphed into Takfirism which is Daesh and their ilk, have always sought out Shias
first and foremost for attack.
The Islamic Republic of Iran is firstly an Islamic Republic in full revolutionary mode,
(as opposed to 'fundamentalist') it is also in a close second the "Capital" of Shia Islam and
what I have described is the history of Iran and the times the Persian state was not an
Islamic one are no less a part of the historical memory of the nation. Even those times
(which invariably ended in defeat for Persia) reinforce the idea that it is as an Islamic
state Iran stands best chance of survival and the confidence that if they remain true to
these principles they will prevail is backed by an unbroken history of successful defense as
a righteous Islamic state. This may be beyond many of the younger generation and ignored by
the wealthy older generation Iranians but it must be ingrained in the political and social
cosnciousness of the political and religious and intellectual elite.
Iran is ready. They have always been ready in one sense. Saddan Hussein who attacked them
when they were at their weakest and still lived to regret it could attest to that if he was
still around to talk. That war in which the USA gave full and unconditional support to their
protege Saddam who only became their enemy when he became a better man and leader later on in
time, was a wake up call to Iranian leadership and the nation as one. They knew that they
needed missiles and a very strong defensive posture and that is what they have. F^ck with
them at your peril I say.
I doubt myself the USA will attack Iran, at least as long as they have ships and troops
within 1000 miles of Iran. That includes towing their static aircraft carrier "Israel" out of
range as well.
@2stateshmustate agree, the comment that "the USA is taking the events to the UN is
loaded with false something or other..
Iran initiated the UN hearing AFAIK and IRAN says it will present evidence that it was the
USA's intention.. to do the deeds ..<=personally, my feeling is neither Russia nor China
will veto .. anything about these deeds.. the only veto will come from Article II of the COUS
, present leader [one Mr. Trumpy]. who is elected not by popular vote of the govern people
in America but instead by the hidden behind the scene, state to state vote of the
electoral college.. .. <== you mean all that to-do every four years to elect a president:
democrats vs republicans beating each other up, newspapers collecting billions in
contribution dollars to publish fake I hate you slogans, and he saids, you saids: dey all
be fake news, propaganda erotic ? yep.. sure enough is. dem guys dat rites dem
Konstitutions ain't no dummies deys knows vat ve good fore dem. Read Article II, sections 2
and 3.. you see..
Popular vote elects the Article I folks ( 525 in all: 425 members of the house of
congressional districts (Art. 1, Section 2), and 100 Senators (amendment 17, proposed 1912,
approved 1913federal reserve(act of congress), income tax (amendment 16) both also 1913
),
=>but Article I (section 2 and amendment 17 ) folks have no power to act.. as powerless
buffoons ..they are authorized only to approve a few things, try cases of Treason, and make
the laws, fund the actions, wants and needs demanded by Article II persons. It takes 2/3 of
each a divided Senate and 2/3 of a divided House [Art. I, sec 7[2,3] to over-power the Art II
privilege of veto.. and
==get this=> Article II persons are charged to enforce the law( Art II, section
2 [3] he[the President} shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Where is
Hillary? I see no words making such duty to enforce the law optional (so does the AG have an
option that the President does not, .) ?
I am in full agreement with the author about who was most likely behind the attacks on the
ships and how the two separate attacks were done. Even down to accepting the possibility Iran
was behind some or all of this as provocation for the reasons given. If so it would mean they
are hurting badly and need to bring things to a head fast. This does not fit with my
observations of Iranian leadership which has always demonstrated a very long term and
patient, typically oriental approach to logjams in diplomacy and nothing has happened to
suggest they are suddenly feeling extremely more pain than previously. In short it is
possible but I doubt it.
To my mind the things which speak against the Iranians having attacked the tankers the
second time at least are substantial: Both ships were Japanese owned. This attack as such was
against Japanese interests WHILST the Japanese PM (Japanese death cult and mafia associations
and all) was making a historical visit to Tehran! What sort of dung for brains clowns would
invite someone for dinner and then send the kids out to set fire to their car whilst they
dined? Of course Washington would do something like this (shooting missiles at Syria whilst
enjoying a lovely piece of cake with their Chinese ally ffs ) but Iran? Give me a break.
Secondly if Iran was guilty, how come the USA is lying like a cheap rug from the get go?
The video the US Navy quickly produced is PROOF they are lying. The black and white imagery
does NOT hide the distinctly different paint jobs on the ship depicted and the actual one
involved. Whatever that video is, it is NOT a video of either of the ships involved in the
second incident. So if Iran was guilty why is the USA using fabricated evidence to assert
it?
The claim that the Iranians tried unsuccesfully to shoot down a Reaper drone which was
according to the USA monitoring the ship BEFORE IT WAS ATTACKED was what stuck in my craw
from the start. What the hell was a REAPER Drone doing monitoring that particular ship at
that particular time? Is this a common practice? Reaper drones are NOT recon drones they
carry hellfire missiles and kill things! When you consider the reports by the crew, as
relayed by the Japanese company owner about a flying object just before the explosion and the
pictures of the damage which clearly show fairly small holes about half way between the
gunwale and waterline the conclusion these were small missiles is hard to avoid. Indeed
HELLFIRE missiles would fit the bill nicely.
As for attacking Iran I do not believe that the USA will dare start anything, especially
now, so long as they have troops and ships within range of Iranian missiles. Iranian missiles
power is immense and an unknown because they do not know where it all is, and they do know
much of it is very, very well hardened against attack. IF they do start a war with Iran
whilst they have assets in the region, invluding "Israel" then they have completely lost
their minds and I'd say the war will end very fast and hard for them. Not even going nuclear
will do it. They are deluded if they think so. Nukes are not magic, they are just big bombs
and even the radiation component is not a big deal these days. (few realise it but modern
nukes are quite 'clean') Iran is a vast country and well dug in over millenia. However
unleashing a full nuclear war against a non nuclear state will end the USA forever as a world
citizen in every way. There is no solution for the USA except to make peace or back off. They
can plan and scheme all they like but Allah is the best of planners.
@Fran Macadam Well if that line of turkeys pecking at the crumbs of provocations
unfolding which purport to involve Iran keep on gobbling on cue they are going to realise too
late they just walked into the slaughter house. Iran will send home many thousands of their
boys and girls in body bags and sink their ships but the real hurt will be the end of the US
economy. They'll be missing even allegorical crumbs when they only have dirt to eat.
@MarkinLA Japan continued to occupy part of China (and viciously so, clearly stamping on
the foot of white-colonial interests with their homegrown late-comer colonialism) but i
mainly started to challenge US power in the Pacific, and with strong determination.
Israel does not have the ability to deceive the US, and why would it need to with Trump in
power? American fracking technology has greatly limited Iranian ability to cause trouble. If
it was the Iranians that did the limpet mine attack on international shipping then what would
their objective have been? Clearly they don't want more any real war or even more sanctions.
What they do want is create demand for their oil and sell it at a good price. The price of
oil is already up from the mere tension over the limpet mine and shootdown and had there been
US military action oil prices would have gone much higher. I see this whole affair as a sign
that the Iranian regieme is getting desperate, because America's slow smothering strategy is
working. Iran wants to breack out of its current situation and Trump is walking them into
that.
Israel will do nothing, the partisan supporters of Israel in the US can be kept quiet on
the immigration Issue by throwing them a bone (as Trump has been doing). Iran want to rase
oil prices and create demand for its oil, that is all. Hitting Iran, but quite lightly, is
the best option for Trump if he wants to win reelection. And so he will hit Iran at a time of
his choosing, which will probabally be closer to the election. The armed forces of America or
any other country are not for enforcing international law or notions of fair play, but rather
for defending that country's interests. Iran and Trump's agendas converge on a clash well
short of all out war in the very near future.
Occam's Razor suggests Trump got news that the drone was indeed inside Iranian airspace and
decided for once to call BS.
Besides, in the great scheme of things, one lost drone doesn't make up for the USS
Vincennes killing 290 people on Iran Air 655 by shooting it down in Iranian Airspace. When
the Empire warned that civil aircraft were not safe in the airspace, it wasn't the Iranian
forces they were warning about.
@Miggle Sorry, "My guess" covers all that follows. It's only my guess that the USA would
have sided with Hitler if they'd known India would not be part of the British Empire.
@TheJester But it wasn't wise for the Japanese as they were completely defeated.
The key difference between Japan and Iran is that the Japanese Empire was an aggressor,
endlessly invading its neighbours. Iran has not fought an offensive war in 40 years.
Also have to question you on the time element. Time is on the side of the Asian countries.
It's countries, like Israel, who see this as peak time for military action. Iran has survived
40 years of sanctions and can certainly survive this time, especially with the support of
Russia and China. Yet they still must react to military planes threatening their air space.
Plus they have no control over oil tankers being targeted by third parties.
The more I see of this, the more convinced I am that the US as a society is clinically
insane.
Its borders are under attack by what can only be described as an invasion is taking place
with millions off illegal immigrants pour across the border to commit crime, steal jobs or
mooch of the welfare programs.
Its cities are decaying with armies of homeless, shit and drugs flooding the streets in
ever greater numbers while the working class people flee in great waves.
Masked and armed criminals roam the streets of major US cities, attack anyone they deem to
be a wrong thinker when not busy rioting, stealing and chanting for the deaths of others.
Its economy is in a bi-polar mood. On one hand the GDP is as high as ever with tons of new
jobs getting created, on the other hand the physical economy is shrinking as stores closes
and houses go unsold due to half the nation being unable to buy anything but food and
clothes.
In the face of all of these problems, the US Government has decided to put its full
attention on overthrowing the government of Venezuela and starting a war with Iran because
somehow, those two nations who posed no danger to the US have been declared high priority
targets that requires the full spectrum attention and political intervention by the US.
@A123 "There will be a response with minimal bloodshed." Yes, we are noted for the
delicate, nearly bloodless nature of our military reactions, merely focusing on regimes with
the full-throated applause of the grateful populaces. It would be a cake-walk, to quote our
valiant SecDef Rumsfeld prior to our 2003 Iraqi minimally bloody response.
And speaking of armchair generalship, I wonder where Trump's multi-starred consultant got
the figure "150" in answer to the question of civilian casualties. This is the kind of
clear-sighted strategic vision that has a U. S. victory in Afghanistan just around the
corner, to quote our junior Clausewitz's.
But it is also plausible (if by no means certain) that at least two groups could have
opposed such a strike:
1) The planners at CENTCOM and/or the Pentagon.
Yes, it's reported that the Pentagon advised Trump not to retaliate militarily for the
drone shoot down.
Given advanced missile technologies, surface warships of any stripe are sitting ducks. I'm
guessing that Iran has a plethora of missile batteries up and down its coast. If Iran
launched a barrage of missiles simultaneously (10? 20? 30?) at a single surface warship in
the Persian Gulf, what would be the probability that the ship's self-defense systems could
neutralize them all?
If a single multi-billion dollar warship were sunk, the credibility of U.S. naval "power
projection" would evaporate. In that context, the Pentagon's reluctance may be because they'd
rather not establish that their hyper-expensive blue-water surface Navy is an
anachronism.
There is a very simple solution to all this, and the sooner it happens the better.
Everyone who conspired to defraud the US taxpayer into illegal wars (dating back to 2002),
should be forced to pay for the cost of the wars they lied us into.
All the assets of these "deceivers" should be "seized" .to pay down the 22 trillion war
debt their lies created.
If there is anything left over , it should be placed in an " Iran War Escrow Account
".
This would ensure that the burden of the war costs falls directly on "their" shoulders and
NOT the US taxpayers.
This seems like a just and fair solution for everybody ., doesn't it ?
An authentic act of war before even before firing the first bullet. First, make the
economy scream in the tradition of yet another thug masquerading as head of state (Nixon).
Second, starve them into submission. Does the first Iraq war resulting in the death of an
estimated half a million children denied essential medicines ring a bell? Venezuela is
similarly being starved into surrender. Meanwhile Guaido is embezzling the humanitarian aid
intended for his needy countrymen.
All said, the history of our country's lies and deception going back a long ways, more
than speaks for itself.
@Justsaying Of course, starvation is a favorite tactic of OUR international Communist
overlords. They've used it for decades and killed hundreds of millions of people using it.
It's cheap and easy.
On direct orders from Donald Trump ..the US Military is illegally occupying the sovereign
Nation of Syria .and Trump took a direct order from JEW ONLY ISRAEL to do this think about it
A case can be made that the US strategy is not to go to war with Iran .but rather, use the
boogey man of Iran to justify a 100 year illegal US Military occupation of Syria on behalf of
JEW ONLY ISRAEL .
The late Fat Cockroach Christopher Hitchens justified murdering thousands of Iraqis
because it would be good for the Kurds Well, here is what I say:THE CRYPTO JEW KURDS WERE
NEVER WORTH IT .Kurdish autonomy in northern Iraq always meant an IDF presence in Northern
Iraq
The best analysis of the 225 million dollar MQ-4C drone(more expensive than the F-35) shoot
down in my opinion is that of Jim Stone:
"The drone shot down was an MQ-4C, which is basically a more advanced clone of the Global
Hawk. A better score for Iran than a Global Hawk. ADDITIONALLY IMPORTANT: Iran was the one
that recovered the debris, the U.S. navy did not, which means Iran was telling the truth
about where it was flying to begin with. If they got it, it fell on their turf. It is really
blown to smithereens, a direct hit. That's good for Iran because it proves their missile
systems can do it, but it is bad because they don't have any big pieces. Additionally, there
was an American P-8 spy plane accompanying the drone, Iran was able to differentiate between
the two, and hit the drone. The P-8 was a much easier target. Iran obviously opted not to hit
it because killing it's crew would have meant war."
What everyone needs to be aware of here is "stealth" technology is a total farce, and can
be defeated with long wave radar, basically the same system used by England during WWII. The
drone shot down was considered a Max Stealth aircraft, same as the F-35. The F-35 and F-22
are basically "hanger queens"(many hours of maintenance required for every hour of flying
time), and with their stealth capabilities being defeatable, they are pretty much worthless.
Trump did not pull the trigger on this because he figured out the whole thing could go real
bad real quick.
Everyone who conspired to defraud the US taxpayer into illegal wars (dating back to
2002), should be forced to pay for the cost of the wars they lied us into.
Everyone who conspired to defraud the US taxpayer into illegal wars, their heirs and all
who profited from (dating back to 1812), should be forced to pay for the cost of the wars
they lied us into.
@Justsaying You are correct. This is economic and siege warfare. Flying bullets, etc.,
add to the drama and consequences, but the war on Iran began many years ago. The vicious
clowns are up to the same old tricks, but bullshitting only the willing gulls.
No, it's not. Clearly the Nazis were on the defensive . Lying Abe Lincoln was, in
fact, much worse than the Nazis ever thought of being; in a totally different category
even.
Iran has not started a war in over 300 years and is not a terrorist nation and does not
export terrorism, that title belongs the the unholy trinity of the zio/US and Israel and
Britain, the creators and funders and suppliers of AL CIADA aka ISIS and all the various off
shoots thereof.
This war on Iran is a zionist project of the zionists who control the governments of the
zio/US and zio/Britain as has been the case in every war in Iraq and Libya and Syria and
Yemen and Lebanon , Israel has been the agent provocateur in every one of these wars!
The zionists have a goal of a satanic zionist NWO and are hell bent to get there if they
have to kill off all the goyim and muslims to accomplish it and they are well on their
way!
Read the book Blood In The Water by Joan Mellen on the zio/US and Israeli attack on the
USS Liberty for a look at how these two terrorist nations operate!
A handful of psychopaths determine our destiny. What makes us different from
animals?
I don't think other animals have psychopaths of the same species ruling over them nor do
they have hasbara clowns spouting sewage and doing worse 24/7, such as the alphanumeric zero,
above.
Mr. Saker left out the inconvenient fact that while that drone was indeed flying over
Iranian air space, a much larger target, the Poseidon P8 was flying nearby. The P8 is a
converted Boeing 737, making for a much larger radar profile for that missile. The P8 has
many ASW capabilities, and also can control drones.
If this is true the stupid bastards in control of this country better take note. If the
missile, that Iran says they developed, is cabable of distinguishing between a P8 and a drone
the US may have a big problem.
More likely, Trump and his Neocons knew that Iran had proof that the spy drone was shot down
over Iran's territory, that the truth would come out after the U.S. strike, earning the
world's condemnation and making Trump et al look like warmongering fools. That's what they
are, of course, but it gave Trump the chance to pose as a big humanitarian, stopping the
strike because, since it was only a plane, with no Americans on board, he didn't want to
"disproportionately" kill anybody. Yeah. Just wait until the Israeli puppets send another
plane with Americans on board, it'll give Israel and our traitorous Neocons the war they've
been lusting after for a decade or more.
In fact it's my understanding that the Japanese were bending over backwards in an attempt
to avoid war with the US but the Wall Street Commie catamite FDR and his henchmen foiled and
insulted them at every turn. The story of how they were repeatedly humiliated would raise the
hackles of the least sensitive among us.
The big picture is that the Wall Street and London Commies were aiming for world hegemony
even at their own populations' expense, of course, and Japan and Germany had to be castrated
even if populated and run by angels and innocent choir boys to ensure that they could be
turned into industrial slave states. It's apparent that the scum of the Earth won't rest
until they've accomplished their goals as we can clearly see here.
Sean Hannity lives in the largest Mansion in Lloyd Neck I have driven past his Mansion
to get a look as to just how big it is IT'S HUGE ..Lloyd Neck has the most expensive zip
code in the US
A simple Google search reveals Hannity sold his Lloyd Neck home in 2014, and has lived in
Oyster Bay for several years. Also, Lloyd Neck isn't even in Forbes' Top 50 Most Expensive
Zip Codes; the list is headed by four communities in California and one in Florida.
I'm not saying Sean isn't a pussy and a faggot, but your facts are suspect.
The question about the causes of the collapse and destruction of the Soviet Union – is not idle. It does not lose its relevance
today, 22 years after occurred the death of the Soviet Union . Why? because some on the basis of this event concluded that, say,
the capitalist model of the economy more competitive, more efficient and has no alternatives. American political scientist
Francis Fukuyama after the collapse of the Soviet Union even hastened to declare that it was the "End of history": humanity has reached the
highest and last stage of its development in the form of a universal, global capitalism. The relevance of studying the shadow economy,
ssco opinion of this kind of political scientists, sociologists and economists, discussing the socialist economic model does not
deserve attention.
Better to focus on improving the capitalist model of the economy, i. E. A model that targets all members of society to the enrichment,
and a means of enrichment (profit) is the exploitation of one person by another. However, there are such "Natural" attributes of
the capitalist model of social and income inequality, competition, cyclical crises, bankruptcies, unemployment and the like. All
proposed improvements are aimed only at mitigating the inhuman consequences of capitalism that is reminiscent of utopian attempts
to limit the appetite of a wolf devouring a sheep. We proceed from the fact that the key socio-economic characteristics of the socialist
model are welfare for all members of society (goal), public ownership of the means of production (the main means), income generation
solely for labor, planned nature of the economy, centralization of management, command positions of the state in the economy, the
social consumption funds, the limited nature of commodity-money relations and so on. While this refers to the well-being not only
in the form of products and services that are vital (biological) needs of the person.
This would also include public safety and defense, education, culture, conditions of work and rest. Of course, socialism – not
only the economy and social relations. It also implies a certain type of political power, ideology, a high level of spiritually-moral
development of society and another. High moral and spiritual requests should assume that there are higher goals in relation to socio-economic
objectives.
But let's focus now is on the socio-economic aspect of the socialist model. So the erosion of the socialist model began long before
the tragic events of december 1991, when it signed the infamous agreement on the division of the ussr in the bialowieza forest. It
was already the final act of the political order. It is not only the date of death of the ussr, and date of full legalization of
a new socio-economic model, which is called "Capitalism". However, implicitly capitalism germinated in the depths of soviet society
for nearly three decades.
The soviet economy de facto has acquired the traits of a mixed. It combined socialist and capitalist structures. However, some
foreign researchers and politicians said that de facto in the Soviet Union there was a complete restoration of capitalism in the
1960-ies – 1970-ies. The restoration of capitalism was linked to the emergence and development in the bowels of the ussr the so-called
shadow or "Second" economy.
In particular, in the early 1960-ies member of the german communist party willy dickhut began publishing their articles, which
stated that since coming to power in our country n. With. Khrushchev happened (not started, but it happened!) the restoration of
capitalism in the ussr. The shadow economy functioned on the principles different from the socialist. Anyway, she was tied to corruption,
embezzlement of state property, receipt of unearned income, in violation of the laws (or use of "Holes" in the legislation). Not
to be confused with the shadow economy "Informal" economy, which is not contrary to the laws and principles of the socialist system,
but complemented the economy "Official".
First of all, this self-employment – for example, the work of the farmer on the plot or the citizen in his summer cottage. And
in the best of times (under stalin) widely developed the so-called fishing cooperation, which was occupied by production of consumer
goods and services. In the Soviet Union state and party authorities chose to ignore the phenomenon of the shadow economy. No, of
course, the police had uncovered and suppressed various operations in the sphere of the shadow economy. But the leaders of the ussr,
commenting on this kind of history, fobbed off with phrases such as "Exception", "Some shortcomings", "Defects", "Bugs" and the like.
For example, in the early 1960-ies of the then first deputy of the ussr council of ministers anastas mikoyan has identified black
market in the Soviet Union as "A handful of some dirty foam appearing on the surface of our society. "The shadow economy of the ussr:
acincinnati some serious research shadow ("Second") economy in the ussr was conducted until the late 1980-ies. Abroad, such studies
came first. First of all we should mention the work of american sociologist gregory grossman (university of california), which was
called "Destructive independence. The historical role of genuine trends in soviet society".
She became widely known after was published in 1988 in the book "The light at the end of the tunnel" (university of berkeley,
edited by stephen f. Cohen). However, the first article of grossman on this topic appeared in 1977 and was called "The second economy
in the ussr (journal problems of communism, september-october 1977). You can also mention the book emigrated to the United States
, the soviet lawyer konstantin simis "Corruption in the Soviet Union – the secret underground world of soviet capitalism", published
in 1982. The author in the 1970-ies is closely in contact with some shady businessman, a lawyer which he performed at the trials.
However, quantitative assessments of shadow ("Second") economy k. Simes does not. Later appeared the work of american sociologists
and economists of Russian origin Vladimir tremlia and michael alexeev. Since 1985, gregory grossman and Vladimir treml produce periodic
collections of the "Second economy" of the ussr. Releases continued until 1993, only 51 were published a study involving 26 authors.
Many studies represented surveys of families of immigrants from the Soviet Union (a total of 1061 family). To studies have also
used surveys of emigrants from other socialist countries, the official statistics of the ussr, publications in mass media and scientific
journals of the Soviet Union . Despite the differences in some quantitative estimates of the individual authors, these differences
were not fundamental. The differences arose due to the fact that some authors considered "Informal economy", the other – the shadow
economy; however, their definitions of both economies could not match. Here are some results of these studies. 1.
In 1979 the illicit manufacture of wine, beer and other alcoholic beverages, as well as speculative resale of alcoholic beverages
produced in the "First economy", provided the income, equal to 2. 2% of gnp (gross national product). 2. In the late 1970-ies in
the ussr was flourishing black market gasoline. From 33 to 65% of purchases of gasoline in urban areas of the country, individual
owners of cars had petrol sold by drivers of public enterprises and organizations (gasoline were sold at a price below the state).
3. In the soviet hairdresser 'left' incomes exceeded the amounts that customers have paid through cash.
This is just one example of what some state-owned enterprises de facto belonged to the "Second" economy. 4. In 1974 the share
of employment in private and home gardens accounted for almost a third of the total working time in agriculture. And this was almost
10% of the total working time in the soviet economy. 5. In the 1970-ies, about a quarter of agricultural products produced on private
plots, much of it was directed at kolkhoz markets. 6.
In the late 1970's, around 30% of all income of the urban population was obtained through various types of private activity –
both legal and illegal. 7. By the end of 1970-ies the proportion of people employed in the "Second economy", reached 10-12% of the
total workforce in the ussr. At the end of 1980-ies there appeared a number of works on the shadow and "Second" economy in the ussr.
First and foremost is the publication of the soviet economist tatyana results and director of the research institute of the state
planning commission valery rutgajzer. Here is the data from the t.
The results of the "Shadow economy of the ussr". The annual value of illegally produced goods and services in the early 1960-ies
amounted to about 5 billion rubles, and in the end of 1980-ies was already reached 90 billion rubles. At current prices, the gnp
of the ussr was (in billions of rubles): in 1960 – 195; in 1990, 701. Thus, the economy of the ussr for thirty years has increased
3. 6 times, and the shadow economy – 14 times.
If in 1960 the shadow economy relative to official gdp was 3. 4%, while by 1988 this figure rose to 20%. However, in 1990 it was
equal to 12. 5%. This decline was due to changes in soviet legislation, which transferred to discharge a legal a range of economic
activities, which were previously considered illegal. The number of employed in the shadow economy, estimated to be the results,
in the beginning of 1960-ies was 6 million people, and in 1974 their number increased to 17-20 million people (6-7% of the population).
In 1989, the such shadow was already 30 million people, or 12% of the population of the ussr. The threats and consequences of the
development of the shadow economy in sssri american and soviet researchers pay attention to some features of the shadow economy and
its impact on the overall situation in the Soviet Union .
Occasionally, a sharp question found a way through. About three hours in, one young man raised the issue of inflated military spending. "Who are you preparing us for war against?" he asked. The calibrated answer mixed belligerence with fiscal caution. Russian remained committed to nuclear parity, Mr Putin said, but it would do so with falling budgets.
Notable quotes:
"... Mr Putin's other rare forays into foreign policy centered on his traditional adversary, the United States. Washington was at the forefront of disrupting the world order and fanning tensions with Iran, he said. The prospect of armed conflict with Tehran was, he said, a "catastrophe" waiting to happen and risked an unpredictable "spike in violence". ..."
"... "Iran is a Shiite nation ready to defend their country to the hilt," he said. "It's very difficult to assess what will happen if military forces are engaged." ..."
Wanting peace meant preparing for war, he added, saying:
"Whoever doesn't want to feed his own army will end up feeding
someone else's."
Mr Putin's other rare forays into foreign policy centered on
his traditional adversary, the United States. Washington was at
the forefront of disrupting the world order and fanning tensions
with Iran, he said. The prospect of armed conflict with Tehran
was, he said, a "catastrophe" waiting to happen and risked an
unpredictable "spike in violence".
"Iran is a Shiite nation ready to defend their country to
the hilt," he said. "It's very difficult to assess what will
happen if military forces are engaged."
Israel is just another 'settlers" country. It might be successful or it might fail like South
Africa and Rhodesia. The survival of Israel as the settler country hinges on the USA
unconditional support as yet another (stealth) USA state, and the continuation of the role of the
USA as the world hegemon and the center of the global neoliberal empire. . The USA position as
for Israel might eventually change with the collapse of neoliberalism.
One problem that creates negative attitude to Israel around the world (according to
BBC data
only the USA and a couple of African countries having the majority of population that views
Israel positively) is, as one commenter observed, the situation in which "The Children of the
Holocaust survivors, born into Israel, have now become the "Holocaust-ers of Palestine"
When Israeli prime ministers are in trouble, facing difficult elections or a corruption
scandal, the temptation has typically been for them to unleash a military operation to bolster
their standing. In recent years, Gaza has served as a favourite punching bag.
Benjamin Netanyahu is confronting both difficulties at once: a second round of elections in
September that he may struggle to win; and an attorney general who is widely expected to indict
him on corruption charges shortly afterwards.
Netanyahu is in an unusually tight spot, even by the standards of an often chaotic and
fractious Israeli political system. After a decade in power, his electoral magic may be
deserting him. There are already rumblings of discontent among his allies on the far right.
Given his desperate straits, some observers fear that he may need to pull a new kind of
rabbit out of the hat.
In the past two elections, Netanyahu rode to success after issuing dramatic last-minute
statements. In 2015, he agitated against the fifth of Israel's citizens who are Palestinian
asserting their democratic rights, warning that they were "coming out in droves to vote".
Back in April, he declared his intention to annex large chunks of the occupied West Bank, in
violation of international law, during the next parliament.
Amos Harel, a veteran military analyst with Haaretz newspaper, observed last week that
Netanyahu may decide words are no longer enough to win. Action is needed, possibly in the form
of an announcement on the eve of September's ballot that as much as two-thirds of the West Bank
is to be annexed.
Washington does not look like it will stand in his way.
Shortly before April's election, the Trump administration offered Netanyahu a campaign
fillip by recognising Israel's illegal annexation of the Golan Heights, territory Israel seized
from Syria in 1967.
This month David Friedman, US ambassador to Israel and one of the chief architects of Donald
Trump's long-delayed "deal of the century" peace plan, appeared to offer a similar, early
election boost.
In interviews, he claimed Israel was "on the side of God" – unlike, or so it was
implied, the Palestinians. He further argued that Israel had the "right to retain" much of the
West Bank.
Both statements suggest that the Trump administration will not object to any Israeli moves
towards annexation, especially if it ensures their favoured candidate returns to power.
Whatever Friedman suggests, it is not God who has intervened on Israel's behalf. The hands
that have carefully cleared a path over many decades to the West Bank's annexation are all too
human.
Israeli officials have been preparing for this moment for more than half a century, since
the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza were seized back in 1967.
That point is underscored by an innovative interactive map of the occupied territories. This
valuable new resource is a joint project of the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem and
Forensic Architecture, a London-based team that uses new technology to visualise and map
political violence and environmental destruction.
Titled Conquer
and Divide , it reveals in detail how Israel has "torn apart Palestinian space, divided the
Palestinian population into dozens of disconnected enclaves and unravelled its social, cultural
and economic fabric".
The map proves beyond doubt that Israel's colonisation of the West Bank was never
accidental, defensive or reluctant. It was coldly calculated and intricately planned, with one
goal in mind – and the moment to realise that goal is fast approaching.
Annexation is not a right-wing project that has hijacked the benign intentions of Israel's
founding generation. Annexation was on the cards from the occupation's very beginnings in 1967,
when the so-called centre-left – now presented as a peace-loving alternative to Netanyahu
– ran the government.
The map shows how Israeli military planners created a complex web of pretexts to seize
Palestinian land: closed military zones today cover a third of the West Bank; firing ranges
impact 38 Palestinian communities; nature reserves are located on 6 per cent of the territory;
nearly a quarter has been declared Israeli "state" land; some 250 settlements have been
established; dozens of permanent checkpoints severely limit movement; and hundreds of
kilometres of walls and fences have been completed.
These interlocking land seizures seamlessly carved up the territory, establishing the walls
of dozens of tightly contained prisons for Palestinians in their own homeland.
Two Nasa satellite images of the region separated by 30 years – from 1987 and 2017
– reveal how Israel's settlements and transport infrastructure have gradually scarred the
West Bank's landscape, clearing away natural vegetation and replacing it with concrete.
The land grabs were not simply about acquisition of territory. They were a weapon, along
with increasingly draconian movement restrictions, to force the native Palestinian population
to submit, to recognise its defeat, to give up hope.
In the immediate wake of the West Bank's occupation, defence minister Moshe Dayan, Israel's
hero of the hour and one of the architects of the settlement project, observed that
Palestinians should be made "to live like dogs, and whoever wants to can leave – and we
shall see where this process leads".
Although Israel has concentrated Palestinians in 165 disconnected areas across the West
Bank, its actions effectively won the international community's seal of approval in 1995. The
Oslo accords cemented Israel's absolute control over 62 per cent of the West Bank, containing
the Palestinians' key agricultural land and water sources, which was classified as Area C.
Occupations are intended to be temporary – and the Oslo accords promised the same.
Gradually, the Palestinians would be allowed to take back more of their territory to build a
state. But Israel made sure both the occupation and the land thefts sanctioned by Oslo
continued.
The new map reveals more than just the methods Israel used to commandeer the West Bank.
Decades of land seizures highlight a trajectory, plotting a course that indicates the project
is still not complete.
ORDER IT NOW
If Netanyahu partially annexes the West Bank – Area C – it will be simply
another stage in Israel's tireless efforts to immiserate the Palestinian population and bully
them into leaving. This is a war of attrition – what Israelis have long understood as
"creeping annexation", carried out by stealth to avoid a backlash from the international
community.
Ultimately, Israel wants the Palestinians gone entirely, squeezed out into neighbouring Arab
states, such as Egypt and Jordan. That next chapter is likely to begin in earnest if Trump ever
gets the chance to unveil his "deal of the century".
A version of this article first appeared in the National, Abu Dhabi.
This study shows us that the pro-Israel narrative has become so firmly entrenched in the
American mainstream media that it is almost impossible for news consumers to discern the
truth about the situation in Israel and Palestine. This has greatly benefitted Washington
which has made it abundantly clear that it sides with Israel in this fifty year-old
conflict.
If Netanyahu partially annexes the West Bank – Area C – it will be simply
another stage in Israel's tireless efforts to immiserate the Palestinian population and
bully them into leaving. This is a war of attrition – what Israelis have long
understood as "creeping annexation", carried out by stealth to avoid a backlash from the
international community.
Ultimately, Israel wants the Palestinians gone entirely, squeezed out into neighbouring
Arab states, such as Egypt and Jordan. That next chapter is likely to begin in earnest if
Trump ever gets the chance to unveil his "deal of the century".
This is probably true-and? I don't see Palestinians as a real people; they're just a bunch
of Arabs & it is absolutely irrelevant whether they are in Syria, Egypt or Arabia. They
themselves say they're not a "real" people:
On the other hand, real peoples like Uyghurs & Tibetans are swamped by the
Chinese, which is a real tragedy & only, huh, Richard Gere complains.
So, what the big deal with "Palestinians"? Why would they have a "right to exist"on some
shitty piece o land Jews seem to be obsessively addicted to in past 2 millennia?
And then, what with Amazonian Indians, Eskimos, Ostyaks, Okinawans, ..? What about
expulsion of 13 million Germans in what are now parts of Poland, Czechia, Russia .?
Israelis should have expelled all of them in 1967. & there would be peace.
There is one point in the article that is not completely accurate. J. Cook writes: "Israeli
officials have been preparing for this moment for more than half a century, since the West
Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza were seized back in 1967."
In fact, Ilan Pappe shows in his book "The biggest Prison on Earth" (2017) that plans to
occupy the whole land were much older. The plans weren't made because Israel took Palestinian
lands in 1967. Israel took lands in 1967 because of the plans to colonize it. Those plans
were older.
So, Pappe says in a more general way in his book that " . since 1948 and even more since
1956, Israel's military and political elites was looking for the right historical moment to
occupy the West Bank." (p. XIV). He also says more specifically: "The strategy was presented
by the CoGS to the army on 1 May 1963 and was meant to prepare the army for controlling the
West Bank as an occupied military area" (p. XIII).
All talk about "peace", about "coexistence", about a "two state solution" are (and were)
made in bad faith. About Pappe's book: I don't want to reccomend it for a casual reading. It
may be valuable historically because it deals with historical material from archives. But
it's basically a book about the Israeli burocracy, about laws, rules which would make sure
that Israel controls the conquested territory which it never thought of giving back. It's a
dry book. He has other books that which are much more agreeable to read like his short book
"Ten Myths About Israel".
"... The real goal is domination of the Middle East -- and that's been a bipartisan US strategy for decades. ..."
"... By striking a compromise with a defiant non-democracy like Iran, which for the past 40 years has defined itself as the foremost opponent of American hegemony (liberal or otherwise), while signaling a desire to slowly dismantle American hegemony in the Middle East (in order to pivot to Asia), Obama introduced an unsustainable contradiction to US foreign policy. ..."
"... Excellent article, because it clearly exposes the central isssue - US hegemony. And that goes has implications way beyond Iran, particularly with respect to relations with China and Russia. Very similar geopolitical games are playing out in the South China Sea, around the Ukraine, and in Syria. ..."
"... This is not 1950 when the world economy was in collapse and the US was overwhelmingly the top dog. Other countries are nearly equal to the US. Hegemony is unsustainable in today's environment and one solution is a cooperative balance of power employing diplomacy, and unprecedented cooperation on questions of energy and security in order to solve global problems like climate change and the elimination of nuclear weapons. ..."
"... The new world order - as this 'confrontation' suggests, the USA, supported by the Saudis, their compatriots, and Israel. All renowned 'friends' of the USA. With friends like these who needs enemies. ..."
"... The "confrontation" goes way back to 1953, when the CIA overthrew Mohammed Mossadegh (for his "sin" of nationalizing Iranian oil) and labelled him a Communist. Everything that is adversarial in US-Iranian relations goes back to that criminal act. ..."
The real goal is domination of the Middle East -- and that's been a bipartisan US
strategy for decades.
... ... ...
...if war is the endgame of their escalation, what is the endgame of their war? Dominance --
perpetual dominance of the Middle East (and the globe as a whole) by the United States. That is
and has been Washington's grand strategy, regardless of whether a Republican, a Democrat, or a
reality-TV star has occupied the White House. America has, of course, often ensured this
domination by supporting friendly dictatorships.
But there is also a liberal version of the strategy. Liberal hegemony, or primacy, dictates
that the United States has the moral obligation and the strategic imperative to transform
anti–status quo non-democracies into liberal (pliant) democracies. According to this
grand strategy, the existence of such non-democracies is a threat to the United States and its
hegemony.
America cannot coexist with them but must ultimately transform them. Military force is
instrumental to this endeavor. As Max Boot wrote back in 2003, the pillars of liberal hegemony
must be spread and sustained " at gunpoint if need
be ."
While some advocates of liberal hegemony object to the more militaristic interpretation
preferred by neoconservatives, the difference between liberal interventionism and
neoconservatism is more a matter of nuance than core belief.
Neither can provide a solution to Washington's endless wars, because both operate within the
paradigm of primacy, which itself is a root cause of the country's perpetual conflicts. As long
as that paradigm remains the guiding principle of foreign policy, hawks like John Bolton, Tom
Cotton, and Lindsey Graham -- and their Democratic fellow travelers, too -- will continue to
steer America's engagement with the world, as it is their outlook that is compatible with
primacy, not that of those on the progressive left or the libertarian right, who have advocated
non-interventionism or negotiated settlements with those who challenge Pax Americana.
This is why the cards were stacked against the survival of the Iran nuclear deal even if
Trump had not been elected. By striking a compromise with a defiant non-democracy like
Iran, which for the past 40 years has defined itself as the foremost opponent of American
hegemony (liberal or otherwise), while signaling a desire to slowly dismantle American hegemony
in the Middle East (in order to pivot to Asia), Obama introduced an unsustainable contradiction
to US foreign policy.
This contradiction has been particularly visible among Democrats who oppose Trump's Iran
policy but who still cannot bring themselves to break with our seemingly endless confrontation
with Iran. As long as such Democrats allow the debate to be defined by the diktat of US
primacy, they will always be on the defensive, and their long-term impact on US-Iran relations
will be marginal.
After all, the strategy of US primacy in the Middle East demands Iran's defeat...
Excellent article, because it clearly exposes the central isssue - US hegemony. And that
goes has implications way beyond Iran, particularly with respect to relations with China and
Russia. Very similar geopolitical games are playing out in the South China Sea, around the
Ukraine, and in Syria.
Liberals have to stop talking about "bad actors" (whenever they are
linked with competing powers, e.g. Iran, N.Korea, etc.) but welcome them as "allies" when
they are our faithful vassals (e.g. Israel, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, etc.). Unfortunately, Obama
appeared to understand this with respect to Iran, but totally ignored it with respect to the
rest of the world.
Victor Sciamarelli says: June 21, 2019 at 1:57 pm
I completely agree with Trita Parsi's succinct description of the problem as, "Dominance
-- perpetual dominance of the Middle East (and the globe as a whole) by the United States.
That is and has been Washington's grand strategy, regardless of whether a Republican, a
Democrat, or a reality-TV star has occupied the White House." However, why not offer
alternative policies for debate?
Consider, for example, the idea of a "balance of power." It was for the same reason that the
British fought Napoleon, the Crimean War, entered the first world war, and also why they were
constantly engaged in diplomatic agreements in Europe. British policy demanded that they
prevent the rise of a hegemon on the continent.
Napoleon was never a threat to the English mainland and neither were the Germans in 1914.
Yet, they fought both because preventing a hegemon and maintaining a balance of power
pre-empted other considerations.
I would suggest that regardless of events since 1918 such as: the decline of the British
empire, Versailles, the world wide economic depression, the rise of fascism, the reaction to
communism, or the rise of a non-European super power like the US, thinking about a modern, up
to date form of the balance of power is useful.
Furthermore, we need an alternative policy because hegemony fails the world and the American
people, and the world faces two existential threats: climate change and nuclear war.
Moreover, the US has been a superpower for so long that nobody remembers what it is like not
to be a superpower. In addition, American elites seem unwilling or unable to grasp the real
limits of military power.
In a world where the five permanent members of the UN security council are nuclear powers,
and nuclear weapons are held by smaller nations, the major power centers of the world:
Europe, Russia, China, and the US, have no choice but to cooperate with each other and with
the countries of the ME.
The ME is a focal point for establishing cooperation because the world needs energy and the
ME needs stability and development, but it requires leadership and motive.
This is not 1950 when the world economy was in collapse and the US was overwhelmingly the top
dog. Other countries are nearly equal to the US. Hegemony is unsustainable in today's
environment and one solution is a cooperative balance of power employing diplomacy, and
unprecedented cooperation on questions of energy and security in order to solve global
problems like climate change and the elimination of nuclear weapons.
Pauline Hartwig says: June 21, 2019 at 1:38 pm
The new world order - as this 'confrontation' suggests, the USA, supported by the Saudis,
their compatriots, and Israel. All renowned 'friends' of the USA. With friends like these who
needs enemies.
Gene Bell-Villada says: June 21, 2019 at 12:40 pm
The "confrontation" goes way back to 1953, when the CIA overthrew Mohammed Mossadegh (for his "sin" of nationalizing
Iranian oil) and labelled him a Communist. Everything that is adversarial in US-Iranian relations
goes back to that
criminal act.
The US will provide Ukraine with $250 million worth of military equipment, training and
support, the Pentagon announced, saying Ukraine's Navy and marines would be among the
beneficiaries.
The Ukrainian military will get sniper rifles, grenade launchers, counter-battery radar
systems, night vision equipment and communication devices, the Pentagon statement said...
The statement said the package will bring total US security assistance to Ukraine to $1.5
billion since 2014, when a US-backed coup in Kiev ousted Ukraine's elected government.
My own analysis is that the choice of Iran is more or less incidental.
For reasons I won't repeat, Israel always has to have an enemy. Between one thing and
another, Iran is the most attractive target at the moment.
Should she be reduced to quivering submission or blood-soaked anarchy, Israel will just
pick another victim for us to attack. My guess is that it would be Turkey, but first things
first.
"7 Countries in 5 years" and the first Arab Spring dress rehearsal designed to culminate in
an Iranian overthrow. Wayback time machine for warnings of what was and was to come: http://www.arkofcrisis.com/id51.html
@Colin
Wright no the Iran War will not be "incidental":
1) as it'll likely set the rest of the Middle East on fire, the Iran War will greatly
facilitate the Greater Israel Project; esp. as cover for a Final Solution of Israhell's
Palestinian Arab Problem.
2) Iran no longer takes 'Murkan debtbucks for oil. That must be put down, as international
demand for the 'Murkan debtbuck-that-buys-oil is what prevents the domestic debtbuck from
going to hyperinflationary collapse. Oil-producing Iraq dropped the 'Murkan debtbuck and so
did Libya. See what happened to them?
& expect Drumpf to announce his "great discovery about 9/11" any day now:
"Iran did it!" and as Linh D. says, the MAGA-idiots will believe it.
@Haxo
Angmark'no the Iran War will not be "incidental" '
My point is that what's at the heart of this is Israel's need for an enemy. Iran could
vanish tomorrow; it'd just mean Israel would have to start the work up on someone else.
Since we're in the endless war era, another war for Israel is on the horizon, but hardly
anyone seems alarmed, least of all Americans, for they've come to see themselves, quite
casually and indifferently, as only asskicking agents of war, and never its victims.
Please, don't be stupid. The "white man" goyim are not your enemies. We're all in
this together.
If we were that bad, we'd end everyone else tomorrow.
@Escher
If all it takes are some cocaine-addicted pedophiles who molested child actors like Corey
Faim to make some cheesy films for Americans to be brainwashed, perhaps they DESERVE this.
Definitely Jews themselves are not brainwashed.
Nor are Hindus in America. You won't see many Indian-Americans running out to die in Iran
because of the latest film about Nazis.
Muslims-and I worked in a Muslim country-won't care. Emirate Arabs will continue making
money.
Asian-Americans will not care, though clearly our author might be the exception.
Hispanics won't care.
So tell me, why do whites care? What meaning is missing in their lives that can only be
filled by stupid Hollywood films.
Trump's foreign policy is that of the neocons and Israel , the B-52's are fuelled and armed
just waiting for the false flag/pretext to bomb Iran back into the stone age , there will be
no invasion as the costs will be too high . There is speculation that the US is waiting for
Boris Johnson to become Prime Minister as unlike Theresa May he will come out strongly in
favor of military action against Iran .
"Above, I named Jews as the instigators of war against Iran, which made some readers
cringe" Try not to let it bother you. It's pretty obvious that most of the people that read
this website are learning and having a lifetime of indoctrination undone. Many are scared out
of their wits at even having a negative thought about Jews in private. I know the feeling. I
felt similarly growing up.
Growing up I was I was bombarded with non-stop anti-German hatred in the media and
everywhere else. This probably would not have bothered me except that both my parents grew up
in Germany during the war. That meant that like 99% of the other Germans, they were
patriotic. Both of them experienced some harassment when they came to the US, but my mother
liked the USA until we noticed a change around 1970. My father had a more difficult time at
work, but he survived and did very well, but he too noticed a change around that time. That
is the time period Norman Finkelstein identifies as the beginning of the "Holocaust
Industry". Finkelstein explains, that after Israel's victory in the 1967 war, Israel was
considered a valuable ally to the US when they defeated the Soviet backed Arabs. The Jews in
the US became more bold and the word "Holocaust" was abducted by them and was redefined to
refer to what supposedly happened to them during the war. There was an explosion of holocaust
movies, newspaper and magazine articles, everywhere you were bombarded with this propaganda.
In school too. On top of that, we lived in New York, which the Jews openly dominated by the
1970's. My parents also noticed how some Jews mocked Christianity and how Christianity was
being torn down. I think Europeans are more alert than Americans in regards to some things.
When I think about how Christianity has been destroyed in the west I can credit my parents
with seeing it coming.
My parents hardly noticed Jews until they began this full blown propaganda campaign that
went on for decades and I don't think it ever really ended. If it bothered you, it bothered
you less as the years passed by. I asked my mom, and during the National Socialist period,
she knew some Jews but they were a small minority so she had little interaction with them and
their was very little discussion of them. So, in other words, my parents growing up didn't
have negative thoughts about Jews, certainly not strong ones. That changed when the Holocaust
Industry took off and the Jews showed their hatred for the Germans everywhere, and as I said,
it never really stopped. Back then, while having some feelings for my parents homeland, I was
often arguing with them and going against them and Germany. And like the frightened readers
on this website, I knew better than to say, or even think a negative thought about Jews. I
always knew there were many things wrong with the WW II narrative but I think I really became
aware of the lies when I wrote an email to David Irving and he replied in 2007. With the
advent of the internet and reading some important books, you have to be a coward or liar to
deny the hatred and lies that many powerful Jews peddle and how they shove these lies down
everyone else's throats. I'm not as timid as I used to be.
Not only are we fighting Israels wars in the mideast, but the zionists who control the US can
attack and kill 34 and wound 174 Americans on the USS Liberty and got away with it and then
Israel and the zionist controlled deep state attacked the WTC on 911 and killed some 3000
Americans and got away with that also, and plunged America into 18 years and counting of
unending war!
In regards to the USS Liberty see the book Blood In The Water by Joan Mellen, can be had
on amazon.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov called on Washington to weigh the possible
consequences of conflict with Iran and said a report in the New York Times showed the situation
was extremely dangerous.
U.S. President Donald Trump approved military strikes against Iran in retaliation for the
downing of a U.S. surveillance drone, but called off the attacks at the last minute, the report
said.
"... Trump issued an executive order, according to which a schedule of tariffs will be implemented unless Mexico polices its borders and ups its dismal rate of deportation, currently at 10 to 20 percent. ..."
"... Beginning on June 10, " a 5 percent tariff was placed on all imports from Mexico, to be increased by five percentage points each month until it hits 25 percent in October." ..."
"... Lo and behold, Mexico quickly promised to arrest Central American migrants headed north. Agreements may soon materialize with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, to which Trump has already cut off foreign aid, in March ..."
"... How free and fair is trade anyway? Are unfettered markets at work when Canada, for instance, taxes purchases of American goods starting at $20, while America starts taxing Canadian goods at $1000? Hardly. ..."
"... There needs to be a huge turnaround in the number of illegals crossing the border if Trump wants to avoid being a one term president. It's hard to see the republicans staying relevant as well if the current numbers continue. They might hold the Senate for a little while but the presidency and a majority in Congress will be out of reach forever. ..."
"... In 2018, there were 70 million refugees, seeking safety from the world's conflict zone. One person was forced to flee their home because of war and violence every two seconds. ..."
"... Trump should have made reducing LEGAL immigration (and building the Wall to stop illegals) his #1 priority as soon as he was inaugurated. Instead, he dithered with personnel issues, then Obmacare (betrayed by rot-in-hell you bastard McCain), then tax cuts, Kavanaugh, loss of House, the End. ..."
If President Trump doesn't waver, his border deal with Mexico will be a victory. The Mexicans have agreed to quit serving as conduits
to hundreds of thousands of central Americans headed for the U.S.A.
Despite protests from Democrats, stateside -- Mexico has agreed to significantly increase enforcement on its borders.
At first, Mexico was as defiant as the Democrats -- and some Republicans.
Democrats certainly can be counted on to argue for the other side -- any side other than the so-called sovereign people they swore
to represent.
In fairness to the Democrats, Republicans are only notionally committed to the tough policing of the border. And certainly not
if policing the porous border entails threatening trade tariffs against our neighborly narco-state. Some Republican senators even
considered a vote to block the tariffs.
Nevertheless, to the hooting and hollering of the cretins in Congress and media, Trump went ahead and threatened Mexico with tariffs
.
More than that. The president didn't just tweet out "strong words" and taunts.
Since Mexico, the party duopoly, and his own courts have forced his hand, the president proceeded to "retrieve from his arsenal
a time bomb of ruinous proportions."
Or, so the Economist hyperventilated.
Trump issued an executive order, according to which a schedule of tariffs will be implemented unless Mexico polices its borders
and ups its dismal rate of deportation, currently at 10 to 20 percent.
Beginning on June 10, "
a 5 percent tariff was placed on all imports from Mexico, to be increased by five percentage points each month until it hits
25 percent in October."
Lo and behold, Mexico quickly
promised
to arrest Central American migrants headed north. Agreements may soon materialize with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, to which
Trump has already cut off foreign aid, in March
It remains for Trump to stick with tough love for Mexico and the rest. If the torrent of grifters from Central America does not
let up, neither should the tariffs be lifted or aid restored.
Trump's trade and tariff tactics are about winning negotiations for Americans; they're not aimed at flouting the putative free-market.
How free and fair is trade anyway? Are unfettered markets at work when Canada, for instance, taxes purchases of American goods
starting at $20, while America starts taxing Canadian goods at $1000? Hardly.
Free trade is an unknown ideal, to echo Ayn Rand's observations. What goes for "free trade," rather, is trade managed by bureaucratic
juggernauts -- national and international -- central planners concerned with regulating, not freeing, trade; whose goal it is to
harmonize labor, health, and environmental laws throughout the developed world. The undeveloped and developing worlds generally exploit
labor, despoil land and kill off critters as they please.
The American market economy is massive. Trump knows its might. The difference between the president and his detractors is that
Trump is prepared to harness the power of American markets to benefit the American people.
But what of the "billions of dollars in imports from Mexico" that are at stake, as one media shill
shrieked
.
Give me a break. The truth about what Fake News call a major trading partner, Mexico, is that it's a trade pygmy -- a fact known
all too well to Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and his foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard.
The reason these leaders were quick to the negotiating table once a schedule of tariffs had been decided upon by the president
is this.
Via the Economist :
"Only about 15 percent of the United States' exports go to Mexico, but a whopping 80 percent of Mexico's exports head the other
way. 'There is nothing we have in our arsenal that is equivalent to what the United States can do to us,' says Andrés Rozental, a
Mexican former diplomat and minister."
Next, President Trump must compel Mexico to accept "safe third-country status." Translated, this means that the U.S. can expel
any and all "asylum seekers" if they pass through Mexico, as Mexico becomes their lawful, first port-of-call.
Thinking people should realize that Trump's victory here is a Pyrrhic one. For what the president has had to do is convince the
Mexican president to deploy his national guards to do the work American immigration police is not allowed to do.
The U.S. must turn to Mexico to police its border because the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has, to all intents and purposes, outlawed
immigration laws.
Congressional quislings, for their part, have sat back and grumbled about the need for new laws. But as Daniel Horowitz
argues
convincingly, this is "a separation of powers problem." Unless the Trump administration understands that the problem lies with
the lower-court judges [exceeding their constitutional authority] and not the law -- there will be no fix.
For President Trump, the executive order serves as a way around the courts' violation of the constitutionally enshrined federal
scheme, within which the role -- nay, the obligation -- of the commander in chief -- is to defend the country.
Although they're temporary fixes, executive orders can serve to nullify unjust laws. As I argued in my 2016 book,
"The Trump Revolution: The Donald's Creative Destruction Reconstructed," executive
orders are Trump's political power tool -- justice's Jaws of Life, if you will -- to be used by the Executive to pry the people free
from judicial oppression.
Understand: The right of a nation to stop The World from flooding its communities amounts to upholding a negative right. In other
words, by stopping trespassers at their borders, Americans are not robbing invaders of the trinity of life, liberty and property.
All Americans are asserting is their right to be left alone. What we are saying to The World is what we tell our disobedient toddlers
every day, "No. You can't go there."
If you believe Mexico is going to squelch the flow of humans into America -- the same humans who are wiring $25BILLION per year
back to family members in Mexico -- I've got a fleet of taco trucks with square tires to sell you.
There needs to be a huge turnaround in the number of illegals crossing the border if Trump wants to avoid being a one term
president. It's hard to see the republicans staying relevant as well if the current numbers continue. They might hold the Senate
for a little while but the presidency and a majority in Congress will be out of reach forever.
The more this nonsense carries on, the more I empathize with Stalin. Sometimes you gotta bulldoze your way through. Democracy
produces nothing but obstacles. Time to put the keys into the caterpillar.
I applaud this move by Trump, and will of course vote for him in 2020 (for a patriot, what is the alternative?). But unless we
end the LEGAL immigration invasion, all this is for nought, and Trump will likely be the last non-leftist Republican President.
I have fought immigration for 40 years without success, except for CA Prop 187 in 1994, quickly overturned by a dirty Muslim
immigrant Federal judge. Immigration of racial and cultural and (now it's clear to everyone, as I knew by the 80s in CA) ideological
aliens is simple invasion, imperialism by non-military means. We needed Pat Buchanan in the 90s; instead, the stupid Christianists,
with whom I used to argue in the 80s-90s-00s endlessly wrt their insane priorities, worried more about abortion and queers (how'd
that work out, morons?) than alien conquest – with the obvious result that "globohomo" is stronger than ever – AND we have another
50+ MILLION race aliens voting 8-1 Democrat.
Sadly, Trump and the all-GOP 2017-18 Congress were America's very last chance to stop the invasion and save our (and the GOP's)
future. Trump blew it, utterly. Now the USA as a unitary, Occidental, Constitutional, capitalist nation-state cannot be salvaged
and/or restored. The only hope for American patriots is White conservative territorial ingathering and eventual racial secession
and new sovereignty.
Unless the Trump administration understands that the problem lies with the lower-court judges [exceeding their constitutional
authority] and not the law -- there will be no fix.
This is the crux. And this is true, too..
Free trade is an unknown ideal, to echo Ayn Rand's observations. What goes for "free trade," rather, is trade managed by
bureaucratic juggernauts -- national and international -- central planners concerned with regulating, not freeing, trade; whose
goal it is to harmonize labor, health, and environmental laws throughout the developed world. The undeveloped and developing
worlds generally exploit labor, despoil land and kill off critters as they please.
In 2018, there were 70 million refugees, seeking safety from the world's conflict zone. One person was forced to flee their home
because of war and violence every two seconds.
"And I'll huff and puff and bow your house down," said the Big, Bad Wolf.
When stories about the record number of illegals flooding in stop hitting the news cycle, and we no longer get possibly Ebola
infected Congolese with wads of $100 bills, I might believe your assumptions.
Africans Coming Across The Southern Border Have "Rolls Of $100 Bills"
One more thought: Remember that hot air the Big, Bad Orange wolf blew that ICE was going to start rounding up millions of
illegals
on Tuesday? Here it is Friday and no action.
How many times will people fall for Trump's BS promises where nothing gets done or he backtracks?
Madame Mercer, I suspect the real reason behind your story is that Trump is the best POTUS for Israel since the traitor
LBJ and that a certain group wants to keep Tubby the Grifter in the WH so he can keep acting as Israel's de facto real estate
agent.
The simpleton Mercer misses what is really going on. The re-election push is on and Trump will roll out "plans" to deal with immigration.
They will never come into fruition as they are mere "boob bait for bubba". The drug cartels run Mexico and people trafficking
is a bigger business than drug trafficking. If you think they are going to stop, you are as delusional as Ms Mercer. By the way
the politicians work for the drug cartels in Mexico. Of course the advice that Mercer gave to South Africa led to the current
situation where the ANC runs the country and whites are disenfranchised. But what else would you expect from a Jew who sell the
goyim down the river every chance they get.
@sarz Grade:
D+ (every other President since Kennedy: F)
Trump should have made reducing LEGAL immigration (and building the Wall to stop illegals) his #1 priority as soon as he was
inaugurated. Instead, he dithered with personnel issues, then Obmacare (betrayed by rot-in-hell you bastard McCain), then tax
cuts, Kavanaugh, loss of House, the End.
America is gone as not only a White nation, but within 25 years, even a semi-civilized and First World one. Diversity is what
destroyed us. We could have integrated (more or less) the blacks, but the sheer numbers of mostly clannish nonwhite colonizers
since 1968 has doomed us. America was its White, Christian, Anglo-Nordic majority. Without that majority, American dies.
Yong is a typical neoliberal candidate, a creature of Silicon Valley. His cult of entrepreneurship looks silly, because this is
neoliberal myth which is destructive for the society (a lot of Silicon Valley startup are useless or harmful). Politically he is tend
to lean libertarian.
He own success look pretty accidental. He is a despicable venture capitalist himself. His NGO is essentially trying to compensate
for the neoliberalism flaws: they want fully trains candidate for the jobs and do not want tot "train on the job" candidates, who has
potential to be more productive in a long run.
Notable quotes:
"... After graduation, he worked as a corporate lawyer; as a Silicon Valley businessman; as the CEO of a GMAT prep company; and lastly, as the director of Venture for America, an NGO that provided training and seed money for aspiring entrepreneurs. ..."
"... Moore's Law basically already came to an end. While, there are possibly new architectures to explore, i don't see how AI will continue to advance without sharp increases in processing power. ..."
"... I believe it is also immoral to brain drain countries. ..."
"... Considering the fact that 99% of the U.S. government is appointed(by the deciders), and the rest is pre-approved for voting so you can play 'democracy' on special Tuesdays, it doesn't look too good for populism or populists like Andrew or Tulsi. They want another Obama – another shit eating grin to sell a load of false claims and empty promises. ..."
"... Even a big name like Kamala Harris, who has lots of money, a strong organization, tons of endorsements and close to double digit poll numbers, will have to drop out after Iowa and New Hampshire if she doesn't secure, at minimum, no less than third place in either state. Without the momentum a strong finish in these two states provide, campaigns wither and die. The money stops flowing. Volunteers quit. The press pool shrinks. ..."
"... Andrew Yang isn't even polling at 1% in either Iowa or New Hampshire (or anywhere else). He has no ground game. He has no organization. He hasn't raised much money. He has no fired up volunteers willing to make countless phone calls and trudge through the snow to knock on doors. Basically, he has nothing. ..."
"... Moreover, UBI is a terrible idea if it is proposed as a replacement for current social welfare programs, which provide a great deal more value to recipients than $1000 a month. A strict libertarian interpretation of the UBI concept would, in exchange for $1k a month, get rid of food stamps, section 8 housing, AFDC, cash welfare benefits, Medicaid, Medicare, the earned income tax credit and even mortgage interest deductions. There are more moderate proposals. But, ultimately, UBI has to be paid for somehow, either by raising taxes or eliminating much of the welfare state. ..."
"... The narcissistic, self-congratulatory rambling about the superior traits of people who live in coastal cities sounds very much like that Zuckerberg guy, or Chelsea Clinton – in other words, a "progressive" type who want to set up re-education camps for the masses of unwashed, reactionary "white people" – for their own good, of course. ..."
"... The war on terror is a self induced psychosis that is eating away at the moral core of america. Opiods, underage sex, porn are merely diversions. Blessed are the blessed. ..."
"... $12k a year isn't going to free anybody, it's just going to accelerate white genocide (more money for heroin and opiate pills and alcohol). In a world of $1500 a month apartments you're still living on the street with $12k income. ..."
"... Yang says he is against the income tax in principle because you shouldn't tax what you want more of (work) and rich people find loop holes around it anyway. ..."
"... Well, who else offers a better solution? Trump who is to busy being a legendary Isreali president ..."
"... A vomit-inducing brew of Establishment globalists, SJW-appeasing identity politicians, bland corporate stooges, Russiagate conspiracy theorists, and "liberal interventionists" who call Christians "Easter worshippers." ..."
"... America is being continually being deindustrialised by outsourcing every thing to China and Mexico etc. ..."
Andrew Yang – THE WAR ON NORMAL PEOPLE (
2018 )
Rating: 5 /5
You can access all of my latest book, film, and video game reviews
at this link , as well as an ordered, categorized list of
all my book reviews and ratings here: https://akarlin.com/books
I
I don't normally read the vapid hagiographies that characterize most political manifestoes. The two exceptions are Trump's
ART OF THE DEAL , and Putin's FROM THE FIRST PERSON .
The former was a genuinely well-written book that provided many insights into real estate development, and really explained the logic
behind Trump's showman "style" of politics (see Scott Alexander's
great review ). Though it wasn't
a Trump manifesto as such, having been written three decades ago by a guy who now actually hates The Donald, it was probably the
closest thing to one amidst the meme wars of 2016. The Putin book was a relatively dull series of interviews, though it still accounts
for a significant percentage of what we know about Putin's career before the Presidency and remains required reading for any serious
Russia watcher. That said, I imagine the vast majority of such books hew to the pattern of Hillary Clinton's
HARD CHOICES , which was apparently so bad that Amazon was forced to mass delete one star reviews to avoid embarrassing their
favored candidate.
So why did I make an exception for Andrew Yang's
THE WAR ON NORMAL PEOPLE ? Well, part of it is that he is my favorite candidate to date (as a proponent of Universal Basic Income
(UBI) since 2015 , there is nothing particularly illogical
or contradictory about that). His rational, common sense positions on a bewildering amount of issues help. But what really impressed
me is a Twitter post that highlighted his familiarity with the work of Peter Turchin:
At this point, it was obvious that reading the rest of THE WAR ON NORMAL PEOPLE would not be a waste of time, even if Yang's campaign
was to otherwise pete out (ha-ha). And good thing I did. While I consider myself relatively well read, especially on "futurist" topics,
I was nonetheless continuously regaled with all manner of original insights and things that I didn't know before.
II
The Yang bio only takes up one chapter. This is a good thing. I don't feel people should be writing about themselves unless they're
over 60, or have done something pretty impressive, or participated in a war or something. Quite the welcome contrast to Obama, who
wrote an entire memoir on the subject at the age of 34.
Yang is highly intelligent. Both of his parents went to grad school, and his father made 69 patents over the course of his career.
His brother is a professor. "Good genes, very good genes." He got admitted to Stanford and Brown. He is obviously well read, and
the literature he reads is K-selected. Apart from Turchin's book, he also cites Yuval Hari (HOMO DEUS) and Martin Ford (RISE OF THE
ROBOTS). After graduation, he worked as a corporate lawyer; as a Silicon Valley businessman; as the CEO of a GMAT prep company;
and lastly, as the director of Venture for America, an NGO that provided training and seed money for aspiring entrepreneurs.
One curious, endearingly personal note is that it seems he was bullied at school:
"Hey, Yang, what's it like having such a small dick? Everyone knows Chinese guys have small dicks. Do you need tweezers to
masturbate?" Most of this was in middle school. I had a few natural responses: I became quite self-conscious. I started wondering
if I did indeed have a small dick. Last, I became very, very angry.
I admit I chuckled a bit at the idea that there
is perhaps
a 6% chance (today's odds on PredictIt) that high school taunts about anatomy might end up playing a role in creating America's
next President. Many of these bullied Asian-Americans tend to become bitter and withdraw into communities such as the SJWs at
/r/azidentity or the Chinese nationalists at
/r/Sino . Yang didn't go down that path. That said, as someone raised
in an Asian-American family, bused tables at a Chinese restaurant as a teen, and who has
maintained strong ties to the wider Asian-American
community, those ideological currents must have influenced him to at least some extent.
His father immigrated from Taiwan. Geopolitics regardless, many Taiwanese-Americans are very proud of Chinese progress. The early
base of Yang's support was predominantly Asian-American, and I was told that many of his earliest foreign fans were Chinese. I have
a friend who was slightly acquainted with Yang before he became famous, and he confirmed
my impressions – based on the
exclusively positive mentions
of China on his Twitter, and his website – that Yang is a strong Sinophile. As we saw with Trump and Russia – or for that matter,
with Gabbard and Syria – being unseemingly friendly with or even just objective towards countries that have been declared strategic
competitors, rivals, or enemies of the US isn't all that great for your political capital. You heard it here first: If Yang somehow
wins the Dem nomination, the possibility of a "Chinagate" cannot be excluded. III
As Yang recounts it, his travels throughout America opened his eyes to the yawning gap between the flourishing coasts and its
depressed hinterlands. From the chapter "Life in the Bubble":
We joked at Venture for America that "smart" people in the United States will do one of six things in six places: finance,
consulting, law, technology, medicine, or academia in New York, San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, or Washington, DC.
Other parts of the book consist of depressive travelogues about cities in the Rustbelt, with their abandoned malls, dilapidated
infrastructure, brain drain, opioid epidemics, and casinos filled with people who probably shouldn't be gambling.
So he is quite aware of the distinction in outcomes between the "Belmont" and "Fishtown" of Charles Murray's
COMING APART (for a summary, see " Trump's
America " in The Wall Street Journal).
Moreover, I am reasonably sure that Yang is more or less directly familiar with Murray's thesis:
Think of your five best friends. The odds of them all being college graduates if you took a random sampling of Americans would
be about one-third of 1 percent, or 0.0036. The likelihood of four or more of them being college graduates would be only about
4 percent. If that described you, you're among the educated class (even without necessarily knowing it; in your context, you're
perfectly normal).
This argument that America is developing into a meritocratic caste system is directly lifted from COMING APART, as is the "bubble"
metaphor used to describe its Brahmins. E.g., see Charles Murray's
Bubble Quiz .
Today, thanks to assortative mating in a handful of cities, intellect, attractiveness, education, and wealth are all converging
in the same families and neighborhoods. I look at my friends' children, and many of them resemble unicorns: brilliant, beautiful,
socially precocious creatures who have gotten the best of all possible resources since the day they were born.
I imagine them in 10 or 15 years traveling to other parts of the country, and I know that they are going to feel like, and
be received as, strangers in a strange land. They will have thriving online lives and not even remember a car that didn't drive
itself.
They may feel they have nothing in common with the people before them. Their ties to the greater national fabric will be minimal.
Their empathy and desire to subsidize and address the distress of the general public will likely be lower and lower.
That pretty much cinches it. "Assortative mating" isn't the sort of term that everyone throws around; although it is a biological
term, its popularization in sociology was led by Murray and other "HBD realists." While I understand and sympathize that these people
are generally "unhandshakeworthy", and hence uncitable by someone running for the Dem nomination, I think it is legitimate to think
of THE WAR ON NORMAL PEOPLE as the solutions set to the problems posed by COMING APART.
IV
Here are some of the main problems and challenges that Yang talks about:
1. Automation . I won't go on here at length, as this has already been widely covered in the media. I recommend Martin
Ford's book RISE OF THE ROBOTS, or at least this 15 minute
video , for a full treatment. But the basic thing to take away is that automation is coming for many jobs, and it won't just
be manufacturing ones this time round. Some things that struck me as noteworthy:
There are now less than 400 NYSE floor traders, down from 5,500. Legal review: Humans have 60% accuracy, AI already at 85%. Friend
of Yang's who works in a ride-sharing company says that according to internal projections, half of all rides will accrue to autonomous
vehicles by 2022.
This will eliminate jobs in truck driving, the ride-sharing sector (Uber, Lyft, etc.), and more and more repetitive cognitive
white-collar work.
2. Unsatisfactory jobs . There will be jobs to take the place of automated ones, but these will be low productivity jobs
with lower salaries (which will further incentivize companies to automate them away). Perhaps uniquely for a politician, Yang is
sympathetic to people who can no longer be bothered to pull themselves up by the bootstraps, as conservative orthodoxy dictates.
Imagine a 21-year-old college dropout who is not excited to make sandwiches at Jimmy John's and prefers his gaming community.
You could say to him, "Hey, this Jimmy John's job could go places. Sure you make $8 an hour now. But maybe if you stick with it
for a few years you could become a manager. Eventually, you could make $35,000 or so if you really excel and are willing to work
long and hard hours, including waking up at 5 a.m. to slice up tomatoes and cucumbers every morning, and commit to it." The above
is possibly true. Or, the retail district around his Jimmy John's could shrink and a management job might never open up. Or Jimmy
John's could bring in an automated system that gets rid of cashiers and front-of-house staff two years from now. Or his manager
could just choose someone else.
3. Video games . This explains why NEETs like the above have turned to video games; young men without college degrees now
spend 75% of the time they used to spend working with gaming. This is easy, because the marginal cost of video games is near zero;
as Yang sagely points out, they are an "inferior good" in economic terms. However, he also notes – as a onetime gamer – that while
playing games for hours on end might seem "sad", their satisfaction level is high, especially relative to their low social status
and high rates of unemployment.
4. Disability . More and more people, especially discouraged workers, are entering the disability rolls. This is an understandable
reaction to the loss of good jobs. However, since most disability applications are more or less fake – rates have been soaring, even
as the rate of workplace accidents plummets – this encourages a culture of dishonesty, and disincentivizes people from rejoining
the workforce since they would then lose their disability "basic income." There are no solid ways to disprove some common ailments,
so getting a note from a doctor is relatively easy. This is a way of life for many depressed rustbelt communities.
5. Other social maladies . These include:
Abandoned malls creating derelict no-go zones. The poverty of communities left behind by falling manufacturing employment, soon
to be repeated on an even bigger scale as automation takes off. Rising white middle-aged mortality, in which he cites
Case & Deaton's research . He is woke to
the opioid crisis: " Many of the deaths are from opiate overdoses. Approximately 59,000 Americans died of drug overdoses in
2016, up 19 percent from the then-record 52,404 reported in 2015. For the first time, drug overdoses have surpassed car accidents
as the leading cause of accidental death in the United States. " I assume he's likelier to make progress on it
than Kushner
. " An army of drug dealers in suits marketed addictive opioids to doctors, getting paid hundreds of thousands to do it.
"
V
In the final "problems"-related chapter, he mentions the work of Russian-American biologist/historian Peter Turchin, one of the
founders of cliodynamics, a new multidiscplinary field that aims to mathematize the cycles of history*.
In his book Ages of Discord, the scholar Peter Turchin proposes a structural-demographic theory of political instability based
on societies throughout history. He suggests that there are three main preconditions to revolution:
(1) elite oversupply and disunity,
(2) popular misery based on falling living standards, and
(3) a state in fiscal crisis.
Most of the variables that he measures began trending negatively between 1965 and 1980 and are now reaching near-crisis levels.
By his analysis, "the US right now has much in common with the Antebellum 1850s [before the Civil War] and, more surprisingly,
with France on the eve of the French Revolution." He projects increased turmoil through 2020 and warns that "we are rapidly approaching
a historical cusp at which American society will be particularly vulnerable to violent upheaval."
Turchin isn't one of those "doomers" who have predicted all ten of America's past zero collapses since he began predicting.
But he
did predict the rise of Islamic State in Iraq back in 2005 :
Western intrusion will eventually generate a counter-response, possibly in the form of a new theocratic Caliphate (War and
Peace and War, Penguin, 2005).
And he predicted that populism and social instability in the US would increase through to the 2020s. This was well before either
Trump or Sanders came on the radar.
So given this impressive predictive record, it's certainly worth listening to what Turchin has to say.
In addition to Turchin's analysis, Yang also mentions that there will be racial ressentiments:
A highly disproportionate number of the people at the top will be educated whites, Jews, and Asians. America is projected to
become majority minority by 2045. African Americans and Latinos will almost certainly make up a disproportionate number of the
less privileged in the wake of automation, as they currently enjoy lower levels of wealth and education.
and suggests that SJW policing of speech will complicate frank discussions of these problems:
Contributing to the discord will be a climate that equates opposing ideas or speech to violence and hate. Righteousness can
fuel abhorrent behavior, and many react with a shocking level of vitriol and contempt for conflicting viewpoints and the people
who hold them. Hatred is easy, as is condemnation.
This could set the stage for RACE WAR NOW as economic dislocations produced by automation further turbocharge preexisting trends
towards inequality and polarization:
After the riots, things continue to deteriorate. Hundreds of thousands stop paying taxes because they refuse to support a government
that "killed the working man." A man in a bunker surrounded by dozens of guns releases a video saying, "Come and get your taxes,
IRS man!" that goes viral. Anti-Semitic violence breaks out targeting those who "own the robots." A white nationalist party arises
that openly advocates "returning America to its roots" and "traditional gender roles" and wins several state races in the South.
Incidentally, I would say that this explains the context behind Yang's "whites will shoot up Asian-Americans in another generation"
video .
VI
Yang's signature issue is UBI, so it makes sense that he devotes two entire chapters to the topic. Despite its current association
with libertarians, crypto evangelists, NEETS, gamers, digital nomads, and various other eccentrics who have only begun spawning on
a reasonably large scale these past 1-2 decades, it was once much more mainstream**.
It's hard to fathom now, but the idea of a guaranteed annual income was mainstream political wisdom in the United States in
the late 1960s and early 1970s. Medicare and Medicaid had just been passed in 1965, and the country had an appetite for solutions
for social problems. In May 1968, over 1,000 university economists signed a letter supporting a guaranteed annual income. In 1969,
President Nixon proposed the Family Assistance Plan, which would provide cash benefits of about $10,000 per family and serve as
a guaranteed annual income with some eligibility requirements; this bill was supported by 79 percent of respondents polled at
the time. The Family Assistance Plan passed the House of Representatives by a wide margin -- 243 to 155 -- but then stalled in
the Senate due to, of all things, Democrats who wanted an even more robust plan.
But then the Reagan Revolution rolled out, economists produced (now discredited) studies that UBI depressed work hours and increased
the divorce rate, and the general public lost interest.
The literature that Yang has amassed tells a different story. He mentions a study by Evelyn Forget (2005) in Canada, who found
the effect on work to be "minimal." The only groups of people that worked substantially less were new mothers and teens, which seems
to be a perfectly fine outcome. There was also a rise in high school graduation rates, a reduction in hospital visits, less domestic
violence, and fewer cases of mental illness. Another study by Akee on Native Americans who got basic income from casino earnings
found that children became more conscientious and agreeable.
I was genuinely surprised to learn that there is one major country that has already adopted UBI: Iran. During the 2011 reforms,
it eliminated inefficient food and gas subsidies, and replaced them with basic income of $16,000 per year. ( Strictly speaking,
this is not quite accurate on Yang's part; this is far too much for a middle-income country like Iran, and as I subsequently confirmed,
$16,000 is their basic income NORMED to US standards, i.e. what Americans would get under a scheme that drew on a similar share of
the national income ). But in any case, there was apparently no reduction in hours worked. I don't know what effect it had on
Iranian economic productivity, and Yang doesn't go into it. I would imagine that doing such analyses on the Iranian economy would
be complicated by the relative opacity of its national accounts, as well as by the (much larger) economic shocks created by US sanctions
over this past decade.
Either way, the general picture – so far as we can say based on the limited UBI experiments to date – is that they don't have
much effect either way on employment or GDP, but they do increase happiness and general welfare. But in any case, when the current
President thinks it is very normal to mark Easter with an economic growth update
perhaps it is time to stop worshipping the latest quarterly GDP figures, as was suggested by Simon Kuznets in 1934, the inventor
of the GDP:
economic welfare cannot be adequately measured unless the personal distribution of income is known. And no income measurement
undertakes to estimate the reverse side of income, that is, the intensity and unpleasantness of effort going into the earning
of income. The welfare of a nation can, therefore, scarcely be inferred from a measurement of national income as defined above.
In Yang's vision, the size of American UBI – the "Freedom Dividend", as he calls it – will be $12,000 for each American aged 18-64,
subsequently indexed to inflation. This is just above the current poverty line of $11,700.
But will it be affordable?
An analysis by the Roosevelt Institute of this $12,000 per year per adult proposal found that adopting it would permanently
grow the economy by 12.56 to 13.10 percent -- or about $2.5 trillion by 2025 -- and it would increase the labor force by 4.5 to
4.7 million people. Putting money into people's hands and keeping it there would be a perpetual boost and support to job growth
and the economy. The cost would be about an additional $1.3 trillion per year on top of existing welfare programs, most of which
would be folded into the plan, as well as increased taxable revenue and cost savings.
The cost of $1.3 trillion seems like an awful lot. For reference, the federal budget is about $4 trillion and the entire U.S.
economy about $19 trillion. But there are myriad ways to pay for it. The most sensible way to pay for it in my view would be with
a value-added tax (VAT) -- a consumption tax -- that would generate income from the people and businesses that benefit from society
the most.
A VAT would result in slightly higher prices. But technological advancement would continue to drive down the cost of most things.
And with the backdrop of a universal basic income of $12,000, the only way a VAT of 10 percent makes you worse off is if you consume
more than $120,000 in goods and services per year, which means you're doing fine and are likely at the top of the income distribution.
This counters one of the central "leftist" arguments against UBI – that it is regressive, and falls disproportionately on the
poor. Sure, they'll be paying 10% more for most goods and services. But their income will also increase by at least 50%, and by around
100% if they work part-time. It will be rich consumers who lose out.
For people who consider this farcical, consider the bailouts that took place during the financial crisis. You may not recall
that the U.S. government printed over $4 trillion in new money for its quantitative easing program following the 2008 financial
collapse. This money went to the balance sheets of the banks and depressed interest rates. It punished savers and retirees. There
was little to no inflation.
This one is for the inflation bears.
VII
While UBI is the mainstay of Yang's policy platform, he has many other excellent ideas, which he elucidates in the three final
chapters.
1. Raise government worker retirement packages, with President getting $4 million per year . This is to be coupled with a lifetime
prohibition on making money from their office through speeches, etc.
I very strongly agree with this, and have proposed this on many occasions in the past as well. Admittedly, I was talking about
Russia, but it really applies to any country. Politicians and bureaucrats get less money than businessmen, even though they are often
just as talented. This is a truism nigh well everywhere. This makes them resentful. Many of them want to close the gap. In the more
corrupt countries, they do that directly, from pressuring companies to "contribute" to their family's accounts (at best) to directly
"raiding" successful companies and stealing from government accounts. In less corrupt countries, they tend to be slaves to lobbyist
interests, on the unspoken understanding that they would be rewarded for their service once out of office (this describes the US).
I suppose that in a few countries they might genuine "servants of the people" but the number of such countries isn't all that high.
As it is, the only country that I am aware of that runs similar policies is Singapore, where Ministers get close to $1 million
per year. As a high IQ authoritarian state, it is able to resist populist demotism.
2. Stop corporate welfare . This one, I wager, would play well with both Bernie and Trump supporters:
Here's an idea for a dramatic rule -- for every $100 million a company is fined by the Department of Justice or bailed out
by the federal government, both its CEO and its largest individual shareholder will spend one month in jail. Call the new law
the Public Protection against Market Abuse Act. If it's a foreign company, this would apply to the head of the U.S. operation
and the largest American shareholder. There would be a legal tribunal and due process in each case. The president would have the
ability to pardon, suspend, shorten, or otherwise modify the period or sentence. The president would also have the ability to
claw back the assets of any such individual to repay the public.
3. Education realism . He notes that while tertiary enrollment is rising, its efficiency is falling.
That is, only 59 percent of students who started college in 2009 had completed a bachelor's degree by 2015, and this level
has been more or less consistent the past number of years. For those who attended private, selective colleges, this number will
seem jarringly low; the same number at selective schools is 88 percent. Among schools with open admissions policies the rate is
only 32 percent, and among for-profit universities the six-year graduation rate is 23 percent.
This is inevitable. Only 25% of students
can benefit from a university education, as there is only so much space on the right hand side of the IQ bell curve. Only choice
is to fail more and more students, to lower standards, or to abandon the fiction that everyone is suited for university.
While Yang can't exactly couch it in such terms, he is – unlike the increasing number of Democrats agitating for free college
– obviously woke to the Education Question:
(a) Administrative staff at US universities is blooming, and they are passing on the costs to the captive student market. Meanwhile,
they use their tax exempt status to run hedge funds.
One way to change this would be a law stipulating that any private university with an endowment over $5 billion will lose its
tax-exempt status unless it spends its full endowment income from the previous year on direct educational expenses, student support,
or domestic expansion. This would spur Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Princeton, MIT, Penn, Northwestern, and others to spend billions
each year directly on their students and expansion within the United States. There could be a Harvard center in Ohio or Michigan
as well as the new one they just opened in Shanghai.
Incidentally, describing the Ivy League colleges as hedge funds with a university attached is something that Ron Unz has also
done, though his solution was to suggest forcing Harvard
to eliminate its fees .
(b) He talks of the need for more vocational training and apprenticeships.
(c) Massive open online courses (MOOCs) are largely ineffective. While I wasn't expecting miracles, I was still surprised to learn
that Udacity's course completion rate is only around 4%. They are not a panacea.
(d) He is especially hard on government "retraining" programs for displaced workers:
The reality is more often displaced workers spending government funds or racking up debt at the University of Phoenix or another
for-profit institution in desperate bids to stay relevant and marketable.
In particular, he agrees that "learn to code" is useless advice for the vast majority of these people. They would be better off
with a UBI.
4. Mandate "serenity" settings for smartphones and social media . Currently it's a pain to get notifications settings down to
a manageable level. Would be good to have an all-in-one option.
5. Social credits . No, this is not the quasi-totalitarian Chinese scheme to coercively promote good behavior. This is similar
to a thing called "time banking", which are already exisiting voluntary associations in the US where people get credits within communities
by performing useful tasks, e.g. minor home repairs, walking dogs, etc. The idea is to have the government allocate these credits
towards solving some major problem, e.g. "100 million DSCs to reduce obesity levels in Mississippi", and let normal people sort out
the details in a more efficient way than bureaucrats could dictate. Apart from the direct benefits, it should also help people feel
more useful and enhance life satisfactino. I am not fully convinced having the government being involved in this is such a good idea,
but I will reserve judgment until I learn more about it.
6. Primary care doctors helped by AI in healthcare . This will also help keep costs down, and lessen the strain on overworked
doctors.
Martin Ford, the author of Rise of the Robots, suggests that we create a new class of health care provider armed with AI --
college graduates or master's students unburdened by additional years of costly specialization, who would nonetheless be equipped
to head out to rural areas. They could help people monitor chronic conditions like obesity and diabetes and refer particularly
hairy problems to more experienced doctors. Call them primary care specialists. AI will soon be at a point where technology, in
conjunction with a non-doctor, could offer the same quality of care as a doctor in the vast majority of cases. In one study, IBM's
Watson made the same recommendation as human doctors did in 99 percent of 1,000 medical cases and made suggestions human doctors
missed in 30 percent of them. AI can reference more cases than the most experienced physician while keeping up to date with the
latest journals and studies.
In return for a less hectic pace and greater freedom to focus on patients as opposed to paperwork, doctors will need to take a
salary hit:
What's required is an honest conversation in which we say to people who are interested in becoming doctors, "If you become
a doctor, you'll be respected, admired, and heal people each day. You will live a comfortable life. But medicine will not be a
path to riches. On the bright side, we're not going to burn you out by forcing you to see a million patients a day and fill out
paperwork all the time. We're going to supplement you with an army of empathetic people equipped with AI who will handle most
routine cases. We'll only call you when the case genuinely requires distincthuman judgment or empathy. We want you to become the
best and most human version of yourself, not Dr. Speed Demon who can bang out a nine-minute appointment. Let's leave that to Watson."
VIII
It should be blindingly obvious, but yes, Yang is really the only US Presidential candidate that interests me at this point in
time. I consider his policies to be head and shoulders above those of any other candidate. Note that many of his other great ideas,
such as banning robocalls, regulating social media as a public utility, and promoting nuclear power are not even in this book. The
one mostly blank spot on his policy agenda – admittedly, a very big one – is his stance on foreign policy.
In my view, Yang correctly identifies that a war is being waged on "normal people." And he has a battlefield strategy – a mixture
of paternalistic technocracy and capitalism with a human face – that has at least some chance of turning the tables.
I mean look, here is the situation come 2020:
1. An orange man turned POTATUS whose foreign policy agenda is set by neocons and AIPAC, and who has gone from calling for a Wall
to calling for millions of LEGAL immigrants to work in factories that will soon be swept away by automation. Yang, at least, will
favor cognitively elitist immigration, i.e. which actually creates
tons of value and will continue to be viable in the age of automation.
2. A vomit-inducing brew of Establishment globalists, SJW-appeasing identity politicians, bland corporate stooges, Russiagate
conspiracy theorists, and "liberal interventionists" who call Christians "
Easter worshippers ." Sure, there's one other decent
candidate there, but she doesn't seem to have policies between foreign policy and has a <1% chance of getting elected, while Yang
has at least a distant shot at it.
3. While I like people such as Tucker Carlson, the problem is that he is not running. It doesn't seem that there will be any challenger
to Trump from the Dissident Right. Fortunately, there is no great contradiction, as Yang and Carlson also seem to like each other.
Furthermore, while both Yang and Carlson are concerned with automation, the Freedom Dividend is clearly a better and more adaptive
policy than the latter's Neo-Luddism.
Most likely, Yang will not win the Dem nomination, and will fade from the scene by this time next year. (Just like Audacious Epigone,
I bet on Kamala Harris on PredictIt). This does not mean he will fade from history. Automation isn't going anywhere, and pressure
for UBI will continue to build up (and not just in the US). It is reasonable to posit that Yang will continue to serve as a figurehead
for it within the US. However, at the rate that "contradictions" are piling up in US society, it is unclear if it will come about
in time to prevent mayhem.
The choice is essentially to cut and run or to stand and fight. We must convert from a mindset of scarcity to a mindset of
abundance. The revolution will happen either before or after the breakdown of society. We must choose before.
On the off chance that Yang actually makes it, I hope this book review will convince at least a few people into helping bring
that about and launch fully automated luxury cyborg space human capitalism.
** I also learned that Thomas Paine was a fan, writing in 1796: Out of a collected fund from landowners, "there shall be paid
to every person, when arrived at the age of twenty-one years, the sum of fifteen pounds sterling, as a compensation in part, for
the loss of his or her natural inheritance, to every person, rich or poor."
Karlin, how do you reconcile your support for UBI with your equally strong support for the Putin entitlement reform?
"But the basic thing to take away is that automation is coming for many jobs, and it won't just be manufacturing ones
this time round."
Stagnant productivity for eight years and counting. This is not just a problem unique to Russia, Brazil, Italy, etc.
"is clearly a better and more adaptive policy than the latter's Neo-Luddism"
I actually find Tucker much more Woke than UBI advocates. The central challenges of our generation are basically not about
GDP, though more is helpful. Like Ron Unz, I support free college, though obviously for a small minority.
